United Mileage Plus Explorer Card
Welcome Offer
Earn 60,000 United Mileage Plus points after spending $3,000 within your first three months of card membership, plus an additional 10,000 points if you spend $6,000 total win your first six months. Since the pandemic, United has been devaluing its program and we cannot value United miles any greater than 1.20 cents now. Therefore, we value this Welcome Bonus around $720. No annual fee for the first year, $95 thereafter.
Point Accrual
Earn 2x on United purchases, at restaurants and on purchases directly from hotels. Earn 1 mile everywhere else.
Why BestCashCow Likes
Those who fly United and those who can take advantage of the extensive 2x point categories. The card includes 2 United Club passes, free first checked bag and a 25% discount on purchases onboard United or from United at the gate. No foreign transaction fees.
Calculating Your Value
Your Annual Points
With our default spend profile, this card can produce 28,300 points annually, assuming you fly United Airlines airline.
We value these points as high as 1.20 cents per point.
So, you can receive up to $339.60 in value per year.
*This value is only achieved if your airline purchases are on same airline as the card brand.
Calculate New Values
Enter Your Estimated Annual Spend in Each Category to See How this Card Can Maximize Your Reward Earnings
Most Valuable Redemptions
As few as 80,000 United miles can still redeemed on any of its Star Alliance® partners for a one-way business class ticket from anywhere in the US to anywhere in Europe. Star Alliance® partners include Lufthansa, TAP Portugal or Austrian. You may also still be able to redeem 180,000 points for a round-trip business class ticket from the US to Narita, or redeem 30,000 points for an intra-Europe round-trip coach class ticket on a Star Alliance® partner.
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Customer Reviews for United Mileage Plus Explorer Card
Have you found a great redemption from your use of this card that you would like to tell others about. Please share your experience below.
Lisa R
December 6, 2020 |
This is the best of the airline cards at the moment, especially if you live in SF and are locked into United. I know a lot of my girlfriends are dishing on United for making point tickets to Hawaii, but it is still the best airline program out there IMHO! Plus great partners (though not good for getting to France or Spain without flying through Lisbon).
Mike
May 24, 2016 |
I dont really understand why someone would get any kind of card not tied directly to an airline? I tried to cash in points once on another card I had and I had to book my ticket on line through their system and the ticket was pretty expensive so I still wound up paying a fortune for it. I have Chase United card now and 25,000 miles I can get a ticket anywhere in the US. It seems you have to burn through so many more points on general cards than on airline specific cards so by the time you have 50K points, that might just get you one flight on the other system but 2 on United. My question I guess is if you have a United Chase card, it says on the paperwork you can not get another one while you have one. Has anyone tried to sign up for 2 United chase cards just to get the 30K, 50K whatever bonus points and just switch from one card to the next for a while? Thanks! Also Question number 2, what is the cheapest way to get a card that allows you access to lounges anywhere? I dont travel all that much to if you are paying 495 for every card that gives you that it is almost cheaper for me to pay as I go not that I could probably ever pay for a lounge. I know there are a lot of gurus in here so just curious if anyone knows a way to get in there cheaper. Thanks everyone!
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