Hyatt World of Hyatt Award Chart Adds 5 Pricing Tiers
Hyatt is changing how many points a free night can cost under World of Hyatt, starting in May 2026, and the shift matters most for travelers who plan aspirational redemptions, and anyone trying to predict point needs from the published chart. Hyatt will expand award pricing inside each hotel category from three bands to five, Lowest, Low, Moderate, Upper, and Top, while keeping fixed point thresholds instead of moving to fully dynamic pricing. Hyatt says existing reservations booked before the switch will be honored at the price booked, even if the stay is after the change, which creates a real decision window for anyone sitting on a high value booking, or a shortfall they can still close.
World of Hyatt Award Chart Changes Start in May
The practical change is a wider spread between the cheapest and most expensive nights inside the same hotel category. Under the new structure, a top end Category 8 standard room can price as high as 75,000 points per night at the Top level, up from 45,000 points at Peak pricing under the current chart. At the other end, Hyatt is also creating some lower floors, which means a subset of off peak style nights can drop, but the bigger traveler facing story is that the ceiling rises sharply on the nights people most often want, and that makes point budgeting less predictable at the property level.
Hyatt is also pairing the chart update with two member facing enhancements it says are coming later in 2026, digital points sharing between members, and earlier access to award night availability for select elite tiers and Hyatt credit cardmembers. Those are meaningful quality of life upgrades, but they do not change the core tradeoff of the new five band structure, more pricing precision for Hyatt, and more variance for members.
Who Gains Value, and Who Gets Squeezed
If a traveler mainly redeems at mid tier properties, or on shoulder dates, there is a plausible path to paying fewer points on the new Lowest band nights, and Hyatt has signaled that only a limited number of hotels will move a limited number of nights into Upper and Top in 2026. In other words, some people will see small wins early, especially if their travel is flexible enough to chase the lowest priced nights.
The travelers most exposed to higher costs are the ones who redeem where cash rates spike, premium leisure dates, marquee city weekends, holiday periods, and events where occupancy compresses. Those are exactly the nights where programs tend to push pricing upward, and the new bands give Hyatt more room to do that without changing the hotel's category number. For business travelers using points to blunt high cash rates, the shift can also reduce the "escape hatch" value of points on high demand weekdays, even as hotel supply expands in some markets. A good example of why supply and demand matters here is Nashville's development pipeline story, where more rooms can soften rates in pockets, but compression nights still hit hard. See: Nashville Hotel Boom Opens Window for Business Rates.
What Travelers Should Do Before the Switch
Travelers with a specific Hyatt redemption in mind should treat this as a booking window, not a wait and see. If you can book a target stay now at a price you are happy with, locking it in before the May 2026 switch reduces the risk that your exact dates migrate into Upper or Top pricing later, and Hyatt says those reservations will be honored as booked. If you are short on points, this is also the moment to decide whether buying points, shifting spend, or moving flexible travel dates is worth it, because the gap between "good enough" and "ideal weekend" redemptions may widen.
If you are flexible and not chasing a specific property, the smarter move can be to wait until the new bands are live and then shop for Lowest or Low nights that undercut today's off peak pricing, but only if your trip can move. Under the five tier system, the savings opportunity is real, but it is more like airfare shopping, you are hunting for a band that fits, rather than assuming the standard chart will hold on most nights.
Finally, plan for the points sharing feature as a timing lever later in 2026, not as a fix you can rely on today. Hyatt currently has a manual transfer process, and it has confirmed the intent to make sharing digital later this year, but it has not published a specific go live date. If a family redemption depends on pooling points, assume the existing process and lead time until Hyatt publishes the new workflow.
Why Hyatt Is Doing This, and How It Changes Planning
Hyatt is trying to preserve the marketing advantage of a published award chart while getting closer to demand based pricing behavior. The mechanism is simple: five price bands let Hyatt push peak dates higher, and pull true low demand nights lower, without reclassifying the entire hotel into a higher category. That helps Hyatt manage perceived stability, because category changes feel like permanent devaluations, while band movement can be framed as seasonal, and hotel specific.
For travelers, the second order effect is that "fixed chart" no longer means "predictable trip cost" at the calendar level. You still have hard caps and floors per category, but the range is wider, and that pushes planning toward earlier booking, more date flexibility, or a willingness to substitute properties. It is the same systems dynamic that shows up in other lodging sectors, where inventory certainty matters as much as price, and when a supplier tightens control over its levers, travelers who plan late often pay more. If you want a broader lodging stability lens, see: What Sonder's Collapse Means for Apartment Hotels.