Marriott elite standing affords some spectacular advantages to frequent vacationers. However the perks get significantly compelling when you accrue not less than 50 elite nights in a calendar yr. At this level, you will unlock Marriott Platinum Elite standing, however you will additionally get the power to choose a Marriott Annual Alternative Profit.
You possibly can choose one Marriott Annual Alternative Profit while you attain 50 elite nights in a calendar yr and one other while you get to 75 elite nights.
In the event you accrued not less than 50 elite nights with Marriott Bonvoy throughout 2025, the deadline for choosing your Alternative Profit is Feb. 1. So, this is what it’s best to learn about deciding on Marriott Annual Alternative Advantages, together with the out there choices and tips on how to make the only option on your upcoming journey.
Marriott Annual Alternative Profit overview
You earn a Marriott Annual Alternative Profit while you accrue 50 elite nights in a calendar yr. Then, you will earn a second Annual Alternative Profit after reaching 75 elite nights in a calendar yr. Nevertheless, the Alternative Advantages choices differ between the 2 tiers.
How one can choose your Marriott Annual Alternative Profit
To pick out your Annual Alternative Profit(s), go to this web page on Marriott’s web site. It’s essential to register to your Marriott Bonvoy account to decide on your profit.
You possibly can’t change your choice when you make it, so select correctly. In the event you’re eligible for a 50-night and a 75-night profit, you have to choose your 50-night profit earlier than you may choose your 75-night profit.
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When to pick out your Marriott Annual Alternative Profit
In the event you accrued 50 or 75 elite nights in 2025, you have to choose your Annual Alternative Profit(s) by 11:59 p.m. EST on Feb. 1. In the event you do not make your choice(s) by the deadline, Marriott will mechanically select Nightly Improve Awards for you.
How one can earn Marriott Bonvoy elite nights
Incomes 50 or 75 elite nights in a calendar yr could sound daunting. Nevertheless, Marriott gives a number of methods to earn elite nights. You will earn elite nights at taking part Marriott manufacturers while you ebook immediately with Marriott — even when redeeming Marriott factors or utilizing a free evening award certificates.
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You can too earn elite evening credit with choose Marriott Bonvoy bank cards. You possibly can earn as much as 25 elite evening credit every year with a Marriott shopper card and an extra 15 with a Marriott enterprise card. Some Marriott playing cards even provide extra elite evening credit while you hit particular spending thresholds.
Lastly, it is value noting that you have to attain the relevant elite evening thresholds to unlock a Alternative Profit. Though the Marriott Bonvoy Good® American Specific® Card comes with automated Platinum Elite standing so long as your account stays open, that does not qualify for a profit choice.
Nevertheless, the Marriott Bonvoy Good card does provide an identical profit — the Good Earned Alternative Award — that cardholders earn after spending $60,000 on eligible purchases with their Bonvoy Good card in a calendar yr. Good Earned Alternative Awards — which you have to choose by Feb. 1 of the yr following the spending — embody a alternative of 5 Nightly Improve Awards, a free evening award value as much as 85,000 factors, 50,000 Marriott Bonvoy factors or $1,000 off a mattress from any Marriott Bonvoy retail model. The low cost on a mattress buy is just out there in case you earned your Good Earned Alternative Award based mostly on spending in 2025 or earlier than, although.
Associated: Why you want each a private and enterprise Marriott Bonvoy bank card
50-night Annual Alternative Profit choices
You will unlock your first Marriott Annual Alternative Profit while you accrue 50 elite nights in a calendar yr. Your choices for the 50-night profit earned by way of nights in 2025 are as follows:
- 5 elite evening credit
- 5 Nightly Improve Awards
- $1,000 off a mattress
- $100 charity donation
- Reward Marriott Silver Elite standing to a different member
Most of those advantages are troublesome to worth, so let’s study every possibility extra carefully. I will begin with the choices which are unlikely to make sense for many elite members.
Reward Marriott Silver Elite standing
Giving standing to another person would possibly initially sound like possibility. Nevertheless, Marriott Silver Elite standing is not value a lot, as the first perks are a ten% factors bonus on paid stays and precedence late checkout.
As an alternative of utilizing your Marriott Alternative Profit to reward standing, you could possibly encourage your pal or member of the family to earn Marriott standing by way of a bank card. For instance, major cardholders of the no-annual-fee Marriott Bonvoy Daring® Credit score Card (see charges and costs) get automated Silver Elite standing and 5 elite evening credit every calendar yr as a cardholder perk.
Give a $100 charity donation
You possibly can choose a $100 donation to a number of charities — together with UNICEF, the World Wildlife Fund and the Arne M. Sorenson Hospitality Fund — as your Marriott Annual Alternative Profit.
The $100 charity donation is a pleasant contact and might be the correct resolution if you cannot use some other Annual Alternative Profit choices. Nevertheless, I would want to earn factors and miles by donating to a charity of my alternative and keep my potential to pick out one of many different advantages.
Associated: How one can donate your factors and miles to charity
Get $1,000 off a mattress
In the event you love the mattress at a selected Marriott model, you should buy a brand new one on your dwelling. In the event you’re available in the market for a Marriott mattress, you may choose a promo code value $1,000 off the total retail worth for mattresses and field springs from choose Marriott manufacturers as your Annual Alternative Profit.
Nevertheless, you may’t mix the one-time $1,000 low cost with different affords. Due to this fact, test whether or not the promo code affords enough worth in comparison with different reductions to justify its choice.
Obtain 5 elite evening credit
Selecting 5 elite evening credit on your Marriott Annual Alternative Profit is sensible for some vacationers. Marriott will put up the elite evening credit to the yr you earned them (which can be completely different from the yr during which you selected them).
Selecting elite evening credit could also be helpful in case you fell 5 or fewer nights wanting incomes Titanium Elite standing or a brand new Marriott Bonvoy lifetime standing throughout the 2025 calendar yr. If you choose 5 elite evening credit to clear the 75-night threshold for Titanium Elite standing, make certain additionally to pick out your 75-night Annual Alternative Profit earlier than the deadline.
Obtain 5 Nightly Improve Awards
Every Nightly Improve Award is legitimate for a one-night advance, confirmable improve to pick out premium rooms and suites designated by every property. For instance, you’d want 5 Nightly Improve Award certificates to request an improve for a five-night reservation.
Many members save their Nightly Improve Award for stays at high-end Marriott Bonvoy properties, whereas others accumulate them for nights they’d like more room. In 2025, I used Nightly Improve Awards to safe a set on the Moxy Glasgow Service provider Metropolis and a one-bedroom suite on the Component Toronto Airport. Nevertheless, take into account that Nightly Improve Awards do not begin clearing till 5 days earlier than your arrival (or three days earlier than arrival for Version, Ritz-Carlton and St. Regis stays).
In the event you go for 5 Nightly Improve Awards as a Alternative Profit, your awards will expire Dec. 31 of the yr following the one during which you earned them. So, in case you reached 50 nights in 2025, your Nightly Improve Awards expire Dec. 31, 2026.
75-night Annual Alternative Profit choices
You will earn Marriott Titanium Elite standing and a second Annual Alternative Profit after incomes 75 elite nights inside a calendar yr. In the event you reached this threshold in 2025, listed below are your decisions:
- 5 elite evening credit
- 5 Nightly Improve Awards
- $1,000 off a mattress
- $100 charity donation
- Reward Marriott Gold Elite standing to a different member
- Free evening award value as much as 40,000 factors
The alternatives listed below are largely the identical as these out there after hitting the 50-night threshold. I will skip over the charitable donation, Nightly Improve Awards and mattress low cost since I’ve already mentioned these choices within the earlier part. Likewise, I will not focus on gifting Gold Elite standing since incomes Marriott standing by way of bank cards is comparatively straightforward.
Nevertheless, let’s take a more in-depth take a look at the opposite two choices.
Obtain 5 elite evening credit
Earlier on this article, I thought-about how some vacationers would possibly choose 5 elite evening credit because the 50-night Annual Alternative Profit to achieve Titanium Elite or lifetime elite standing. Nevertheless, it may additionally make sense for Titanium Elite members to decide on 5 elite evening credit to earn Ambassador Elite standing. This standing usually requires 100 elite nights and $23,000 in annual Marriott spending.
This feature will doubtless solely make sense in case you ended 2025 inside 5 elite nights of a better lifetime elite standing tier or with 95 to 99 elite nights and not less than $23,000 in annual qualifying spending with Marriott.
Get a free evening award value as much as 40,000 factors
The ultimate possibility, distinctive to the 75-night Annual Alternative Profit, is a free evening award value as much as 40,000 factors. This free evening award is barely extra priceless than the 35,000-point free evening award certificates related to lots of the Marriott Bonvoy playing cards.
TPG’s January 2026 valuations say 40,000 Marriott factors are value $280, making this a priceless possibility. Nevertheless, if you have already got numerous Marriott Bonvoy factors and excellent free evening awards to cowl your future travels, you might need to take into account one other profit.
Which Marriott Annual Alternative Profit must you select?
The perfect Marriott Annual Alternative Profit for many loyalists on the 50-night tier is 5 Nightly Improve Awards. On the 75-night tier, the very best Annual Alternative Profit is normally 5 extra Nightly Improve Awards or a free evening award value as much as 40,000 factors. Nevertheless, the 5 elite evening credit could also be an important alternative at both tier in the event that they’d allow you to qualify for the next standing tier.
It’s possible you’ll surprise what I usually choose for my Annual Alternative Advantages. After I earned Titanium Elite standing in 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2025, I picked 5 Nightly Improve Awards (beforehand known as Suite Improve Awards) for my 50-night alternative and a free evening award value as much as 40,000 factors for my 75-night alternative.
Nevertheless, I solely accrued 71 elite nights in 2024. So, I chosen 5 elite evening credit as my 50-night profit to achieve 76 elite nights for 2024, requalify for Titanium Elite standing and procure a 75-night alternative. For my 75-night alternative, I selected 5 Nightly Improve Awards. The free evening award value as much as 40,000 factors was doubtless a extra priceless alternative, however I needed entry to some Nightly Improve Awards since I did not select any as my 50-night profit.
Associated: 5 methods to maximise Marriott Bonvoy award evening redemptions
Backside line
Marriott’s Annual Alternative Advantages are priceless, with ample choices at every threshold. The choices aren’t valued equally, so ensure that to rigorously take into account which profit can be most precious for you earlier than deciding.
In the event you aren’t positive what to decide on, essentially the most priceless possibility on the 50-night tier is normally Nightly Improve Awards. In the meantime, the most suitable choice on the 75-night tier is normally extra Nightly Improve Awards or a free evening award value as much as 40,000 factors. No matter you determine, choose your profit by 11:59 p.m. EST on Feb. 1.
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