4 Free Ways to Start Travel Hacking and Earn Your First Free Trip

You’ve seen the highlight reels on Instagram.

Someone booked a first class flight for only $5.60. Someone else stayed at a luxury resort for free. And according to the caption, all it took was opening a few credit cards and earning the sign-up bonuses.

Travel hacking can absolutely help you take trips you might not otherwise afford. But when you’re first getting started, it can also feel overwhelming.

There is so much information out there. Points. Miles. Transfer partners. Airline alliances. Hotel programs. Credit card rules. Suddenly what looked simple on social media starts feeling a lot more complicated.

And if you’ve spent years using a debit card, cash, or maybe just one credit card for everyday purchases, the idea of opening multiple new cards can feel intimidating. Maybe you’re not ready for that step yet. Or maybe you just want to understand how all of this works before diving in.

The good news? You do not need to open a new credit card to start your travel hacking journey.

There are several completely free ways to start building points and miles using things you likely already do: ordering coffee, taking rideshares, shopping online, or simply signing up for loyalty programs.

These strategies won’t earn you a first class flight overnight. But they will help you start building the habits and accounts that make travel hacking work long term.

This guide breaks down four simple, free ways to get started. No credit card applications required. No complicated systems. Just simple steps that quietly build your points and miles over time. And, when you’re ready to open that credit card? We’ve got you there, too.

Why start with free travel hacking methods?

Before diving in, it helps to understand what’s happening behind the scenes.

Airlines, hotels, and travel companies all want loyalty. They want you booking directly, choosing their ecosystem, and coming back again next time. So even if you’re not spending huge amounts of money, there are still ways to earn rewards.

That means you can start collecting points and miles before opening a new card or learning advanced strategies.

Think of these four steps as building your foundation.

And if you’re completely new to this and wondering how people earn enough points for nearly free travel in the first place, start with our post on travel hacking for beginners. That gives the bigger picture. This post is about taking your first steps.

Join loyalty programs

This sounds simple, but creating loyalty accounts is one of the easiest ways to start travel hacking, and it’s something a lot of people overlook.

If you’ve ever booked a flight or hotel, you’ve probably been prompted to create an account and skipped it because it felt like one more username and password to keep track of. But those loyalty programs are how airlines and hotels track your activity and reward repeat customers.

Even if you only travel occasionally, those points and miles can add up over time.

And when you’re eventually ready to redeem points for a flight or hotel stay, you’ll need an account anyway because that’s where your reservations, balances, and rewards live. You might as well start earning now instead of waiting until you have enough travel planned to think about it.

It’s likely you already have preferred airlines or hotel brands. Maybe your home airport makes one airline more convenient than others. Maybe you prefer a certain hotel chain. Or maybe your employer requires you to book with specific providers for work travel.

For us, flying out of a United hub naturally means we lean heavier into United. Your setup may look completely different.

But one of the biggest ways to maximize points and miles is staying flexible, especially when you’re first starting out. Having accounts across multiple airlines and hotel programs gives you more opportunities to earn rewards, take advantage of promotions, and eventually redeem points when one option works better than another.

If you’re just getting started, these are the loyalty programs we’d recommend creating accounts with:

• American Airlines – AAdvantage
• Delta Airlines – Skymiles
• Southwest Airlines – Rapid Rewards
• United Airlines – MileagePlus
• Hilton Hotels – Hilton Honors
• Hyatt Hotels – World of Hyatt
• Marriott Hotels – Marriott Bonvoy

Now there are others (like KLM, Flying Blue, etc.) that may need to be created once you get more into the points and miles game. These are especially important when you begin looking to transfer points from credit cards for your redemptions. But creating these accounts first will give you a good starting point with providers you’ve likely used in the past.

Do you need to actively use all of them? No.

But having the accounts means that when opportunities come up, whether it’s a random hotel stay, a work trip, or a promotion offering bonus points, you’re earning something instead of nothing. That’s a pretty easy first step.

Link partner programs

One of the easiest ways to start earning points and miles is by linking loyalty accounts to programs you may already use.

This is one of those travel hacking strategies that sounds almost too simple to matter. Ordering coffee, taking an Uber, or using Lyft isn’t going to earn enough points for a free trip overnight.

Those small amounts add up. And if the choice is between earning nothing and earning something, I’ll take the points.

The nice thing about partner programs is that most are truly a “set it and forget it” situation. You link the accounts once, and after that, your normal spending starts earning rewards in the background.

Starbucks and Delta Airlines – earn miles for every $25 you reload on your Starbucks account. We haven’t flown Delta in years, but this is a no effort way to accrue miles we might need in the future. Is this method going to earn you a free flight quickly? Not unless you’re spending thousands at Starbucks each month. It will, however, start building up your stash of points that you can top off when needed. Sign up here: link Starbucks & Delta.

Uber / Uber Eats and Marriott – another set it and forget it way to earn points. Simply link your Uber account to your Marriott account and earn points for free nights. If you take a ride on an Uber XL, Uber Comfort, Uber SUV, and Uber Black, you will earn 3 Marriott Bonvoy points per dollar spent on the ride. Members with linked accounts earn 2x Marriott Bonvoy points on eligible restaurants. That number jumps to 6x, however, when the food is delivered to any restaurant in the Marriott portfolio.

Lyft and Choose Your Preferred Provider – Lyft offers users the ability to link with Delta Skymiles, Hilton Honors, Alaska Airlines, or Bilt Rewards. You can only pick one of the four to earn points on from your Lyft purchases. While some programs earn more points than others, it’s important to pick the program you most likely will use. It’s no good accruing points with a provider you have no use for!

• Delta – 1 mile per dollar on all rides and 2 miles per dollar on airport rides
• Hilton – 3 points per dollar
• Alaska – 1 mile per dollar
• Bilt – 2 points per dollar with an additional 3 Bilt points per dollar if you have a Bilt Mastercard
• United – up to 4 miles per dollar on eligible rides. This is the one I have linked because we’re loyal to United as residents of Chicago (a United hub)

If you already spend money at Starbucks, use rideshare occasionally, or order food delivery, linking loyalty programs is an easy way to start building balances without changing your habits.

Will these strategies earn a luxury resort stay by themselves? Obviously not. But combined with everything else in this post, they help get you started earning points and miles.

Install shopping portals

If you shop online, and let’s face it, most of us do, then installing a shopping portal is one of the easiest ways to start earning extra points and miles. When you visit a website that is eligible for the portal, a notification will pop up and you simply have to activate. Shop as normal and receive points or miles a few days later. Here are some options of shopping portals:

Rakuten – Rakuten is popularly known as a cash back site. If you have an American Express card, however, you can earn Membership Rewards points for future travel. Rakuten also started partnering with Bilt in 2025, giving you access to earn points with partners like Hyatt. While some sites are as low as 1% cash back, Rakuten frequently has elevated deals throughout the year (often around holidays) on many popular sites like Petsmart, Adidas, and Macy’s.

The four major U.S. airlines (United, American, Delta, and Southwest) all have their own shopping portals. Because we fly out of a United hub, we have the United shopping portal installed on our browser.

We would suggest you install Rakuten and an airline shopping portal so that you have options. Not every website has Rakuten or your selected airline, so having at least two shopping portals installed will let you compare the points. If we only had Rakuten, we’d be missing out!

This is also one of those strategies where the points quietly add up in the background. You order dog food. Buy back-to-school clothes. Replace something around the house.

Months later, those random purchases become meaningful balances.

If you want a deeper breakdown of how shopping portals work and the ones we use, read our full post on online shopping portals.

Because if you’re looking for free ways to start travel hacking, this is honestly one of the easiest places to begin.

Set up auto pay (for the right categories)

Now you likely already have auto pay set up on your credit cards for your regular bills. But in many cases, you may only be earning 1 point per dollar depending on the credit card you have selected for that payment.

Take a look at the cards already in your wallet and compare the earning categories. For example, our Chase Sapphire Preferred earns 3x points on streaming services. So naturally, things like Netflix go there because if we’re paying for it anyway, we might as well earn more than 1 point per dollar.

But not everything falls into a bonus category.

Our internet bill is a good example. Some recurring charges just don’t earn elevated rewards on many cards. For those expenses, we typically use our Chase Freedom Unlimited because it earns at least 1.5x points on everything.

We value Chase Ultimate Rewards points, so even when something doesn’t fit into a specific category bonus, we’re still earning more than the standard baseline.

That means things like:

• internet bills
• recurring subscriptions
• random household expenses
• autopay charges without elevated categories

You do not need a spreadsheet tracking every recurring payment or constantly moving charges around.

The goal is simply asking: “Can I earn something more than 1 point per dollar?”

Because over time, those small optimizations become hotel nights. Flights. Or the extra points you need to top off an account for a redemption. This is also one of the reasons people eventually move into more intentional card strategies. Different cards reward different spending categories.

Look at the cards you already have. Check the earning categories. Move a few bills if it makes sense. Then stop thinking about it and let the points accumulate.

Summary

We all see the posts of people flying first class or staying at luxury resorts entirely on points. And while travel hacking can absolutely help you take trips you might not otherwise afford, most people don’t start there. Most people start by creating loyalty accounts, installing shopping portals, linking partner programs, or realizing the credit card already in their wallet could be earning more on everyday purchases.

The reality is that earning points and miles is often less about one big strategy and more about stacking a lot of small ones over time. If you’re ready to start travel hacking but aren’t ready to open a new credit card, start with one of the four steps in this post. None of them cost anything, all of them take only a few minutes to set up, and together they can help you build the foundation that eventually turns into free flights, hotel stays, and trips that once felt out of reach.