3 things to know about using Hilton Honors points for concert and festival tickets

We talk a lot about redeeming points specifically for travel here on TPG, and with good reason — points are typically most valuable when redeemed for flights or hotel stays. However, there are other options that can get you a decent return for points, especially if you don’t plan on traveling much for the foreseeable future.

Hilton allows you to book certain experiences — including music festivals and concerts on Ticketmaster and Live Nation — with your Hilton Honors points. There are two main ways to do this, either through Hilton experiences or through Ticketmaster or Live Nation, but the value you can vary.

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Here’s what you should know if you might want to turn your Hilton points into experiences.

You can book Hilton Experiences with points

You can go through the Hilton Honors Experiences portal to book select events with your points.

At the time of writing, many of what I’d consider the top pick events were sold out or no longer available — including Music Midtown. But there are still a few festivals you can grab tickets to, including EDC in Las Vegas and Orlando. It’s likely that more will be added over time.

Event packages are redeemable for a set number of points, and how much value you can get per point varies.

You can sometimes get a good return for your points

As an example of the value you can get when redeeming Hilton points in this manner, for the EDC festival in Las Vegas, you can redeem 100,000 Hilton points for a general admissions access package for two people. If you buy a three-day general admission pass outright, you’ll pay $379 plus taxes and fees per person. So you’re getting at least .76 cents per point for the pair of tickets. For the mid-tier experience package, you’ll actually get closer to .9 cents per point in value.

Considering TPG currently puts Hilton Honors points at .6 cents per point in our monthly valuations, it’s not a terrible deal at all.

Of course, you can often squeeze more than .6 cents per point in value depending on where you book your hotel stay, but if you aren’t planning on traveling and want to attend these events, it is worth considering.

Related: Ways to maximize Hilton Honors redemptions 

You can “pay with points” with Ticketmaster and Live Nation — but probably shouldn’t

You can also connect your Ticketmaster, Live Nation and Hilton accounts to use your points to book concerts and other events through those sites.

Simply log into your Ticketmaster account, go to settings, hit connected accounts and you should see a button to connect your Hilton Honors account. Once connected, you can use your points to pay for part or all of your Ticketmaster purchases.

However, while this seems like a good idea, it actually isn’t a great value for your points in our tests.

You’ll have more options for which events you can use points toward, but the redemption rate is subpar. For 500 Hilton points, you’re only getting $1 in value — that’s .2 cents per point and far lower than TPG’s valuation for Hilton points.

But if you have a stash of Hilton points to burn and no travel planned in the foreseeable future, this is an option for music and festival fans looking to redeem points, but it’s not a great one.

Instead, we recommend keeping an eye on the Hilton Honors Experiences page to see if some events or activities that align with your interest and points balance become available.

Featured photo by Flashpop/Getty Images.