The Citi Strata Elite Card offers an industry-leading 12X ThankYou Points on hotels, car rentals and attractions when booked exclusively through the Citi Travel portal. This high earn rate is complemented by an annual $300 hotel benefit for stays of 2+ nights, making it a powerful tool for maximizing travel rewards.
How useful are Citi ThankYou points?
Citi ThankYou Points are highly flexible and transferable to partners like American Airlines, Qatar Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Flying Blue, Asia Miles and LifeMiles.
Can you reliably find the accommodation you are looking for on the Citi Travel Portal?
Compared to Booking.com, I find the Citi Travel Portal to be the second best (better than Capital One, Chase and Amex Travel Portals) when it comes to finding accommodations in remote places (e.g., Norway, Greenland and Patagonia).
However, I come across the “just missed it” message quite often when searching the Citi Travel Portal. I will be staying at the famous Eqi Glacier Lodge during my trip to Ilulissat in September. It costs around $1500 per night and I ended up using Booking.com and missed out on 12X Citi ThankYou points (see image below).
Patagonia Accommodation Options
The vast Patagonia region of Chile (Torres del Paine National Park) and Argentina (Los Glaciares National Park) has several properties ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars a night (e.g., the all-inclusive Explora properties in Torres del Paine and El Chalten and others like Awasi and Tierra Patagonia).
If you are a big spender and staying at the premium properties mentioned above, it will be worthwhile to look for them on Citi’s Travel Portal and pay with the Strata Elite card to earn 12X points.
I am planning to book the Destino Sur hotel in El Calafate and Hotel Rio Serrano in Torres Del Paine National Park for my 2027 trip (see images below).
My Citi Strata Earnings since January 2026
Citi’s Strata Elite posts 12X points to your account as quickly as the charge is posted to your profile. While it is unavoidable to spend a lot of money on accommodations at some destinations (e.g., Greenland), it is great to earn 22K Citi ThankYou points at the same time for a $1900 hotel booking (see image below).
Do not use Citi Strata Elite to pay for non-Citi travel portal hotel bookings
I typically use Citi Strata Premier or Chase Ink Preferred to earn 3X points for non-Citi travel portal hotel bookings (e.g., Booking.com), since Strata Elite earns only 1X points for these purchases (premium credit card master comparison).
Is Citi’s Strata Elite a lifetime keeper card?
I can easily use the $200 splurge credit (buy Amazon gift cards from BestBuy) and $300 hotel credit every year. I have unexpectedly also enjoyed the $100 Blacklane credit twice since I opened the account last year. This premium card ($595 annual fee) pretty much pays itself off with these 3 credits and I am planning to keep it long-term for the time being.
Conclusion
I am happy to see that Citi Strata Elite beats the premium credit card competition by offering 12X points earnings for hotel bookings on their portal. I am excited to earn 12X points by booking hotels for my upcoming Greenland, Africa and Patagonia trips.