What Is the Value of Southwest Rapid Rewards Points?

Southwest Airlines used to have some of the most dedicated fans in the airline business. If you’re sitting on a bunch of hard-earned Rapid Rewards points, you might be wondering how much those points are worth.

Based on our April 2025 analysis, the short answer is this: the Southwest points value is about 1.3 cents each. This is a median value, drawn from real-world data collected on 88 round-trip Southwest flights in 2025.

Our value of 1.3 cents per Southwest point is a median value that can help determine whether a given redemption is "worth it." It is effectively what you can expect to get from your Rapids Rewards points if you use them for a random redemption.

» Learn more: The complete guide to Southwest’s Rapid Rewards program

In March 2025, Southwest switched to dynamic pricing, meaning the value of your points may vary. One award flight might get 1.1 cents per point while another may get you 1.5 cents per point.

Use this Southwest points calculator to determine the cash value of any number of Rapid Rewards points. This is useful when determining the value of a promotion, or when trying to decide whether to use cash or miles to book a flight.

Southwest now also gives travelers the option of booking with a combination of cash and points at checkout, allowing flyers to offset the cash price of the flight with points. Note, however, that this option is not available when searching for flights through the points booking flow.

Because of dynamic pricing, there are now Southwest "sweet spots," redemptions where you may be able to get more than 1.3 cents per point. Based on our analysis, you may be able to get better value with:

• Close-in bookings. Every award booking we analyzed 15 days before departure was at or above the average value of 1.3 cents per point.

• Fare sales. In one example, we saw a 1,000-point discount on a flight that led to redemption value of 1.9 cents per point.

Here's what we found when looking at Southwest point valuations across different booking windows.

• 1.4 cents each when booking 15 days before departure, with a range of 1.3 to 1.5 cents per mile.

• 1.3 cents each when booking 60 days before departure, with a range of 1.1 to 1.4 cents each.

• 1.2 cents each when booking 90 days before departure, with a range of 1.1 to 1.5 cents each.

• 1.2 cents each when booking 180 days before departure, with a range of 1.1 to 1.9 cents each.

One of the easiest ways to amass Southwest points is to get a Southwest credit card and earn its sign-up bonus. Here are some popular options.

Here's how Southwest points' valuation stacks up with other airlines' points.

Despite their middle-of-the-road value, if you’re looking for more adventurous, high-value flight redemptions, like booking international first-class suites, you’re better off looking to other programs that enable more partner redemptions.

Southwest points can only currently be used to book flights with Southwest and one partner airline, Icelandair. This limits the possible flights you could book on points compared to other airlines that are part of airline alliances and have larger route networks.

Southwest Rapid Rewards points offers some value for flyers who mainly travel within North America, but less razzle-dazzle.

» Learn more: How much are my airline miles and hotel points worth?

Southwest used to lead the pack in terms of airline point and mile valuations, hovering around 1.4 or 1.5 cents per point, but not anymore. Part of this is due to Southwest's switch to dynamic pricing.

We analyzed the cash and points prices of 88 round-trip Southwest flights across a range of domestic and international routes. The Wanna Get Away Plus fare class was used for all pricing data to be able to compare the valuations of similar Main Cabin-type fares that are bookable with points or miles on other airlines.

Departure dates were selected at 15, 60, 90 and 180 days from the day of the analysis. Return dates were chosen eight days after the departure date. This process allowed us to analyze a wide combination of days of the week and not bias the data towards expensive (i.e. weekend) or cheaper (i.e. midweek) flights. We used the median value of the dataset as the average.

This method differs from many others in that it looks at real-world redemptions rather than hypothetical, maximized redemptions. The advantage of this approach is that it provides an actual, real-world indication of how much these points are worth on average. That said, it doesn’t take into account the high-value redemptions that points enthusiasts seek.