6 simple things you can do to earn more miles in 2026
Updated: 8 Jan 2026
Written byAaron Wong
The Milelion
Stop using one card for everything!
While it’s no doubt convenient to use the same card everywhere, it’s also very costly from a miles perspective.
Why? Because there’s no single best card to use everywhere, the best card depends on what you’re spending on, and how you’re spending (e.g. online vs offline, local vs foreign currency). By using the wrong card, you’re leaving miles on the table!
Don’t worry, you don’t have to rush out and sign up for every single card out there. A simple three-card strategy like the one I’m suggesting below would cover a good amount of everyday spending:
-
UOB Preferred Platinum Visa: Use this wherever mobile contactless payments are accepted to earn 4 miles per dollar (mpd), capped at S$600 per calendar month
-
DBS Woman’s World Card: Use for online transactions to earn 4 mpd, capped at S$1,000 per calendar month
-
Citi Rewards Card: Use for online transactions (excluding travel) to earn 4 mpd, capped at S$1,000 per statement month
You basically use the UOB Preferred Platinum Visa for all your in-store spending, and the DBS Woman’s World Card or Citi Rewards Card for online transactions such as shopping, food delivery, and ridehailing.
Collectively, this offers 4 mpd on up to S$2,600 each month. Do this for a year, and you’d have enough miles for a First Class round-trip to Shanghai!
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Specialised spending, not general spending
If there’s one habit you should be building in 2026, it’s to focus primarily on specialised spending cards, and make general spending cards your cards of last resort.
General spending cards, such as the Citi PremierMiles and DBS Altitude Card, offer the same earn rate everywhere. For example, whether you’re dining in a restaurant, buying groceries, repairing your car or shopping online, you’ll earn 1.3 mpd with the DBS Altitude.
Specialised spending cards, such as the HSBC Revolution and Maybank XL Rewards Card, offer bonuses on particular categories of spend. For example, if you’re buying air tickets, ordering food delivery or eating out, paying for streaming subscriptions or booking hotels, the Maybank XL Rewards Card will earn 4 mpd (with a minimum spend of S$500 per calendar month).
It should be quite obvious that someone earning 4 mpd on most of their spending would earn their free vacation a lot faster than someone earning just 1.3 mpd!
Does that mean you don’t need general spending cards at all? Not quite. General spending cards come in useful for categories not covered by specialised spending cards, or when you’ve exhausted the bonus caps for the month. Going back to our XL Rewards Card example, the 4 mpd earn rate is capped at S$1,000 per calendar month, after which it drops to just 0.4 mpd. Beyond that range, you’re better off switching back to a general spending card (or even better- a different specialised spending card!)
So the key is to use specialised spending cards up to their bonus caps, before switching to general spending cards to cover the rest.
Here’s a suggestion of some specialised spending cards you can focus on (be sure to read the T&Cs to see how each category is defined).
|
Card |
Earn Rate |
Remarks |
|
HSBC Revolution |
4 mpd |
For travel, shopping, dining and transport |
|
Maybank XL Rewards Card |
4 mpd |
For travel, shopping, dining and entertainment |
|
UOB Lady’s Card |
4 mpd |
Choose a bonus category: |
|
OCBC Rewards Card |
4 mpd |
For shopping |
|
*Heads up: from 1 March 2025, the cap will be reduced to S$1,000 per calendar month, and the bonuses for travel will be removed |
||
Card | Hot Reward Pick | SingSaver Reward | Minimum Annual Income | Card Benefit | Annual Fee | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | HSBC Revolution Credit Card | S$799 | S$65,000 | 0.4 | No Annual Fee | ||
 | Maybank XL Rewards Card | - | - | S$30,000 | 0.2 - 5 % | S$87.20 | |
 | UOB Lady's Card | - | - | S$30,000 | 0.4 - 10 miles per dollar | S$196.20 | |
 | OCBC Rewards Credit Card | S$499 | S$30,000 | 1 - 15 | S$196.20 |
Focus on earning flexible points
While Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer might be the most popular frequent flyer programme in Singapore by far, it’s not the only option out there.
In fact, last year provided an important lesson about why it’s unwise to put all your eggs in one basket. In November 2025, KrisFlyer devalued its award charts, increasing the cost of most redemptions across its network. While the price hikes were generally in the 5-15% range, and relatively mild compared to what we’ve seen with other programmes, it’s still unpleasant to find the goalposts have shifted!
What’s the best defence against this? Earning so-called “flexible points”, or credit card points with multiple transfer partners, such as American Express Membership Rewards, Citi Miles and ThankYou points, and HSBC points.
For example, HSBC points can be transferred to 20 different airline and hotel programmes. The diversity provides a hedge against a devaluation by any one particular programme.
In contrast, UOB only offers transfers to Asia Miles, Air Asia and KrisFlyer, which leaves you much more exposed.
All this to say: if two cards are matched on earn rates, then what should separate them is points flexibility.
For reference, here’s a summary of each bank and the number of partners it offers.
|
Airlines |
Hotels |
|
|
American Express |
7 |
2 |
|
Bank of China |
1 |
0 |
|
Citi |
10 |
1 |
|
DBS |
4 |
0 |
|
HSBC |
16 |
4 |
|
Maybank |
4 |
0 |
|
OCBC |
6 |
3 |
|
Standard Chartered |
2 |
0 |
|
UOB |
3 |
0 |
Don’t let bill payments go to waste
Over the years, banks have progressively excluded certain categories of spending such as education, insurance premiums, government services and utility bills. Then there’s other categories of payments where credit cards are usually not accepted, such as rental and income tax.
But all these still need to be paid one way or another, and platforms like CardUp, Citi PayAll and Standard Chartered EasyBill allow you to earn credit card points for paying, in exchange for a small admin fee.
For example, you could set up a rental payment with CardUp with your DBS Vantage Card, which earns 1.5 mpd with a 1.79% fee. Each month, CardUp will make a bank transfer to your landlord (he/she doesn’t need to register with the platform), and you’ll pay the equivalent of 1.17 cents per mile.
Now, this only makes sense if you value a mile at more than the acquisition cost, and valuation will differ from person to person, but the general idea is to use as high-earning a card as you have, and look out for promo codes that reduce the fees.
SingSaver x DBS Exclusive Offer
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Minimise conversion costs
It strikes me as a little odd that we’re in 2026, and banks are still charging a flat fee of around S$25 per points conversion - a fee which, incidentally, has very little to do with the actual cost of processing!
A S$25 fee isn’t the end of the world, but it is annoying- and there are ways of minimising it. One easy way is to focus your spending with a bank that pools points together.
For instance, the Citi PremierMiles Card earns Citi Miles, but the Citi Rewards Card earns ThankYou points. These two currencies do not mix, and when the time comes to redeem them, I’ll need to pay one conversion fee for the Citi Miles, and another for the ThankYou points. Likewise, the OCBC 90N Card earns 90N Miles, but the OCBC Rewards Card earns OCBC$, so you’ll have the same issue.
However, all UOB cards earn a standard rewards currency called UNI$, which pools together. When converting points, you’ll only pay a single admin fee. Alternatively, you can consider earning points with HSBC, where not only are points pooled, all conversion fees are waived until further notice!
|
Bank |
Pools Points? |
Remarks |
|
American Express |
Yes |
Membership Rewards points earned on the AMEX Platinum Charge have a preferable transfer ratio to airlines (400 pts = 250 miles vs 450 pts = 250 miles) |
|
Bank of China |
No |
|
|
Citibank |
No |
|
|
DBS |
Yes |
While points are pooled for redemptions, cancelling a card will forfeit all the points associated with that card- so redeem them before cancelling! |
|
HSBC |
Yes |
While points are pooled for redemptions, cancelling a card will forfeit all the points associated with that card- so redeem them before cancelling! |
|
Maybank |
Yes |
|
|
OCBC |
Some |
OCBC has three rewards currencies: OCBC$, 90N Miles and VOYAGE Miles. There is no pooling across different kinds of currencies |
|
Standard Chartered |
Some |
Standard Chartered has two tiers of cards, points pool within but not across tiers
|
|
UOB |
Yes |
✨Get the Apple Upgrade You Deserve✨
Get your dream Apple gadget when you apply for select Citi, HSBC, OCBC, or Standard Chartered credit cards via SingSaver and top up as low as S$220! Valid till 15 January 2026. T&Cs apply.
Don’t miss the double dip
Finally, there are plenty of opportunities to double dip on miles, which means earning miles both from your credit card, as well as the merchant you’re buying from.
I’ve listed some of my favourite examples below:
-
Use Kris+ to pay at participating dining and retail merchants to earn up to 9 mpd extra
-
Book restaurants using Kris+ to earn 100 miles per completed reservation
-
Book activities, attraction tickets, tours and transportation through Pelago to earn an additional 3 mpd (there are monthly offers which boost this rate even further if you book via Kris+)
-
Buy vouchers for shopping, food delivery, groceries, transport and retail through HeyMax and earn Max Miles
-
Pump petrol at Esso to earn Esso Smiles points, which can be converted to KrisFlyer miles (Esso is also a Kris+ partner, so there’s a triple dip opportunity here!)
Conclusion
Earning more miles doesn’t necessarily require spending more (and indeed, it’d be a terrible idea to spend more just so you can earn miles). In most cases, it’s about fixing a few common inefficiencies: using the wrong card, defaulting to general spending cards, locking yourself into inflexible points, or letting large unavoidable payments earn nothing at all.
A small change in behaviour, whether it’s switching cards or looking for double dip opportunities, can compound over time into a meaningful difference.
So pick a few of these habits to work on this year, and your 2026 travel plans will take care of themselves!
About the author
Aaron Wong
Aaron founded The Milelion to teach people how to travel better for less, with credit cards, airline and hotel loyalty programmes. With 500,000 miles flown and counting, he’s keen to debunk the myth that you can’t travel in style without breaking the bank.