Why a Targeted Offer Made Me Reconsider the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant (and Its $650 Fee)

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I never thought I’d be considering the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant again.

We ditched this card back in 2023, right around the time the annual fee jumped to $650. Not because the card was “bad,” but because it felt like work. The value math depended on keeping up with monthly credits, and I didn’t want yet another card where I had to remember to use a benefit every single month just to do better than breaking even.

And then American Express did what American Express does… it sent me an upgrade offer that made me stop scrolling and start doing math.

(If you want the full rundown of the card’s perks beyond the bonus, here’s our review of the Bonvoy Brilliant.)

The current public welcome offer (and the fine print reality)

The public offer I’m seeing right now is:

• 100,000 Marriott Bonvoy points after spending $6,000 in the first 6 months.

And, as usual, the terms include a long list of ways you might not be eligible for that welcome offer—especially if you’ve had certain Marriott cards (including a bunch from Chase) recently, or received a bonus/upgrade offer in the last 24 months.

The upgrade offer that’s tempting me

Instead of applying for a new card, I received an upgrade offer for my legacy Marriott Bonvoy Amex with a slightly different structure (and a higher spending requirement):

• 85,000 bonus points after spending $6,000 in 6 months (from the upgrade date), plus
• One bonus Free Night Award after spending an additional $3,000 (for $9,000 total) in those same 6 months.

So the tradeoff is pretty clear:

• The public offer gives you more points for less spend.
• The upgrade offer gives you fewer points, but adds a potentially valuable Free Night Award if you can hit the bigger spend.

And there’s one more reason the upgrade route is appealing: it helps me avoid the whole “pop-up jail” stress. With a new application, there’s always that chance Amex decides—at the very last second—that you’re not eligible for the bonus after all. An upgrade offer is generally much more straightforward: if the offer is attached to your account and you accept it, you’re not sitting there wondering if you’ll get hit with a surprise “actually… no bonus for you” message.

The redemption that’s pushing me toward “yes.”

Here’s the real reason I’m even considering this.

I have a Marriott stay coming up where I could use 85,000 points for a night that would otherwise cost $476.

That means my redemption value would be:

• $476 ÷ 85,000 points = ~0.56 cents per point

Is that the “best” use of 85,000 Marriott points? Probably not.

But it is a very real use. It turns an out-of-pocket expense into a points booking on a night I actually want. And that matters more (to me) than squeezing out a theoretical max value that requires a destination, hotel, or travel date I don’t even need.

So… is 0.56 cents per point good?

In a vacuum, 0.56 cpp isn’t a jaw-dropping redemption. With Marriott’s dynamic award pricing, you’ll sometimes do better—especially when cash rates spike, during events, or at higher-end properties where paid rates get silly.

But “good value” depends on what you’re comparing it to.

If the alternative is paying $476 cash for the same night, then using points at ~0.56 cpp can still be a perfectly reasonable move—especially if it helps you keep cash in your pocket for the rest of the trip.

The part that could make this upgrade a legitimately good deal

The sneaky value here isn’t the 85,000 points. It’s the bonus Free Night Award.

If that Free Night Award is usable up to 85,000 points, it could cover a night that would cost far more than $476—depending on where and when you use it. And if you’re strategic, that free night can be the thing that turns an “ehhh” upgrade into a “okay, fine, you got me” upgrade.

In other words:

• If I redeem 85,000 points for a $476 night, that’s a solid but not spectacular value.
• If I also redeem the 85K Free Night Award for a night that would have cost $600, $700, or more? Now the upgrade starts looking a lot more attractive.

And there’s an added bonus angle for us: if I earn this Free Night Award, we could potentially pair it with the 85K Free Night Certificate my wife gets from her Ritz-Carlton card and turn it into a two-night stay at a genuinely nice (a.k.a. “fancy”) hotel—without having to burn a pile of points or pay two nights of cash rates.

Why I still don’t love this card long-term

Even if I take the upgrade, I haven’t forgotten why we canceled before.

The Brilliant can be a “coupon book” card. You can absolutely make the annual fee hurt less—if you consistently use the monthly dining credits and actually value the other perks. But I don’t love the feeling of having to manage another set of monthly reminders to justify a premium annual fee.

The good news is that an upgrade doesn’t have to be forever. If the bonus is the main reason you’re doing it, you can always reassess later and downgrade back to a lower-fee option.

My take: Is the upgrade worth it?

This is one of those classic Your Mileage May Vary situations.

Under normal circumstances, I’m not sure I’d be excited about upgrading to a $650-a-year card again. But right now, we’re a little boxed in with Marriott. Between the cards we already have (personal and business), there aren’t a ton of easy opportunities to score a truly large stash of Marriott points without jumping through hoops.

That’s why this upgrade offer is suddenly a lot more interesting than it would be on paper:

• I already have a stay in mind where the points will be genuinely useful.
• I’ve got a large expense coming up, which makes hitting the spending requirement a lot easier (without forcing spend).
• And with the 85K Free Night Award, we can potentially book a two-night stay at a fancy hotel—precisely the kind of redemption that makes this feel less like “chasing a bonus” and more like “solving a real travel cost.”

So while this offer might be a “maybe” in other situations, with the timing lining up this well, it’s looking like a pretty good idea—at least for now.

Final Thought

I still don’t love the idea of paying $650 every year for the privilege of tracking monthly credits. But if an upgrade bonus helps cover a stay I already have planned—and the Free Night Award saves me even more on a second night—this might be one of those rare times where the math makes the Brilliant… actually brilliant.

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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary