The Hilton Aspire card saved me more than $400 on food, checked bags, and oceanfront cabanas on my birthday trip to Aruba

• The Hilton Honors Aspire Card from American Express has a high annual fee of $450, but you'll get perks like airport lounge membership, Hilton Diamond status, up to a $250 resort credit, up to a $250 airline fee credit, and a free weekend night each year.
• With up to $500 in travel credits and plenty of other perks, this card can provide excellent value if you can put the benefits to good use.
• For my 40th birthday trip to Aruba last year, the Hilton Aspire card's statement credits and elite status benefits saved me more than $400 on food, checked bags, and oceanfront cabanas.
• See Business Insider's list of the best travel rewards credit cards.

While I don't normally get very excited about hotel credit cards, the Hilton Aspire card from American Express provides an exception. I originally signed up for this card in 2018, and I got a ton of value out of it during my first cardmember year. But I also scored a ton of value out of my cardholder benefits for the subsequent cardmember year as well. In fact, the card paid for itself over the course of just one trip to Aruba, thanks to its various statement credits that saved me money on food, checked bags, and more.

Keep in mind that we're focusing on the rewards and perks that make these credit cards great options, not things like interest rates and late fees, which will far outweigh the value of any points or miles. It's important to practice financial discipline when using credit cards by paying your balances in full each month, making payments on time, and only spending what you can afford to pay back.

Hilton Aspire card basics

In case this card isn't on your radar, there are a ton of reasons to consider signing up. The Hilton Aspire starts you off with 150,000 Hilton Honors points after you spend $4,000 on purchases within three months of account opening. You also earn 14x points on eligible Hilton purchases, 7x points on flights booked directly or through AmexTravel.com, car rentals booked directly, and US restaurants, and 3x points on other purchases.

There's a $450 annual fee, but this card provides you with myriad perks that are worth more than the annual fee. For starters, you'll get Priority Pass Select airport lounge membership.

You also receive the following annual benefits:

• up to a $250 airline fee credit for your chosen airline each year - this is only good for incidental fees such as checked baggage, in-flight refreshments, and flight change fees, not for actual airfare
• up to a $250 resort credit - this is only good for select Hilton resort properties, which you can browse through on this page
• a free weekend night every year you have the card (including the first year)

Other perks include automatic Hilton Diamond status and a $100 credit at select Waldorf Astoria and Conrad Hotels and Resorts.

Simply put, signing up for this card can be a lucrative proposition. Priority Pass Select membership is worth $429 since the equivalent membership you can buy, a Prestige membership, retails for that amount. The free weekend night you get each year is easily worth several hundred dollars depending on where you stay, and the $500 in airline and resort credits are extremely generous.

Here's how I got value out of these credits and other cardholder benefits last year.

Click here to learn more about the Hilton Aspire card »

I used my resort credits for food the Hilton Aruba Caribbean Resort & Casino

For my 40th birthday, I was really craving a beach vacation. As a result, I redeemed 80,000 points per night for five nights at the Hilton Aruba Caribbean Resort & Casino. Since Hilton Honors allows a fifth night free when you book with points, I was able to stay six nights for free in total.

Both my husband and I have the Hilton Aspire card, so we used our Hilton resort credits for lunch delivered to us directly at the beach. We also used our $250 resort credits for tropical drinks at the hotel bar. I love the fact that the Hilton Aspire card automatically applied these credits to my bill. I didn't even have to call and ask!

I really like the fact that the Hilton Honors program waives resort fees when you pay with points as well, so our stay at this property was "free" other than money we spent on site. To be fair, we did run up a significant bill for food over the week since it was my birthday and we weren't trying to be cheap, but our $250 resort credits did soften the blow.

I also paid for an oceanfront cabana

I also used part of my resort credit to pay for an oceanfront cabana for several days of our trip. You can score free cabanas if you wait in line, but this was my 40th birthday trip! I wanted to wake up in the morning and head to my shaded beachfront cabana without any hassle or stress, so this money was well spent.

This property has a dedicated beach services website that lets you reserve beachfront cabanas and pick where you want to be ahead of time, so I took advantage. I also got a 25% discount off of cabana rentals for being a Hilton Diamond member, which brought the cost down to around $30 to $40 per day (cabana rental pricing varied by location).

My Hilton Honors Diamond status came in handy, too

Speaking of my Hilton Diamond status, I really love this perk and the fact it is offered as a cardholder benefit without any spending requirements. At the Hilton Aruba, Hilton Diamond status qualified us for a $12.50-per-person food credit we could use however we wanted.

That meant we had $25 per day to spend on breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Food was fairly expensive at this property, so it didn't go far, but it did help us keep us save $150 over our six-night stay.

Read more: Credit cards that offer hotel elite status

I used my airline credit for checked bags and in-flight food

Finally, I used my airline fee credit to pay for four checked bags on the way to Aruba and four checked bags on the way home. At $30 per checked bag, that is a $120 benefit for each direction of our trip, and a $240 benefit in total.

We did not check two bags each for our trip, by the way. We traveled with my best friend and her husband, so we offered to pay for their checked bags since I had this credit on my Hilton Aspire card.

As a side note, I also used part of my credit for a $8.99 snack basket on my way to Aruba. That was totally worth the splurge since this charge was erased from my account.

Bottom line

If you're looking for a hotel credit card with a ton of perks, it's hard to beat the Hilton Aspire. That's especially true if you travel and stay in Hilton properties a few times per year. It certainly proved to be a game-changer on my 40th-birthday trip to Aruba, saving me money with the various credits and also upgrading my experience thanks to the complimentary Hilton Diamond elite status.

Click here to learn more about the Hilton Aspire card »

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