Unmatched by any other airline loyalty perk, the Southwest Companion Pass can make every flight you take into a buy-one-get-one-free deal. Once you earn the pass, you can use it for the rest of the calendar year — and all of the following year — to bring along a designated buddy every time you fly, nearly free of cost.
Whether you designate your spouse, child, or even a business partner, a Companion Pass can save you thousands of dollars a year on airfare.
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How to qualify for the Southwest Companion Pass
To qualify for a Southwest Companion Pass, you must fly 100 one-way flights or earn 135,000 qualifying points in a calendar year.
However, the many ways to get the Companion Pass by earning 135,000 qualifying points aren’t always simple. You can earn them by flying, spending money on Southwest credit cards, or through partners. Nearly every Rapid Rewards point you earn will count toward your Companion Pass. The key word there is nearly — there are a few ways you can get Rapid Rewards points that don’t add to your tally toward the Companion Pass, which we will talk more about later.
What matters for the Companion Pass is how many points you’ve earned in the year, not how many points you have in your account. Once you have earned 135,000 points in the calendar year, Southwest will award your Companion Pass.
How to earn a Southwest Companion Pass with a credit card welcome bonus
There’s one strategy that many people — especially those who don’t fly a ton — use to earn a Southwest Companion Pass quickly: signing up for new Southwest credit cards. The three Southwest-branded consumer cards and the two business cards typically offer tens of thousands of points as sign-up bonuses. These bonuses count towards the 135,000 points needed to earn a Southwest Companion Pass.
Bonus offers vary throughout the year, but they typically start around 30,000-40,000 points and require you to spend a minimum amount on your new card within a set period of time. For example, the consumer cards currently offer 40,000 bonus points and $400 after spending $3,000 in the first four months of account opening. Meanwhile, the Southwest Rapid Rewards® Performance Business Credit Card offers 80,000 points after spending $5,000 within the first three months of account opening.
You could qualify for a Southwest Companion Pass faster by earning the 40,000-point bonus for a new personal card and an 80,000-point bonus for a new business card.
When deciding whether it’s worth it for you to apply for a new credit card, keep these things in mind:
- These cards have annual fees ranging from $69 to $199.
- Chase limits how many of its credit cards you can get approved for in a two-year period.
- Southwest limits how many bonuses you can earn from personal cards in a two-year period.
- Earning these bonuses is only rewarding if you spend within your budget and pay off your entire balance each month. Once you start accruing interest, the cost tends to outweigh the perks. This goes for all credit card rewards programs.
Credit card bonuses other than the sign-up bonus also count toward the Southwest Companion Pass, such as:
- Anniversary bonuses: All the Southwest cards offer a little gift each year, ranging from 3,000 to 9,000 points, depending on the card.
- Refer-a-friend bonuses: When available, you may be able to earn points by having a friend sign up for a new Southwest card using a customized referral link. A recent bonus offer awarded 25,000 points each for up to four referrals.
- Southwest credit card holders get a 10,000-point Companion Pass boost each year (these points are not redeemable for flights).
Other ways to earn more points toward a Southwest Companion Pass
Credit cards aren’t the only way to earn a Companion Pass without flying. Other ways to earn those “companion qualifying points” include:
- The Rapid Rewards Shopping portal: From groceries to clothing to electronics, you can accrue points for every purchase you make by clicking through Southwest’s shopping portal to your favorite online retailers. Watch for larger bonuses for services such as meal delivery plans or media subscriptions.
- Hotel stays: Book a room through either Southwest Hotels, major hotel partners, or Rocketmiles and earn bonus rewards. On Southwest Hotels, look for Rapid Rewards Points Plus properties for bonuses — sometimes, you can snag tens of thousands of points this way.
- Rapid Rewards Dining: Register a credit card to earn up to three Rapid Rewards points per dollar spent at participating restaurants. This is in addition to any points you may earn for spending on a Southwest credit card.
- Other partners: Browse the partners page on Southwest’s website or app for partners ranging from car rentals to flower delivery to utilities to opinion surveys.
- Special promotions: Periodically, Southwest lists promotions on the website and app for opportunities to earn bonus points by completing a spending target or other activities. The offer will specify whether the points earned will count toward the Companion Pass.
What won’t earn you points towards the Southwest Companion Pass
There are a few activities that can add Rapid Rewards points to your account but — sadly — don’t count toward your Companion Pass tally:
- Purchased points
- Points transferred from other Southwest members
- Transfers from programs like Chase Ultimate Rewards.
Sometimes Southwest runs promotions where activity that normally wouldn’t count toward the Companion Pass suddenly does count for a limited time. You need to register for these promotions on your Southwest account to get that benefit.
The best time to earn the Southwest Companion Pass
Remember, a Southwest Companion Pass is good for the remainder of the calendar year in which you earn it, plus the entire following calendar year. That makes January the best time to earn your Companion Pass. If you earn the pass in January 2025, it will be valid for all of 2025 plus all of 2026. Of course, if you are relying on flying or credit card spending on a Southwest credit card to earn the pass, it might take you most of the year to get there.
Those who have their hearts set on earning nearly two years of BOGO flights by getting it early in the year usually focus on the opportunities to earn a lot of points at once: mainly credit card sign-up bonuses, with some help from Points Plus hotel properties and referral bonuses.
If you earned a Southwest Companion Pass last year, you should decide in January if you want to earn it again by Dec. 31 in order to extend your privileges by a single year or if you want to earn it as early as possible starting next January. If you choose the latter strategy, you’ll have a gap of a few weeks or even months between when your current pass expires and the new one begins. On the upside, waiting to earn the pass will give you more months of benefits overall.
Those who want to earn a Southwest Companion Pass next year can actually start their efforts late in the current year by applying for a new credit card in November but waiting until January to complete the spending requirement. The sign-up bonus will be posted in January, and if you have enough rewards, you’ll earn the Companion Pass.
But be careful! If you pursue this strategy. It’s recommended not to get too close to the spending goal in the current year. If you accidentally hit the goal early and trigger the sign-up bonus, the points will be credited in the current year and won’t count toward next year’s Companion Pass. Companion Pass points do not carry over from year to year: Your counter will reset at 0 on January 1.
How the Southwest Companion Pass works
Once you earn 135,000 points, Southwest will email you their congratulations, and your Rapid Rewards account will show how long the pass is good for.
Now, the fun begins! The first thing you can do is designate your companion. Choose carefully because you can only change your companion three times per calendar year. Designating your first companion doesn’t count as one of those three changes. You can call Southwest to give them your companion’s name, or — a recently added feature — you can add them to your account online. Either way, make sure to provide your companion’s Rapid Rewards number at the time.
Once your companion’s name shows up on your account, you can begin adding them to flights. This is easy to do. First, book the flight for yourself and any other paid passengers. When buying the ticket, do not buy a ticket for your companion.
Once the flight is purchased, click on the reservation on the website or app. You’ll see an image of a plus sign with the words “add companion.” Once you click that, Southwest will show you the taxes and fees you owe for the companion’s seat, which starts at $5.60 each way. Hit “continue,” and the next screen will show your companion’s name and Rapid Rewards number (which should already be in the system). Pay the fees, and your companion will have a seat on the flight.
You can even wait until the last minute to add a companion — and since the flight is free (except for taxes and fees), you don’t need to worry about last-minute price increases. As long as there is a single seat available on the plane, you can add your companion.
You can also cancel your companion’s seat online without affecting your own reservation.
There are a few nuances to managing travel with a companion that aren’t immediately obvious:
- You can’t change your reservation with a companion attached. So if you decide, for instance, to move up your departure time, you’ll need to cancel your companion’s reservation, make the change, and then add the companion again.
- You can only have reservations for one companion at a time. Say, for instance, that you have two children, and you want to fly with Child A in February, Child B in June, and Child A again in September. You can book all three flights for yourself in advance. But if Child A is your current reservation as a companion, you won’t be able to add Child B to your June flight until after you change your companion from Child A to Child B. And if you had already reserved Child A for that September flight at this point, you’d have to cancel their reservation before changing your companion to Child B. Because of all these complications, some Companion Pass holders prefer to wait until closer to flight time to add their companion.
- Your companion cannot fly free without you. This may seem obvious, but it sometimes happens that the Companion Pass holder has to cancel their flight, but the companion still needs to get to their destination. In that case, you would have to purchase a ticket for the companion.
Frequently asked questions about the Southwest Companion Pass
How does the Southwest Companion Pass work?
Once you have earned the Southwest Companion Pass, it’s good for the rest of the year, plus the following calendar year. On each flight you book, you can bring a companion for only the cost of taxes and fees.
How many points do you need to earn the Southwest Companion Pass?
You need to earn 135,000 Rapid Rewards points in the calendar year to earn the Companion Pass.
When is the best time to earn the Southwest Companion Pass?
The best time to earn the Companion Pass is early in the year so that you have access to it for nearly two full years.
How many times per year can you change your designated companion for Southwest?
You can change your companion for the free flight with the Southwest Companion Pass up to three times per year.
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