Program hub
Air India Maharaja Points
The default premium-cabin target after the Vistara merger. The April 2026 award-cost cuts nudged value up; business-class sweet spots still clear ₹1.5+/point.
Nerf risk: watch 2 cuts in 24 months — latest: Jan-2026 lounge cut (moderate)
Expiry: 24 months; any paid Air India or Air India Express flight extends the whole balance another 24 months (award tickets don't count)
Floor = the worst redemption you can always fall back on; ceiling = the best sweet-spot exit. The house value is what a disciplined traveller actually clears.
Every way in
Currencies that transfer in
Ratios read source points : Air India Maharaja Points points, cheapest mint first — the ₹ figure is what one point here costs you via that route.
What a point has been worth
Derived only from quantified, dated events in the tracker — no interpolation, no vibes.
- 10 Jul 2026 ₹0.80 current house value
- 12 Nov 2024 ₹0.80 2024-11-12 — Club Vistara folds into Maharaja Club at 1:1 (changelog event; the modern program's birth). No quantified whole-currency move since: the 2026-04-01 buff states the new floor (domestic awards from 1,500 pts) but not the prior cost, so no percentage can be derived — flat is the honest line even though the trend reads up.
The nerf log
Full tracker →Every tracked event that touches Air India Maharaja Points.
- 1 Jun 2026AU, YES and IndusInd points open transfers to Maharaja ClubAU/YES/IndusInd points locked in closed loops → Maharaja routes: IndusInd Tiger 1:1 (Pinnacle 2:1, Legend 4:1); AU Zenith+ 3:2, other AU cards 6:1; YES Marquee/Reserv 15:1
Three banks joined Air India's transfer roster at once — and the ratios are the whole story. The lifetime-free IndusInd Tiger gets the only honest 1:1 (capped 25k/month); AU Zenith+ lands a genuinely good 3:2 that triples what AU points were worth; everything else — Pinnacle 2:1, Legend 4:1, the AU 6:1 crowd, YES at a punitive 15:1 — is a decoy dressed as a partnership.
- 1 Apr 2026Maharaja Club gets cheaper awards and faster creditingHigher award costs; slow points crediting → Domestic awards from 1,500 pts; credited within 2 hours
A rare buff. Air India's post-merger programme drops domestic award flights to 1,500 points, cabin upgrades to 4,000, credits Star Alliance miles within two hours, and eases Platinum to 60 flights. The transfer target Indian card geeks care about actually got better.
- 10 Jan 2026SBI Card splits domestic lounges into tiers, adds entry feesUniform domestic lounge list, free swipe-in access → Set A/Set B lounge tiers by card, plus ₹2–25 entry charges
From 10 January 2026, SBI Card sorts its domestic lounge network into a Set A (top cards like Club Vistara SBI Card, Apollo SELECT) and a broader Set B (PRIME, Pulse, Titan SBI Card and others) — and bolts on a non-refundable ₹2 authorization charge plus a ₹25 validation hold on every visit. It's marketed as an expansion since more airports are covered, but the fine print is a two-tier system with new friction at the gate, right after SBI had already pulled complimentary air accident insurance six months earlier.
- 1 Apr 2025Amex Platinum Travel kills Flipkart redemption, devalues Taj by 20%Flipkart voucher redemption available; cheaper Taj vouchers → Flipkart gone; Taj vouchers cost ~20% more MR points
From 1 April 2025, Flipkart disappeared entirely as a Platinum Travel Collection redemption option, and Taj vouchers got pricier — a ₹5,000 voucher now costs 12,500 MR points and a ₹10,000 voucher costs 25,000, both roughly 20% worse than before. Amex threw in two new options, The Postcard Hotel and Air India vouchers, but neither matches Flipkart's everyday liquidity — this was the first of two Platinum Travel hits inside 12 months, with the milestone restructure following in March 2026.
- 1 Dec 2024HSBC TravelOne arrives — a 20-partner airmiles cardNo mainstream HSBC airmiles card in India → ₹4,999 card, 4X travel/forex, 1:1 to Avios & KrisFlyer
HSBC's serious play for Indian miles chasers: 4 points per ₹100 on flights, travel aggregators and forex, and instant 1:1 transfers to British Airways and Qatar Avios plus ~20 airline/hotel partners including KrisFlyer and Air India — all from the app. A genuine sub-₹5k alternative to Atlas. (Welcome-offer window opened 1 Dec 2024.)
- 12 Nov 2024Vistara flies its last; Club Vistara becomes Maharaja ClubClub Vistara (Vistara) → Maharaja Club (Air India), points 1:1
Vistara's final flight was 11 November 2024. Over 4.5 million Club Vistara members — and the single most-loved transfer target for Indian card points — folded into Air India's Maharaja Club at 1:1. The premium-cabin sweet spots Indian miles chasers plan around all moved house overnight.
- 1 Mar 2024Amex Gold Card's Karat Collection catalogue gets thinner18K/24K Gold Collection vouchers at pre-2024 values → Vouchers cut ~₹1,000 each, ~13-14% value erosion
The Gold Card's flagship redemption catalogue hadn't been touched since 2022, and on March 1, 2024 Amex quietly trimmed the value of its 18K and 24K shopping vouchers by roughly ₹1,000 apiece. A couple of new retail partners got added as cover, but the math is simple: 13-14% less value for the same points. Vistara gift cards had already vanished from the catalogue in late 2023 — a preview of the direction of travel.
- 3 Jan 2024Axis Vistara card cuts CV Points on govt and utility spendsGovt services & utility bills earned CV Points normally → Govt services & utility bills earn zero CV Points
From January 3, 2024, Axis Bank's Vistara-branded cards stopped awarding Club Vistara points — and stopped counting toward milestone benefits — for government services and utility bill payments. It was the second cut to the Vistara card lineup in four months, arriving right after the September 2023 transfer-ratio squeeze, and it closed off one of the easiest manufactured-spend categories loyalists used to hit their milestone thresholds.
- 11 Jul 2023IDFC First and Club Vistara team up on a travel credit cardNo IDFC First travel card tied to an airline programme → Club Vistara IDFC FIRST Card: CV Points, lounge, golf perks
IDFC FIRST Bank, Club Vistara and Mastercard announced a new co-branded travel card on July 11, 2023, bundling CV Points earning with lounge access, golf benefits and trip-cancellation cover. It was a modest entrant next to the HDFC and Axis Vistara cards already in market, but it gave IDFC First — still building out its premium lineup — a genuine travel-rewards product for the first time.
- 23 Mar 2023HDFC launches Regalia Gold, a new super-premium travel cardRegalia topped out HDFC's upper-mid travel lineup → Regalia Gold: global lounge access, CV Silver, MMT Elite
HDFC announced Regalia Gold on March 23, 2023 as its next rung into the super-premium category, sitting above the ageing Regalia with global lounge access, airmiles-focused milestone benefits, and complimentary Club Vistara Silver and MakeMyTrip Black Elite tiers thrown in. It gave HDFC a mid-tier travel card to point upgrade-seeking Regalia holders toward, ahead of the Infinia and Diners Black Metal at the very top.
- 29 Nov 2022Tata Group announces Air India-Vistara mergerVistara and Air India run as separate Tata carriers → Single merged airline planned by March 2024, SIA to invest
Tata Sons and Singapore Airlines announced they'd fold Vistara into Air India, with SIA investing ₹2,059 crore for a stake in the combined carrier. For Club Vistara and Flying Returns members this was the first signal that two separate loyalty programs were headed for a messy, multi-year merger.
- 27 Jan 2022Air India returns to the Tata GroupState-owned, stagnant Air India → Tata-owned; the loyalty revival begins
The Tatas formally took Air India back after 69 years. It set up everything that followed for Indian travel points — the Vistara merger, the Maharaja Club revival, and Air India becoming the default premium-cabin transfer target.
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