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Southwest Companion Pass: Earn It in January, Not in November

Plan a trip around the points you already have

Most people treat the Southwest Companion Pass as a points problem. It is a calendar problem.

The maths of a Southwest Companion Pass never changes. You need 135,000 qualifying points or 100 qualifying one-way flights inside a single calendar year, and when you cross that line you hold the pass for the rest of that year plus the whole of the next one. Read that sentence twice, because the second half is where the money is. The threshold is fixed. The expiry date is fixed. The only variable you control is the day you cross the line, and almost nobody optimises for it.

I see the consequence of that in client conversations every autumn. Somebody has been quietly grinding toward a Southwest Companion Pass since spring, they are within reach in October, and they are delighted. They should not be. Crossing the line in October buys them about fifteen months of two-for-one flying. Waiting eleven weeks and crossing it in January buys them twenty-four. Same spend, same effort, nine extra months of a companion flying for taxes.

Everything below is sourced from The Points Guy, whose Southwest Rapid Rewards guide was last updated on 31 March 2026, and whose two Southwest Companion Pass guides, one a how-to and one a sixteen-year practitioner account, carry the earning thresholds, the validity rule, the companion-change limits and the booking mechanics. Where a figure appears here, it appears there. Where I am giving planning judgment rather than a published fact, I say so in the line itself.

And the limit worth stating plainly: we are travel advisors, not a credit card broker. We hold no issuer relationship, we earn nothing if you open a card, and we are not going to tell you which one to apply for. What we can do is tell you when to pull the trigger, because timing is a trip-planning question and that is squarely our job.

For example, earning the pass Jan. 15, 2026, will give you the pass through Dec. 31, 2027 — that’s 23 and a half months as a passholder. Earn the pass in November 2026, and it will still expire Dec. 31, 2027, giving you only 15 months to use it.
— The Points Guy

What the Southwest Companion Pass Actually Is

Strip away the forum folklore and the Southwest Companion Pass is a simple thing. You name one person. That person flies with you on any Southwest flight you book, paying only taxes and fees. There are no blackout dates and no seat restrictions, you can use it as many times as you like, and it works on cash tickets and award tickets alike. On a domestic route the companion pays the September 11 Security Fee, which is 5.60 dollars per one-way ticket. That is the whole cost.

Your companion also inherits your perks rather than travelling as a second-class passenger — boarding benefits and checked bag allowance come across with them. Given that Southwest ended its bags-fly-free policy for most customers and retired the Wanna Get Away fares in a broader fare rebrand, that inheritance is worth more now than it was two years ago.

1. Know Which of the Two Thresholds You Will Actually Hit

There are two doors into a Southwest Companion Pass. Fly 100 qualifying one-way Southwest segments in a calendar year, or accrue 135,000 qualifying points in the same window. Almost nobody walks through the first door on purpose. A hundred segments is a commuter’s year, not a traveller’s, and if you are flying that much you have already earned the pass without reading an article about it.

The second door is the real one, and it is wider than it looks because qualifying points are not just flown points. Credit card welcome bonuses count. Everyday card spend counts. So do purchases through Rapid Rewards Dining and the Rapid Rewards Shopping portal, hotel stays and car rentals with partners, and the cash portion of a Cash and Points booking. Cardholders also get a 10,000-point qualifying boost each calendar year, capped at one per member rather than one per card, which pulls the real target down to 125,000.

Best for: anyone who will open a Southwest card anyway, or who already spends enough on one to clear six figures of points in twelve months.
Do this when: you have looked at the 100-segment door honestly and ruled it out. Our judgment, not a published rule: if you fly Southwest fewer than forty times a year, the points door is the only one worth planning around.

2. The Southwest Companion Pass Is a Calendar Problem

Here is the rule in full: the Southwest Companion Pass is valid for the remainder of the year in which it is earned and the entirety of the following year. The expiry date is not twelve months from your qualifying date. It is 31 December of the year after, no matter what. Cross the line on 15 January and you hold the Southwest Companion Pass for roughly twenty-three and a half months. Cross it in November and you hold the same Southwest Companion Pass for fifteen.

That is not a rounding error. It is eight or nine months of a second person flying for 5.60 dollars a leg, gained or lost purely on which side of New Year you land. Nothing else in the loyalty world rewards patience this crudely. If you are reading this in September and you are sixty thousand points short, the correct move is almost certainly to stop, park the effort, and restart deliberately in the first weeks of January.

Best for: anyone who is not already past the Southwest Companion Pass threshold and has any control at all over when their big spend lands.
Do this when: it is the second half of the year and you are not going to finish by about August. Our judgment: after roughly the end of August, deliberately missing the current year is worth more than finishing it.

3. Points Count When They Post, Not When You Spend

This is the trap inside the trap. Qualifying points only count toward the year in which they actually post to your account, which means a card welcome bonus triggered by December spending can very easily land in January statements and count for the wrong year — or, if you are timing it well, the right one.

The practitioner move is to apply for the card late in one year, hit the minimum spend deliberately, and let the bonus post in the new year. That is precisely how a January Southwest Companion Pass gets engineered rather than hoped for. It also means that if you are close to the line in December and want the pass to start fresh, you should stop spending and let the clock run out.

Best for: anyone using a welcome bonus as the engine, which is most people.
Do this when: you are opening a card in the fourth quarter. Judgment call, not a published rule: leave yourself a clear month of slack, because posting dates move and a bonus you expected in January can show up on 29 December.

4. Know What Does Not Count Toward the Southwest Companion Pass

Points transferred in from Chase Ultimate Rewards or from Bilt do not count as qualifying points. They will sit in your Rapid Rewards account and they will book flights perfectly well, but they move you not one inch closer to the threshold. This catches out a lot of otherwise sophisticated people who assume a flexible-points balance is a shortcut.

It is worth saying the general shape of the rule out loud, because it explains the exceptions: what counts is what you earned into the programme, not what you moved into it. Flying, card spend, the welcome bonus, the shopping and dining portals, partner hotels and cars. Transfers are the outlier, and they are the outlier that costs people a year.

Best for: anybody holding a large flexible-points balance who assumed it was a shortcut.
Do this when: you are mapping out how you will reach 125,000 or 135,000. Count only what genuinely qualifies, then add your buffer on top.

5. Your Companion Is a Slot, Not a Person

You name one companion at a time, but you can change who that is up to three times per calendar year, and changes now go through instantly online or in the app. Earn the pass in one year and you get three changes that year and three the next, which means as many as seven different people can fly on the same Southwest Companion Pass across its life. You can also cycle back to the same person more than once.

There is a neat piece of housekeeping in this. If you reach December without having used all three of that year’s changes, switch your companion to whoever is flying with you first in the new year. The change is free, it does not count against next year’s allowance, and you start January already pointed at the right person.

One thing the slot does not do is travel alone. The two bookings carry separate confirmation numbers but they are linked, and if the passholder does not show up the companion can be pulled off the flight.

Best for: families and friend groups who would otherwise assume the pass only benefits one relationship.
Do this when: you know the year’s trips in advance. Judgment: sequence the changes around the biggest fares, not the most trips — one transcontinental is worth four short hops.

6. What a Southwest Companion Pass Actually Costs You

Domestically, almost nothing. The companion ticket carries the September 11 Security Fee at 5.60 dollars per one-way ticket and that is the end of it, on any route Southwest flies, Hawaii and Alaska included. Internationally the picture changes, because foreign departure taxes and arrival fees are levied on the ticket regardless of how it was paid for, and they can run to real money.

The value on the other side of that ledger is easier to size than most loyalty currencies. The Points Guy valued Rapid Rewards points at 1.3 cents apiece in its March 2026 valuations, with real-world redemptions landing anywhere between 1.1 and 1.7 cents depending on date and demand. A companion flying free effectively doubles whatever rate you are getting.

Best for: domestic pairs travelling often. The economics are strongest on short, frequent, full-fare routes.
Do this when: you are comparing a companion booking against a cash fare. Our judgment, not a published figure: on international itineraries, price the companion taxes before you assume the pass saves you anything.

7. When the Pass Is Worth Nothing at All

I will argue against my own subject here, because a lot of the people who read this should not chase it. The Southwest Companion Pass is only as good as Southwest’s route map. If your travel year is Lisbon, Tokyo and a week in the Douro, the pass is a beautifully engineered benefit pointed at flights you are never going to take, and the six figures of spend it takes to earn would have been better routed through a transferable currency that reaches a transatlantic carrier.

The honest test is not whether the pass is valuable. It plainly is. The test is whether you will genuinely fly Southwest with the same person at least half a dozen times across roughly two years. If the answer is no, the Southwest Companion Pass is a hobby rather than a saving, and we would rather tell you that now than after you have re-routed a year of spending to get it.

Best for: nobody, which is the point of including it.
Do this when: before you apply for anything. Write down the trips you will actually take in the next two years and count how many Southwest can fly.

The Timing Table, in Plain Arithmetic

Arithmetic from Southwest’s stated validity rule — the remainder of the year earned, plus the whole of the following year — applied to a 2027 qualifying year. The Points Guy publishes two worked examples of the same rule: 15 January 2026 gives 23 and a half months, November 2026 gives 15. The right-hand column is our judgment, not a published recommendation.

Booking With a Southwest Companion Pass Without Losing the Seat

Book yourself first, then add the companion

Only one seat needs to be available for the companion booking to go through, which is generous. The failure mode is a genuinely sold-out flight, so on a tight route do not leave the companion booking to the week of travel.

Changing a flight means cancelling the companion first

If you change your own flight after the companion is attached, you have to cancel their reservation, rebook yourself, then manually add them back. Do it in that order and it is administrative. Do it in the wrong order and you can find yourself rebooked alone on a flight with no seats left.

Know how your money comes back

Cancel and your Rapid Rewards points return to the account that paid, while the taxes and fees come back as flight credit rather than cash. That credit is time-limited: Basic fare credits are valid up to six months, Choice fare credits for twelve.

See how we build a travel year around the points you hold

Frequently Asked Questions

How many points do you need for the Southwest Companion Pass?

A Southwest Companion Pass needs 135,000 qualifying points inside one calendar year, or 100 qualifying one-way Southwest flights. Cardholders receive a 10,000-point qualifying boost once per calendar year, capped per member rather than per card, which brings the working target down to 125,000 points for most people chasing it.

How long does the Southwest Companion Pass last?

A Southwest Companion Pass lasts for the rest of the calendar year in which you earn it, plus the whole of the following year. The expiry is always 31 December of the year after qualification, so the earlier in a year you cross the threshold the longer you hold it — roughly twenty-four months from January, roughly thirteen from December.

Can you change your companion on a Southwest Companion Pass?

Yes, up to three times per calendar year, and the change now processes instantly online or through the app. Because a pass spans two calendar years, that allows as many as seven different companions across its life. You can also name the same person more than once.

Does the Southwest Companion Pass work on international flights?

A Southwest Companion Pass works on every route Southwest flies, including Hawaii, Alaska and international destinations. The difference is cost. A domestic companion ticket carries only the 5.60 dollar security fee per one-way, while international taxes and fees are significantly higher and are charged on the companion ticket as normal.

Do Chase points count toward the Southwest Companion Pass?

No. Points transferred in from Chase Ultimate Rewards or from Bilt will book Southwest flights, but they do not count as qualifying points and move you no closer to the threshold. Only points earned into the programme count — flying, card spend, welcome bonuses, the dining and shopping portals, and partner hotels and cars.

Is the Southwest Companion Pass still worth it after all the changes?

Southwest has ended bags-fly-free for most customers, retired the Wanna Get Away fares and moved to assigned seating and eight boarding groups for flights from 27 January 2026. The pass itself survived all of it intact. Our judgment: it is still the strongest two-for-one in US aviation, provided Southwest actually flies where you go.

The Dorian Destinations Verdict

If it is autumn and you are short of the line, stop. That is the whole verdict and it is deliberately unglamorous. The Southwest Companion Pass rewards one decision above every other, and that decision is which calendar year your qualifying points land in. Everything else — which card, which portal, which bonus — is noise next to it.

So park the effort, sit on your hands through the fourth quarter, apply in late November or December if you need a welcome bonus, and let that bonus post in January. You will hold the pass through the end of the following year and you will have bought yourself something close to twenty-four months of a second person flying for 5.60 dollars a leg, off exactly the same spending you were going to do anyway.

And if Southwest does not fly where you go, skip the whole thing with a clear conscience. We say the same about booking windows in our piece on the best day to book flights: the loyalty industry sells complexity, and most of the real gains sit in two or three plain decisions about timing. This is one of them. The rest is marketing.

Talk to a Dorian Destinations advisor

Sources: The Points Guy’s Southwest Rapid Rewards programme guide (updated 31 March 2026), how to earn and use the Southwest Companion Pass, sixteen years of holding the pass, and its guide to Southwest’s eight boarding groups. Thresholds, validity, companion-change limits, fee figures and point valuations are as published there; Southwest’s own Rapid Rewards terms are the underlying authority. Offers and valuations move — check both before you act on them.

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