Rove Miles Gets a Major Upgrade: New App, Dining Rewards, Instant Gift Cards & More
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Rove Miles has quickly become one of the more interesting rewards programs for points and miles enthusiasts, and now the platform is getting its biggest upgrade yet.
Rove has rolled out several major new features, including Rove Dining, an instant-earning gift card marketplace, a new mobile app, in-store shopping offers, upgraded browser extensions, and a completely redesigned hotel booking platform.
The changes make Rove much more than a traditional shopping portal. Members now have several ways to earn transferable Rove Miles from purchases they may already be making every day.
New to Rove? Sign up for Rove Miles here and get 500 miles
What Is Rove Miles?
Rove is a travel rewards platform that allows members to earn Rove Miles from shopping, travel bookings and other purchases.
The biggest attraction is that Rove Miles can be transferred to a large selection of airline and hotel loyalty programs.
Current partners include programs such as:
- Air Canada Aeroplan
- Air France-KLM Flying Blue
- Cathay Pacific Asia Miles
- Etihad Guest
- Finnair Plus
- Japan Airlines Mileage Bank
- Lufthansa Miles & More
- Qantas Frequent Flyer
- Qatar Airways Privilege Club
- Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles
- Virgin Atlantic Flying Club
- Virgin Red
- Accor Live Limitless
- Aeromexico
- Flying Blue
- Frontier Miles
- Hainan Airlines Fortune Wings Club
- SAS EuroBonus
- And several others
Most airline partners transfer at a 1:1 ratio, giving Rove Miles significantly more flexibility than rewards from a typical cashback shopping portal.
Rove has also frequently offered transfer bonuses, making it worth watching for promotions before moving your miles.
New Rove Miles Mobile App
Rove finally has its own mobile app.
The Rove app is currently available for iOS, with an Android beta also being rolled out.
Members can use the app to check their mileage balance, find earning opportunities, purchase gift cards, find participating restaurants, shop, book travel and manage their Rove account.
This is an important improvement because Rove is increasingly moving beyond online shopping. With dining, gift cards and card-linked offers, having everything available from your phone makes the program much easier to use.
Rove Dining: Earn Miles at Restaurants
One of the most interesting additions is Rove Dining.
Members can link an eligible credit or debit card to Rove, find a participating restaurant and simply pay with the linked card.
There are no coupons to print or codes to enter. Eligible Rove Miles are automatically tracked after the purchase.
This creates another opportunity to stack rewards.
For example, you could potentially:
Earn Rove Miles + earn credit card dining rewards on the same purchase.
If you’re already spending money at a participating restaurant, those extra miles can essentially be free additional rewards.
Rove Dining is starting in select markets and is expected to expand to more restaurants and cities.
Instant Rove Miles From Gift Cards
This might be the most exciting addition for serious points and miles enthusiasts.
Rove has launched a gift card marketplace that awards Rove Miles instantly on eligible purchases.
Instead of buying a gift card directly from a merchant, you can purchase an eligible gift card through Rove and earn additional miles.
There are two potentially valuable uses here.
First, you can purchase gift cards for merchants where you were already planning to spend money and pick up additional Rove Miles along the way.
Second, the instant rewards could be extremely useful when you’re just short of the miles needed for an award.
For example, imagine finding a great business-class award but being 2,000 Rove Miles short. An eligible gift card purchase could potentially generate the miles immediately, allowing you to transfer them and complete your booking before the award disappears.
And don’t forget that you may still earn the normal rewards offered by the credit card used to buy the gift card.
Rove Is Adding In-Store Shopping Offers
Rove Shopping is also moving beyond online purchases.
New card-linked in-store offers are beginning to appear. Members can link a card, activate or qualify for an eligible offer and earn additional Rove Miles when shopping at participating physical stores.
Rove says the program is expected to expand to thousands of participating retail locations.
This puts Rove in more direct competition with cashback and card-linked platforms, except that the reward here is transferable Rove Miles instead of traditional cashback.
New Chrome and Safari Extensions
Rove has also refreshed its shopping extensions.
There are extensions available for Chrome and Safari, including mobile Safari integration through the new iOS app.
The extension can alert you when you’re visiting a retailer where Rove Miles are available, helping prevent you from forgetting to activate an earning offer before making a purchase.
For anyone who regularly uses shopping portals, installing the extension could make earning Rove Miles much easier.
Rove Hotels Gets a Major Overhaul
Rove has also rebuilt its hotel booking platform.
The updated experience includes:
- Tens of thousands of additional hotels
- Better Rove Miles earning multipliers
- More Loyalty Eligible hotel rates
- Clearer room and bed information
- More detailed hotel descriptions
- Better cancellation and meal-plan options
- An AI-powered hotel question feature
The expansion of Loyalty Eligible rates is especially interesting.
With eligible bookings, travelers may be able to earn Rove Miles while still qualifying for applicable hotel loyalty benefits such as hotel points, elite-night credits and elite-status recognition.
That’s potentially much more attractive than traditional third-party hotel bookings where you often give up hotel points and elite benefits.
Always verify that a specific rate is marked Loyalty Eligible before booking if hotel status benefits are important to you.
Rove Miles Is Becoming Much More Interesting
Rove started primarily as another way to earn travel rewards from shopping and travel bookings.
It’s now becoming something much bigger.
Between shopping, dining, hotels, flights, gift cards, in-store purchases and transferable airline miles, there are significantly more opportunities to build a Rove Miles balance without changing your spending habits very much.
The gift card marketplace is particularly worth watching. If Rove continues adding popular merchants with competitive earning rates, there could be some excellent stacking opportunities.
Rove Dining could also become valuable as its restaurant network grows.
Should You Sign Up for Rove Miles?
If you’re interested in airline miles and transferable rewards, Rove is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.
There is no reason to transfer miles speculatively, but earning Rove Miles gives you access to an unusual collection of airline programs, including several programs that aren’t available through every major transferable-points currency.
The best strategy is generally to earn Rove Miles when the rates are attractive, keep the miles inside Rove, and transfer only when you’re ready to make a specific redemption or when an especially valuable transfer bonus appears.
Want to try Rove? Join Rove Miles here
With the new app, Rove Dining, instant gift card rewards, in-store earning and improved hotel bookings, Rove Miles is turning into a much more complete travel rewards ecosystem — and it’s a program points and miles enthusiasts should be paying attention to.
