Hotel Status Matching with Hertz and SIXT

You can easily get more discounts, points and car upgrades by matching your hotel or airline status with Hertz and SIXT. You can then optionally earn airline points from the car rental. Below is a table summarizing the key differences between the loyalty programs for Hertz and SIXT.

Hotel loyalty status with Hertz

Below is a table showing how hotel loyalty tiers map to Hertz tiers or benefits. e.g Marriott Titanium matches to Hertz Five Star.

Marriott Platinum Fast Track to Hertz Five Star used to be 7 rentals, but that doesn't make sense to use Fast Track as Hertz has now lowered the requirement to 3 rentals or $1K spend to reach Five Star. You're better off reaching Hertz Five Star yourself rather than linking to your Marriott account.

Hertz Hotel Partners & Earning Rates (Apr 2026)

Hertz is lighter on hotel partners than SIXT.

My recommendation is to pick based on where your hotel loyalty is. If you have Marriott status, you have the opportunity to get more Hertz points as well as being eligible for an upgrade. Unlike SIXT, Hertz points have a 5 year expiration policy, so even though you don't earn Marriott points, there's a chance you can use them some time in the next 5 years.

Hotel loyalty status with SIXT

Below is a table showing how hotel loyalty tiers map to SIXT tiers or benefits. e.g Marriott Silver matches to SIXT Gold.

Marriott and GHA are the only hotel chains where you can match hotel status to SIXT status.

After matching, I recommend SIXT Status Benefits + Partner Points. This means you use your SIXT status (matched from GHA/Marriott) to get a free car upgrade and discount, while still choosing to earn 750 Marriott points per rental. For GHA Discovery, you do not earn D$ when booking with SIXT.

When you book or pick up your car, you provide one loyalty number. e.g. Marriott or SIXT. If you provide the SIXT loyalty number, you earn SIXT rental points and not Marriott. I do not recommend earning SIXT rental points unless you're a repeat car rental person and can use them within the 12 month expiration period. You are better off adding the few points to Marriott where you are more likely to be able to use them and the expiration policy is 24 months or even no expiration if you are Marriott lifetime status.

Status Match: Remember to match your hotel elite status to SIXT before booking to unlock free upgrades and additional driver benefits.

SIXT Hotel Partners & Earning Rates (Apr 2026)

Here is a partial list of hotel partners. I'm only covering the major loyalty programs that I am a member. Other than Marriott and GHA which offer car upgrade opportunities and discounts, the other hotel chains offer mostly points.

Best Western offers points and up to 15% discount, which is the equivalent discount rate available to SIXT Platinum members, but without the free upgrade. If for some reason you don't care about a car upgrade, and Best Western's 15% discount results in a price difference that is bigger than booking with Marriott + 750 points, then consider using BW instead.

SIXT Airline Partners & Earning Rates (Apr 2026)

SIXT partners with a wide variety of global airlines, typically allowing you to earn a flat rate of 500 miles/points per rental, though some carriers offer tiered rewards based on spend in USD or EUR, based on standard vs premium car rentals, and/or transfer services.

Which points to choose?

You can choose between SIXT points, hotel points or airline points. I would recommend hotel points, particularly Marriott for various reasons. Using a simple example, if I rented 20 times somehow I get 20 x 750 points = 15K Marriott points. That is enough for a 1-night redemption - including taxes - at some places. See my post explaining Marriott points covering taxes.

If it was airline points, 20 x 500 points = 10K miles. While that is enough for a short 1-way flight. Unless you also have enough miles to redeem a 1-way return flight, paying for the 1-way return flight is likely going to be more than 50% of the cost of a round-trip ticket, plus you may still have airline surcharges unlike hotel points.

Takeaway

It is better to be a Marriott elite outside of the US and Canada so you can be matched to SIXT.

For those in the US and Canada, there is no real car rental benefit from Hertz unless you Marriott Titanium or higher.

For those outside the US and Canada, SIXT status matching from Marriott status is the easiest way to get rental car benefits as well as hotel points. GHA Discovery will get you rental car benefits but no D$. Best Western will get you a 15% discount, but no rental car benefits.

Hotel points are more valuable than airline points as most taxes and fees are covered by hotel point redemptions. Even on a mileage redemption, airline surcharges can easily cost as much as half the price of a basic 1-night hotel stay.