World of Hyatt's new Peak & Off-Peak pricing will be effective as of October 26

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Originally planned to come to into effect in March of 2020 Hyatt’s Peak and Off-Peak pricing for their World of Hyatt program was delayed due to the pandemic. Earlier this year the program said they will come into effect this October and now we know exactly when. As of 10:00am CT on Tuesday October 26, 2021 these new options are being introduced for award nights starting on March 1, 2022. This means all free night awards will be at the standard rates until February 28, 2022.

Here is a reminder of how World of Hyatt’ Peak and Off-Peak free night pricing works:

Off-peak: Fewer points will be required during Off-peak times, starting at 3,500 points per night (the best value when hotels are less busy)
Standard: Points required during standard redemption periods will follow today’s point requirements, starting at 5,000 points per night (the most common rate)
Peak: –More points will be required for a free night during Peak times, starting at 6,500 points per night and will be no more than 5,000 points above the Standard point requirement (when hotels are the busiest)

Here are the new free night award charts as of October 26:

Here are more details provided to us by Hyatt

This new structure will be true for all types of award nights, including free nights in a standard room, club-access room, standard and premium suites.
Points + Cash awards will also offer Off-peak and Peak point redemption. With Points+Cash, members can save 50% of the points required for a free night and 50-70% off the Standard Rate.
If a member has an existing award reservation that changes to Off-peak on October 26, 2021, we will automatically refund the point difference. If it changes to Peak, we will not charge any additional points.
Members will have plenty of time to plan ahead. Redemption rates for free nights will be announced as soon as nights are available for reservations (usually 13 months in advance). A new online calendar will also be available to assist in planning.
Category-based Free Night Awards, such as a Category 1-4 or Category 1-7 Free Night Award will not be affected by the new structure. For example, you can use a Category 1-4 Award during an Off-peak, Standard or Peak night.
Our hotel award categories are not changing and will remain 1-8.

As we stated in December of 2019 that overall this isn’t a welcome shift from Hyatt. I mean it is a good thing if you can get off-peak pricing for award nights but those will most likely mirror when the hotel isn’t as full and the cash rates are lower anyways. The true value in the Hyatt program was being able to redeem at a flat rate for those aspirational properties during high season and getting great value out of your points. Now those same nights will undoubtedly price out as Peak. That being said the increase in points isn’t massive, 5,000 at most for a standard room, 10,000 for a suite but some do represent significant increases and decreases percentage wise. While those in the U.S. are lucky enough that you can earn Hyatt points with a credit card which make the points differences slightly more tolerable of a pill to swallow, those outside of the U.S. whose primary means of earning points comes from actual Hyatt stays will find the Peak pricing hitting them harder in the whole earn and burn equation.

Ultimately if you have any plans to redeem your World of Hyatt points for award nights after March 1, 2022 you should do it now as you can’t do any worse. If those night move to a Peak rate Hyatt won’t charge you extra however if it drops to Off-Peak they will automatically refund you the difference.