The Southwest Companion Pass Is Changing, and 2026 Is the Last Year to Get It the Easy Way
Bags aren’t free anymore and the seats are assigned now, and now they’re changing the Companion Pass too, so here’s what that means for families and what I’d do before the end of this year.
We took our family to Hawaii a couple years ago, six of us, and the babies stayed home but the big kids got their first taste of the islands, and we got there almost entirely on points.
It was honestly such a high. I had a spreadsheet with everyone’s name on it and how many points each person would need, and I just started working through it card by card, and for us it was the Southwest cards that made it happen. We used the Companion Pass twice, Chris flew with one kid and I flew with another, and that left a couple kids where we had to transfer points from other cards to cover their flights. But we did it, Hawaii, six of us, for not very much money, and that trip changed the way I think about travel.
So yeah, I have a soft spot for the Companion Pass, but I also want to be honest with you, because Southwest has had a rough couple of years and I’ve been sitting on this post trying to figure out how to say it without sounding like I’m making excuses for an airline.
What Southwest changed
The biggest thing is that free checked bags are gone. That was Southwest’s whole thing for years, you flew them and everyone got two bags free and there was no drama, and that ended in May 2025, and since April 2026 it’s $45 for your first bag and $55 for your second. If you have a Southwest card you still get the first bag free (and so do up to 8 people on the same reservation), so if you have the card you’re mostly okay, but it isn’t automatic anymore for everyone on the plane.
They also cut the earning on the cheap tickets most people book (they’re called Basic fares now, not Wanna Get Away), and you used to earn 6 points per dollar on those and now it’s lower, so if you were earning your points mostly through flying, that one hurts.
And open seating is gone too, assigned seats started on January 27 of 2026 and family boarding and EarlyBird went away with it, so a thing that made Southwest feel like Southwest just isn’t there anymore. The good news if you have a Companion Pass is that you and your companion both get whichever seat perks are better between the two of you, so you can still pick seats together, you just might not board at the exact same time.
So yeah, it’s been a rough stretch for anyone who loves Southwest.
On October 15, 2026 Southwest announced that starting January 1, 2027, credit card sign up bonuses won’t count toward the Companion Pass anymore. The rules below still work for the rest of 2026, so if you’ve been thinking about it, this is honestly the year to do it.
How the Companion Pass works
Through the end of 2026 it works like this: you earn 135,000 qualifying Southwest points in one calendar year (or fly 100 qualifying one way flights, which is a LOT of flying) and you get the Companion Pass, and if you have a Southwest credit card you get a 10,000 point boost, so really it’s 125,000 you need. One person you pick flies with you on every Southwest flight, every single time, paying only the taxes and fees, which can be as little as $5.60 each way on a domestic flight, and a pass you earn in 2026 is good all the way through December 31, 2027.
The old trick was to time it for the very start of a year and stretch it to nearly two full years, but that doesn’t work anymore, because earning it the easy way ends with 2026. If you earn it now you get the rest of this year plus all of 2027, which is still a whole lot of free flights for your companion.
For a family that travels together, or a couple that takes a few trips a year, the math adds up fast, and we used ours to get two people to Hawaii and then we used those same passes again on other trips that year.
How people really earn it
You can’t realistically earn 135,000 points through flying alone, so the way most people do it is through the credit card bonuses, and Southwest has a few personal cards and a business card, and right now (through the end of 2026 only) the sign up bonuses combined, plus that 10,000 cardholder boost, can get you all the way there without a single flight.
Ready to go after the Companion Pass? Right now Chase has a limited-time offer of 80,000 to 90,000 points on the Southwest personal cards, and it’s 80,000 on either Southwest business card (the Premier Business offer on my link ends November 2), and you want to be approved by December 2, 2026 for those bonuses to count.
Personal cards: apply at Chase → Premier Business: apply with Amy’s link →The Southwest personal card does eat one of your Chase 5/24 slots and the business card doesn’t, so if you’re planning out your card sequence you want to already have your Chase Sapphire Preferred before you open the Southwest personal, and honestly I’d get the Sapphire first every time. Apply for the Sapphire Preferred with my link →
What changes in 2027
Starting January 1, 2027, the Companion Pass isn’t going away, but it gets a lot harder. Welcome bonuses, referral bonuses, anniversary points and the extra points from bonus categories (like 2x on gas) won’t count toward it anymore. You’ll earn it with Southwest’s new tier points instead, which come from flying and from 1 point per dollar on any Southwest card. Hit 95,000 of those (or 75 one way flights) and you get three Companion trips, and hit 140,000 (or 100 flights) and you get the unlimited pass with their new Platinum status. For most families that’s a lot of flying or a lot of spending, so the easy card bonus way really is ending with 2026. If you already have a pass, you keep it for your whole term.
Is it still worth it in 2026?
For us, yes, for this one last round. I wouldn’t build my whole strategy around Southwest the way I might have a few years ago, because the program is less generous than it used to be, and starting in 2027 the pass gets much harder to earn. But if you can get approved by December 2 and get your points in before the year ends, you’ve got a companion flying with you through the end of 2027, and for a family that travels together that’s still one of the better deals out there.
Southwest is almost entirely domestic, they don’t fly everywhere and they don’t fly internationally except for a handful of Caribbean spots, so before you commit to this whole strategy pull up their route map and make sure they fly where your family wants to go.
We used ours for Hawaii and we’ve used it to visit family and we’ve used it for quick weekend trips where flying two people would have cost real money, and every time the pass works it feels like a win. That feeling of getting your family somewhere you couldn’t have afforded otherwise is exactly why I started learning about points in the first place.
Well, Southwest did change the pass itself (October 15, 2026), so I updated this. Right now, for the rest of 2026, it’s still real and it’s still worth going after, just don’t wait on it.
xo, Amy