Chase has opened two more Sapphire Lounges this month, both in New York City airports. (Newark undoubtedly feels left out.) If you’re flying out of LaGuardia or JFK airports and have a Chase Sapphire Reserve card, you can now get into these swanky new lounges as many times as you want. You just need to activate your Priority Pass membership that comes as a benefit with that card, and you and up to two guests traveling with you can enter these lounges and enjoy the free food and drinks at no charge. This makes the second and third true Sapphire Lounges in the US; the fourth is in Hong Kong. (There’s also a “Sapphire Terrace” lounge area in Austin, but it’s not a true lounge.) More Sapphire Lounge locations are slated to open in the coming months in Philadelphia, Phoenix, San Diego, and Las Vegas.

If you have a different card that comes with Priority Pass membership, such as the American Express business platinum or personal platinum, or the Capital One personal or business Venture X, you get one free entry per year and any additional entries (either yourself or any guests) are $75. 

The Chase Sapphire Preferred card doesn’t have a lounge benefit, so CSP cardholders won’t be able to access these lounges.

From everything I’ve read and photos I’ve seen, the new lounge at LGA looks absolutely amazing. Huge, stylishly decorated, lots of potential quiet areas, barista-made coffee, fun cocktails, thoughtful food buffet (with everything pre-plated), and an à la carte restaurant menu. There’s even a wellness area and apparently you can book free facial treatments. 

(There aren’t any Chase-published photos of the New York lounges yet, but the one they have available of the lounge in Boston looks similar to what I’ve seen.)

The new lounge at JFK wasn’t purpose-designed—it’s a renovation of a preexisting lounge space—so it’s not quite as impressive-looking as the one at LGA, but it still looks pretty great. And because JFK is an airport where you’ll likely have way more international passengers transiting on layovers, there are private bathrooms with showers in this lounge. A great shower in a lounge can be the only thing that makes you feel human again after a long overnight flight, so this is an amenity I value highly.

If you frequent any of these airports where Chase is opening Sapphire Lounges, this should definitely go into your decision-making process when you’re trying to figure out whether to apply for a Chase Sapphire Preferred or a Sapphire Reserve. Chase lets you have one Sapphire card at a given time, so you can’t have both, and you are also eligible to get the welcome bonus on a Sapphire product only once every 48 months. So it’s worth estimating how much value you’ll get out of both cards before you decide which one to apply for. 

I love the Reserve and think it’s worth the annual fee already because of all the benefits I get with it, but if I lived in one of these cities, it’d go from a “yeah, it’s probably worth it” to a “yes, please, how quickly can I get into these lounges.”

As always, I have a link to the best publicly available offer for the Chase Sapphire Reserve and appreciate your support if you use my link to apply!