Introduction I have tried most if not all chain hotels in the Ottawa Airport area before but never Holiday Inn Express until now. Most hotels around there are almost interchangeable and mediocre therefore they compete on price, but I noticed that for points redemptions booking at HIX was better value than options from Marriott (Fairfield, Residence Inn) or Hilton (Hilton Garden Inn, Hampton, Homewood Suites) so I give it a try. I think HIX can meet the needs of people passing by and is a serviceable option to consider with decent hardware so I can recommend it. Room I had early check-in at HIX and I simply wanted the first room available which I received after waiting a couple of hours so I did not receive an upgrade. The room was in decent shape and comparable to Hampton – perhaps a bit more spacious at HIX. The rooms at Homewood Suites are considerably nicer but also in a higher price range than HIX and include a small kitchen, but at least HIX had a microwave and small fridge. The design was functional with a working desk and plenty of power plugs on both sides of the bed. One drawback of my room was that I would have preferred a stand-alone shower rather than a shower in a bathtub. Also soundproofing was very bad and I could hear frequent banging of doors but the same is often the case at competitor hotels although it felt worse at HIX.After a couple of days I asked out of curiosity if they normally upgrade Spire guests and they said they could move me to a suite. The price difference between the standard rooms and the suites is quite modest, but I appreciated the offer nonetheless. The suite had a living room upon entering the room and the bedroom was at the far end. Having more distance between the bed and the entrance door modestly mitigated the soundproofing issue. A couple of days later the hotel informed me that they were running out of rooms with 2 double beds and since I had made two separate reservations they were asking me to move to a suite with a king bed, I did not mind so I changed room again. To my surprise, that third room type had a stand-alone shower rather than bathtub so I was my favorite of the three. Upon returning to HIX I would ask specifically for a room with such a shower and as far as I remember I don’t think any of the rooms at Hampton Inn have stand-alone showers so that would be another reason why I would pick HIX ahead of Hampton. Dining Breakfast was free for all guests so despite booking with points I did not feel like I was missing out on elite benefits which is sometimes the case at other IHG properties. Breakfast was nothing to write home about, but at least having fruit, yogurt, and coffee in the morning was convenient. They also had a couple of choices for hot food which I generally avoided – the Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwiches were truly awful. However I cannot really blame HIX since in the current covid circumstances the much more luxurious Andaz hotel downtown has also made those Jimmy Dean sandwiches part of their normal breakfast menu. Wifi Wifi worked well with speeds of 15-20 Mbps. Overall Overall I was happy with my stay at HIX compared to other local hotels which apart from Homewood Suites are often all in the same price range when paying cash. For points redemptions HIX stands out favorably because I could get a room for about 15k points per night while Hampton Inn and HGI were 30k+ points (Hilton points are worth approximately the same as IHG points) and Fairfield Inn + Residence Inn were 15k+ points, Marriott points being worth more than IHG points so my conclusion was that HIX was the better deal by a decent margin.