I'm sure someone will chime in soon about the lovely SLH properties Hyatt "has" all over Europe. Indeed, there are some great hotels, but this "partnership" is useful mostly to Americans who can generate Hyatt points cheaply. When booking outright, there are no benefits to Glob status, and the Hyatt "benefits" ("free" continental breakfast being the only guaranteed one, with late checkout and upgrades "if available") cost a significant upcharge when booking direct.

Obviously, coverage in Europe has gotten better compared to 10 years ago, mostly thanks to acquisitions of sometimes doubtful value. For instance, I am planning a trip to Mallorca, where Hyatt now has a whopping 22 hotels, but I'm struggling to find ONE I actually WANT to stay at. Similarly, Germany now has decent coverage, but many of those newly-added Lindner hotels aren't exactly places I'm excited about.

That said, I am pretty happy with my Globalist status. There's a core of maybe a couple dozen Hyatt hotels that work well for me (mostly in Asia), so it's easy to end up with 40-50 "solid" nights in a year, and then I'll throw in a handful of "don't really care" airport nights. Maybe supplement that with a couple "exploratory" stays -- roadtrips to the alps (Lindner Oberstaufen) or smaller cities that turn out to be a charming surprise (me and all Ulm). Heck, with the new acquisitions, Europe is now awash in €50 Aluas and Cat 1 Lindners -- the one in Berlin isn't on par with the GH, but costs 3500 points for much of the summer season. Time that with a good promo, and you're just paying for breakfast. The main point for me is that with Hyatt, the value proposition is still there (elite treatment, some really reasonable redemptions), so it's ok to "stretch" a little for Globalist. The 100% same thing applies to IHG, which also has a couple dozen really strong (and -thanks to the Chase redemption discounts- extremely reasonable) properties, so it's easily worth it to go for 40 nights to reach the Lounge Pass milestone. But realistically, if you travel a lot and want to stay at decent hotels (non-HP/HIX/ancient CP/Lindner), it's hard to get by without Marriott, which of course now often means seeing eye-watering redemption rates at booking and then being greeted by a "we have 100 elites staying, so as LTT enjoy your dumpster view room and please sign up for a one-hour club lounge slot" sign.

So for me, earned Hyatt Glob / IHG Diamond-Lounge Pass coupled with Marriott LTT status does the trick quite nicely. If I had to cut out one of the programs I qualify for it'd likely be Hyatt, but only because they've made it so easy to enjoy someone else's benefits now via GOH and transferrable certs (generous but stupid changes IMO).