Upgrade XBox Live Gold to Gamepass Ultimate at 1:1

******* 2022-04-10 NEW INSTRUCTIONS ADDED TO MAKE IT MUCH EASIER, SINCE MICROSOFT ISN'T OFFERING BONUS MONTHS FOR RECURRING BILLING ANY MORE *******

Make sure you redeem any Gold subscription before converting to game pass ultimate.

Gold time added AFTER conversion to Ultimate will be at a 3:1 rate. 12 months of Gold = 4 Months of Ultimate, so be sure to add BEFORE conversion.

Updated, Simpler Instructions:
1 - Buy 3x12mo Xbox Live Gold. The cheapest legit method is to buy them from Costco @ $59.99/year - you can buy as many as you want in person at a Costco warehouse, if you are buying online buy two first, wait for the codes to arrive in your email, and then buy the third - if you do not do this, your order WILL be cancelled and you'll be blocked from purchasing again for some amount of time. ALSO ENSURE THAT ALL BILLING INFORMATION ON YOUR CREDIT CARD EXACTLY MATCHES WHAT IS IN YOUR COSTCO ACCOUNT. Costco's "fraud detection" is hyper sensitive and will cancel orders seemingly completely at random.
1a - you can purchase cheaper 12mo Live Gold cards from CDKeys, if you want - Turkey and Brazil keys are often offered around $40-45CAD, you just have to use a VPN to apply them to your account. WARNING: multiple people have reported that taking this route results in the region setting getting screwed up on their Microsoft account, so upgrading to Ultimate fails and they have to contact Microsoft support to get it sorted out, which can take multiple attempts. Only you can decide if it's worth saving $15-20/year ($1.25-$1.67 per month) to go this route.
2 - Apply all of the 12mo live gold cards to your account at https://redeem.microsoft.com
3 - Upgrade to Ultimate however you want - the easiest method is via the web, here: https://www.xbox.com/en-CA/games/store/ ... Q7TTC0KN4C
4 - Turn off recurring billing on your Microsoft account subscriptions page for gamepass utltimate, here: https://account.microsoft.com/services/ ... ls#billing

Voilà! You now have 36 months of Gamepass Ultimate!

FAQS
Q: Are there any cheaper routes to take to absolutely minimize my monthly cost? This is RFD, after all.
A: If you're still eligible for PC and XBox game pass trials, technically you can save a few cents per month overall by signing up for those and going with 2x12mo + 1x6mo cards from Costco, but it only works out to something like 5-10 cents a month and you end up with only 33 months of Ultimate in the end of 36. Only you can decide if it's worth the tradeoff of 3 less months of Ultimate to save such a small amount per month.

Q: I've already redeemed the $1 promotion and/or previously/currently have PC Gamepass and/or previously/currently have XBox Gamepass Ultimate and/or previously used this trick with or without the $1 promo. Can I still use this trick to upgrade to Ultimate for cheap?
A: YES! This is the MOST ASKED QUESTION in this thread. As long as you are not currently a Gamepass Ultimate subscriber, upgrading to Gamepass Ultimate will add up all of your current remaining months of PC Gamepass, XBox Gamepass, and XBox Live Gold and give you that many months of Gamepass Ultimate (plus one, since you're also technically paying for one month of Gamepass Ultimate when you upgrade). The $1 promo is just a bonus for a cheap upgrade, it has nothing to do with the 1:1 Gold-to-Ultimate conversion. Just let your Ultimate subscription expire, and you can do the whole process over again. Note: occasionally the upgrade back to Ultimate again doesn't work until your existing sub has been expired for at least 24 hours.

Q: Related to my previous question: How can I get the $1 promotion back, since I've already redeemed it?
A: Nobody knows how or when or if Microsoft ever decides to re-apply the $1 promotion to your account. But if you're stacking the full 3 years, it only works out to like 45 cents a month. I know this is RFD and we want to pinch every penny, but come on now.

Q: I don't have a Costco membership. Where else can I get cheap live gold codes?
A: Walmart currently has 12 month codes on sale for $59.99. If that sale has ended, either CDKeys or Ebay for Brazilian VPN codes have been successful for RFDers. You just need to connect to a Brazilian VPN server (free options should work) before visiting redeem.microsoft.com to redeem your code. You may also need to set your region to Brazil on Microsoft's page (bottom left corner if it doesn't prompt you to do so), and many browsers will auto-translate from Portugese for you as well (Chrome definitely will).

Q: I don't have an XBox. Do I need a console to do any of this?
A: I mean, if you read the instructions above, you would know that you do not. Everything is accomplished using Microsoft's websites.

Q: I don't have an XBox. Is it *worth it* for me to take advantage of this?
A: Only you can truly answer this question. But if you're a PC gamer, or have an Android phone (since XCloud is now included in Gamepass Ultimate), it's really paying the equivalent of 2 games' full retail price to have 3 years' access to a very large game library. Only you can decide if that's worth it to you.

Q: I'm currently a Gamepass Ultimate subscriber till dd/mm/yyyy. Is there any way for me to extend my Ultimate subscription for cheap?
A: You can't use Live Gold codes to extend your Ultimate subscription at 1:1 if you're a current subscriber, unfortunately. They convert it at MSRP. So at the regular price of your 12 month code ($70), they'll give you $70/$16.99 = 4 months. The same conversion process works for 6 and 3 month codes, too.

If the end of your subscription is in the near future (within a few months), you can just cancel it outright and start over. You lose your remaining months, but you can at least re-stack for 3 full years if that's your thing. The only caveat is that you have to do it via support, you can't do it yourself. Chat support on the Microsoft Store website can do it, you just have to make sure you ask for an agent that can see your account, there are lower level support tiers that don't have access to it.

Q: When does this expire? Should I wait till I get my Xbox Series X/S before doing this?
A: Nobody knows when this will expire. XBox Live Gold is rumoured to be going away with the next gen, due to Halo 5 announcing free online play and Microsoft no longer offering 12 month Live Gold subscriptions on their website/consoles (but existing 12 month subscribers with auto-renew are still renewing for 12 months). It continued to work after the launch of the next gen consoles (on Nov 10), so this rumour may or may not have any truth to it. Since Halo has been delayed into 2021, the retirement of Live Gold may be delayed until then (if it's happening at all). Chances are VERY good, however, that if Microsoft is getting rid of Live Gold they will announce it ahead of time, and not just shut it off in the middle of the night. This would be a huge move for them (and a big selling point over Sony which still charges for online play), so one should expect a big announcement (and an update to this thread) if it is going to happen.

Q: Related to the previous question: HAS this expired? Does it still work?
A: If it's no longer working, this thread summary will absolutely be updated, and the thread will be moved to expired deals. But if you're really concerned because somebody hasn't posted in the last 15 minutes that it's still working, or whatever, you can feel free to read Microsoft's Game Pass Ultimate Faq. The question "What happens to my prepaid months of Xbox Live Gold and/or Xbox Game Pass when I sign up for Xbox Game Pass Ultimate?" should answer your question.

Q: I ordered codes from Costco, but they haven't arrived yet! How long do they take to arrive?
A: Digital codes from Costco take anywhere from a few minutes to a few days to arrive. Keep an eye out for an email from Codes2GO, as they're the ones that do the fulfillment. These emails often get pushed into spam folders, as well, so make sure to keep an eye out there.

Q: My Costco digital code orders keep getting cancelled! What am I doing wrong?
A: This happens to a lot of people, and Costco claims it's billing related. They seem to be EXTREMELY strict, so make sure that the name on your Costco account, as well as all address information, matches up exactly with your credit card. If you've verified that all of this matches, unfortunately, you'll have to deal with Costco's (terrible) support to try to get it sorted, or go with the CDKeys/Ebay Brazilian VPN code instead (or just pay full price - it's $10 more a year than Costco for the 12 month codes but that's only really an extra $0.83 a month)

Q: What are the conversion rates for XBox Live Gold codes if I'm an existing Ultimate subscriber? Can I use them to extend my Ultimate subscription?
A: Microsoft's Game Pass Ultimate Faq has a full list of conversion rates for different lengths of codes, but basically: you can use them, but it's the equivalent of paying regular price. So if you've got them sitting around and don't want them to expire? By all means... But it's not a cheaper way of extending your subscription if you're thinking of trying to be sneaky that way.