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The American Express® Green Card
comes with solid earning rates for travel, dining, and transit spending. It’s also got up to $289 in annual statement credits, which is more than enough to offset its $150 annual fee. However, frequent travelers may prefer a card with stronger travel incentives, such as free airport lounge access and top-tier travel insurance.

Review: Is the Amex Green Card the best credit card for you?

The American Express® Green Card currently offers a welcome bonus of 40,000 points after you spend $2,000 on purchases in the first six months of account opening.

That’s worth an average of  $720 in travel, per Insider’s valuations — and significant enough to take a closer look at the card. Is it worth test-driving the card out for a couple of years to see if it integrates well with your lifestyle?

This product is by nature a travel rewards card — if you make a lot of travel, dining, and transit purchases, you’ll be rewarded with 3 points per dollar. Transit is a particularly rare category, and includes merchants like trains, taxicabs, rideshare services, ferries, tolls, parking, buses, and subways.

And with benefits such as up to $189 in CLEAR® credits (helpful for speeding through the TSA airport security line) and up to $100 in LoungeBuddy credits (so you can access airport lounges for free), this is a good starter travel card for occasional travelers.

Here’s what you need to know about the American Express® Green Card.

We’re focused here on the rewards and perks that come with each card. These cards won’t be worth it if you’re paying interest or late fees. When using a credit card, it’s important to pay your balance in full each month, make payments on time, and only spend what you can afford to pay.

How to earn points with the Amex Green card

The Amex Green Card has a simple and powerful earning structure that fits the lifestyle of a frequent traveler. You’ll earn 3 Amex Membership Rewards points per dollar on the following purchases: 

• Restaurants (including takeout and delivery)
• Travel (including airfare, hotels, cruises, tours, car rentals, and more)
• Transit (including trains, buses, ferries, subway, and more)

You’ll earn 1 point per dollar on all other eligible purchases.

Insider estimates Amex points value to be an average of 1.8 cents each when redeemed for travel. That means an earning rate of 3 points per dollar is equivalent to a 5.4% return.

To become an Amex points-earning powerhouse, you can complement this card’s bonus categories with other American Express cards. For example, the Amex Gold Card earns 4 points per dollar at US supermarkets (on up to $25,000 spent per year, then 1x) and at restaurants.

How to use rewards

There are myriad ways to use Amex Membership Rewards points, each offering drastically different value.

To get the biggest return for your rewards, you’ll want to use them for travel — namely, transferring your points to airline and hotel partners such as Air Canada Aeroplan, ANA, Singapore Airlines, Virgin Atlantic, and Hilton. For example, you can:

• Transfer 87,000 Amex points to Avianca for a one-way first-class flight to Frankfurt on Lufthansa (a $7,000+ value)
• Transfer 39,000 Amex points to Singapore Airlines for a round-trip flight to Hawaii on United Airlines  (a $500+ value)
• Transfer 120,000 Amex points to Hilton for a weekend stay at the Conrad Bora Bora (a $2,500+ value)
• Transfer 88,000 Amex points to ANA for a round-trip business class flight to Europe on United Airlines (a $3,500 value)

Alternatively, you can use your points to effectively “buy” flights through the American Express Travel portal at a rate of 1 cent each. You can reserve hotels, rental cars, cruises, etc. through the portal, too, but your points will be worth just 0.7 cents each.

Other options (though we don’t recommend any of these) include:

Benefits and features

The Amex Green Card isn’t as jam-packed with benefits as similarly priced travel credit cards, but it’s got enough to more than offset the card’s annual fee each year.

Up to $100 in LoungeBuddy statement credits

LoungeBuddy aggregates most airport lounges worldwide and allows you to purchase a day pass. This is beneficial if you don’t already have a credit card with free airport lounge access, and if you don’t frequently travel enough to warrant opening one of the aforementioned cards.

Prices for a day pass through LoungeBuddy vary with each location, but day passes can cost as low as $25. If you and a travel buddy want to enter a lounge, you could well get two visits each from this annual statement credit.

Up to $189 in CLEAR® statement credits

CLEAR® is an expedited airport security program that lets you skip to the front of the TSA line. It also operates at the entrance of some stadiums.

A membership to CLEAR® normally costs $189 per year — so a $189 statement credit would lower your out-of-pocket cost to $0 per year.

Modest travel and lifestyle insurance

As with most cards in this price range, you can receive purchase insurance with eligible items. You’ll get:

• Purchase protection
• Extended warranty protection
• Return protection

And because this card is primarily for travelers, it comes with:

• Rental car insurance — This coverage is secondary, so it will pick up what your personal auto insurance doesn’t cover.
• Trip delay insurance — When your flight is delayed 12 hours or more, you’ll get up to $300 per trip (max two claims per year).
• Baggage insurance — Offers reimbursement in the event of lost, stolen, or damaged baggage.
• 24/7 Global Assistance Hotline — Helpful for various emergencies, such as cash wire transfers, medical problems, etc. (you must be at least 100 miles from home).

Fees and costs

The Amex Green Card charges a $150 annual fee. But you’ll also be charged for things like late/returned payments and cash advances.

Also note that this card doesn’t charge foreign transaction fees, so it’s a great companion when traveling internationally.

Comparison: Amex Green Card vs other Amex cards

*on up to $25,000 spent at U.S. supermarkets per calendar year, then 1x

***up to $10 in statement credits per month when you use the Amex Gold card at Grubhub, Seamless, The Cheesecake Factory, Wine.com, Goldbelly, Milk Bar, and participating Shake Shack locations. Enrollment required.

****up to $10 in Uber Cash per month (this is only applicable to U.S. Eats orders and Rides, and the Gold Card needs to be added to the Uber app to receive the Uber Cash benefit)

*****Eligible digital subscriptions include Disney+, ESPN+, Hulu, Audible, SiriusXM, The New York Times, and Peacock

Amex Green Card vs other rewards cards

Amex Green Card frequently asked questions (FAQ)