AmEx Gold Card Review (2020.8 Update: 60k Offer!)

     2020-08-13     2020-09-10 120 Comments

AmEx

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American Express Gold Card (Formerly Premier Rewards Gold) Review

2020.8 Update: This card now offers 60k MR offer! You need to spend $4000 within the first 3 months. There’s also a $250+35k offer: you earn 10% back on every purchase made in the first 6 months, up to $250 back. Normally we  value 25k MR higher than $250 so the 60k MR offer is recommended!

2020.8 Update: AmEx is partnering with Resy and providing a new 35k+$250 welcome offer on this card via the specific link: earn 35k MR points after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months, and earn 20% back as a statement credit at restaurants worldwide in the first 12 months up to $250 back. HT: DoC. As long as you spend $1,250 at restaurants you can earn the full $250 credit, and it should be quite easy. Comparing to the regular 50k offer, it has $250 more but 15k MR points (worth about $240) less, so these two offers have essentially the same value.

2020.7 Update: Some people report that there is a 70k mail in targeted offer recently. Screenshot. HT: reader Iljincal.

Application Link

  • AmEx Gold. Possible to see 60k offer with $4,000 spending requirement. Note that you have to use the incognito mode or empty the cache in your browser to see the 60k offer. If you can only see the 40k or $250+35k offer, please try a few more times. Now the offer differs by location, you may need a VPN to see the big offer, see How to Use VPN to Get Amex Big Offers for details.
  • CardMatch is a place to check pre-qualify offer. You may see a 75k targeted pre-qualify offer (after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months), the chance is very low though (the chance is higher if you have never had an AmEx card).
  • This link is another place to check pre-qualify offer. You may see a 75k targeted pre-qualify offer (after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months), the chance is very low though (the chance is higher if you have never had an AmEx card). It seems you need to open this link in incognito mode in order to see the page with 「Check to see if you Pre-Qualify for these Offers」.

Benefits

  1. 60k offer: Earn 60,000 Membership Rewards (MR) points after spending $4,000 in first 3 months. This is the best public offer so far.
  2. We estimate that Membership Rewards (MR) are worth about 1.6 cents/point, see below for a brief introduction. So the 60k highest sign-up bonus is worth about $960!
  3. [New] Earn 4x MR per $1 spent at restaurants (worldwide); earn 4x MR at supermarkets (in the US); 3x MR per $1 spent directly at airlines; 1x MR per $1 spent on other purchases.
  4. [New] 4x MR earning rate at supermarkets is capped at $25,000 supermarket spending per calendar year, the cap is so large that many people can treat it as unlimited.
  5. [New] $120 dining credit: $10 dining credit per months good at Grubhub, Seamless, boxed, The Cheesecake Factory, Ruth’s Chris Steak House, Shake & Shack. Must enroll first and pay using your new Gold card. Here‘s the link to enroll.
  6. $100 airline fee credit for incidental charges such as checked bags per calendar year. Because this benefit resets according to calendar year instead of when you opened the card, you can actually get airline fee credit TWICE during the first year! Note that this benefit is not automatically enrolled, you need to enroll and specify an airline by clicking here.
  7. The airline credit is actually easy to get: although AmEx terms & conditions says airline gift cards are excluded, data points show that they actually can trigger the credit.
  8. With this card, you have access to Amex Offers, which often offers very good discounts at some stores. In the past we have seen offers like: Spend $15 or more and get $5 back at Walmart; Spend $75 or more and get $25 back on Amazon.com.
  9. No foreign transaction fee.
  10. This card is very easy to get approved, because it is a Charge Card, not a Credit Card. Charge card means that you don’t have an option to pay only minimum payment, you have to pay your balance in full on the due dates. Note that Charge Card applications will also result in a Hard Pull, same as Credit Card applications.
  11. Charge Cards have no pre-set spending limit.
  12. Refer a friend: You can earn 10,000 bonus MR points for every approved account you refer, up to 55,000 MR points per calendar year.

Disadvantages

  1. $250 annual fee, not waived for the first year.
  2. There is no annual fee for up to 5 Additional Cards. But the annual fee for 6 or more Additional Cards is $35 for each Card.
  3. The 4x at supermarkets are limited within the United States.

Introduction to MR Points

  • You can earn MR points with AmEx ED, AmEx EDP, AmEx Green, AmEx Gold, AmEx Platinum, AmEx Platinum for Schwab, AmEx Platinum for Morgan Stanley, AmEx Blue Business Plus, AmEx Business Green, AmEx Business Gold, AmEx Business Platinum, etc.
  • The MR points you earn on different MR cards will automatically go to the same MR account.
  • MR points never expire. You will not lose the MR points on one card if you close the account, but you will lose all of the MR points if you close all of the MR cards. In order to avoid losing your MR points, we recommend to keep the no annual fee AmEx ED.
  • If you have any of the MR cards, MR points can be transferred to some airline miles. One of the most common and best way to use MR points is to 1:1 transfer them to All Nippon Airways (ANA, NH) miles (Star Alliance). Other good options are: Air Canada (AC) (Star Alliance), Delta Air Lines (DL) (SkyTeam), British Airways (BA) (Oneworld), Asia Miles (Oneworld), Singapore Airlines (SQ) (Star Alliance), Flying Blue (SkyTeam), Virgin Atlantic (VS) (Non-alliance), etc. If you use MR in this way, the value is about 1.6 cents/point.
  • If you have any of the MR cards, you can redeem your MR points at a fixed rate about 1 cent/point towards air tickets on AmEx travel portal.
  • If you have AmEx Platinum for Schwab, you can redeem your MR points at a fixed rate 1.25 cents/point towards cash. If you don't want to spend time studying airline miles, this is a pretty good way to cash out the points. If you don't have this card, you can only redeem your MR points at a fixed rate 0.6 cents/point towards cash.
  • In summary, we estimate that MR points are worth about 1.6 cents/point.
  • For more information about MR points, see Maximize the Credit Card Points Values (overview), and Introduction to MR: How to Earn and Introduction to MR: How to Use (very detailed).

Recommended Application Time

  1. You can only get the welcome bonus once in a lifetime, so be sure to apply when the historical highest offer appears.
  2. AmEx doesn’t care about the number of hard pulls.
  3. You can try to apply for it when you have a credit history of 6 months.

Summary

This card is revamped from AmEx Premier Rewards Gold (PRG). The new Gold card has much better points earning structure although we’re paying a higher annual fee. If you can utilize the $100 airline credit and $120 dining credit, then you should consider holding this card even in long term, because 4x points at restaurants and supermarkets easily surpasses other cards. In summary, the new Gold card is a strong competitive product by Amex.

Benefits Before 2018.10

This card is previously called AmEx Premier Rewards Gold (PRG).

  1. 50k offer: Earn 50,000 Membership Rewards (MR) points after spending $2000 in first 3 months.
  2. We estimate that Membership Rewards (MR) are worth about 1.6 cents/point, see below for a brief introduction. So the 50k highest sign-up bonus is worth about $800!
  3. Earn 3 Membership Rewards Points per $1 spent directly at airlines; 2 Membership Rewards Points per $1 spent at US restaurants, supermarkets and US gas stations; 1 Membership Rewards Point per $1 spent on other purchases.
  4. $100 airline fee credit for incidental charges such as checked bags per calendar year. Because this benefit resets according to calendar year instead of when you opened the card, you can actually get airline fee credit TWICE during the first year! Note that this benefit is not automatically enrolled, you need to enroll and specify an airline by clicking here.
  5. The airline credit is actually easy to get: although AmEx terms & conditions says airline gift cards are excluded, data points show that they actually can trigger the credit.
  6. With this card, you have access to Amex Offers, which often offers very good discounts at some stores. In the past we have seen offers like: Spend $15 or more and get $5 back at Walmart; Spend $75 or more and get $25 back on Amazon.com.
  7. No Foreign Transaction Fee.
  8. This card is very easy to get approved, because it is a Charge Card, not a Credit Card. Charge card means that you don』t have an option to pay only minimum payment, you have to pay your balance in full on the due dates. Note that Charge Card applications will also result in a Hard Pull, same as Credit Card applications.
  9. Charge Cards have no pre-set spending limit.
  10. Refer a friend: You can earn 5,000 bonus MR points for every approved account you refer, up to a maximum of 55,000 MR points per calendar year. But the sign-up bonus generated by the referral link is much less than the highest public link, so it』s better not refer this card to your friend…
  11. $195 annual fee, waived for the first year.

If you only keep this card for one year, you will get 50k MR points (is worth about $800) and two airline fee credit ($100*2), and you don』t need to pay for the first year annual fee. So in total, the net income is about $1000!!! However, the reward rate is not impressive except the airline 3x bonus category, which makes it hard to cover the $195 annual fee. If one day you don』t want to keep this card any more, while still have some remaining MR points, you can apply for AmEx EveryDay (ED) (no annual fee) to keep the MR points and use them in the future.

Related Credit Cards

Note that, although the look and benefits of the following cards are almost the same, they are different products, and they don』t affect each other』s sign-up bonus:

Recommended Downgrade Options

  • You can not downgrade this card to any card with no annual fee, so I suggest you close it when you don’t want to keep it any longer.

After Applying

  • Click here to check AmEx application status.
  • AmEx reconsideration backdoor number: 877-399-3083. The 「real」 backdoor number of Amex is well protected. Different from Chase, the representatives from this AmEx reconsideration backdoor number only have the right to help you submit requests.

Historical Offers Chart

Application Link

  • AmEx Gold. Possible to see 60k offer with $4,000 spending requirement. Note that you have to use the incognito mode or empty the cache in your browser to see the 60k offer. If you can only see the 40k or $250+35k offer, please try a few more times. Now the offer differs by location, you may need a VPN to see the big offer, see How to Use VPN to Get Amex Big Offers for details.
  • CardMatch is a place to check pre-qualify offer. You may see a 75k targeted pre-qualify offer (after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months), the chance is very low though (the chance is higher if you have never had an AmEx card).
  • This link is another place to check pre-qualify offer. You may see a 75k targeted pre-qualify offer (after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months), the chance is very low though (the chance is higher if you have never had an AmEx card). It seems you need to open this link in incognito mode in order to see the page with 「Check to see if you Pre-Qualify for these Offers」.

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