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The American Express® Gold Card and The Platinum Card® from American Express are 2 heavy hitters in the world of points and miles, with many award travel enthusiasts carrying one, or both, of the cards in their wallets. But if you’re someone who prefers to carry one card, you might be wondering which Membership Rewards card is a better fit for you?
In this post, we will provide a benefits comparison of both cards to help you determine which is best for you, along with answering how you can go about upgrading your Amex card and who should consider upgrading.
Make no mistake, the Amex Gold card and Amex Platinum card are both fantastic, but very different, travel rewards cards. Here is a breakdown of the top benefits of each card.
Terms Apply / Rates & FeesThis is the go-to card for food lovers who dine out at restaurants and those who want big rewards at U.S. supermarkets!
The American Express® Gold Card is definitely a game-changer.
With this card, you can earn 4x Membership Rewards points at restaurants and you’ll also earn 4x Membership Rewards points at U.S. supermarkets on up to $25,000 per calendar year in purchases, then 1x.
There isn’t another card on the market that offers a 1-2 punch like this. Of course, there are a number of other benefits of the Gold Card as well, including extra monthly dining rewards and more.
Hot Tip: Check to see if you’re eligible for a welcome bonus offer of up to 90,000 points with the Amex Gold card. The current public offer is 60,000 points. (This targeted offer was independently researched and may not be available to all applicants.)
The Amex Gold card has strong earnings at supermarkets and restaurants with a variety of ways to earn/redeem rewards and plenty of travel benefits — all without a premium annual fee!
Our favorite benefits include:
The Amex Gold card aims to help keep you covered by offering travel insurance benefits like baggage insurance coverage, trip delay insurance, and rental car insurance, along with purchase protection and extended warranty protection.
Bottom Line: Spend a lot of money on dining and at supermarkets? The Amex Gold card will help you rack up Amex Membership Rewards points faster than any other card.
Terms Apply / Rates & FeesThis card is undoubtedly the #1 card for luxury travel benefits. From the best lounge access (of any card) to statement credits, to complimentary elite status, you can’t go wrong.
When it comes to cards that offer top-notch benefits, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better card out there than The Platinum Card® from American Express.
Make no mistake — the Amex Platinum card is a premium card with a premium price tag. With amazing benefits like best-in-class airport lounge access, hotel elite status, and tremendous value in annual statement credits, it can easily prove to be one of the most lucrative cards in your wallet year after year.
Hot Tip: Check to see if you’re eligible for a welcome bonus offer of up to 125k (or 150k) points with the Amex Platinum. The current public offer is 80,000 points. (This targeted offer was independently researched and may not be available to all applicants.)
The premium Amex Platinum card is packed with $500+ in statement credits, considerable 5x points travel earnings, and access to thousands of airport lounges worldwide.
Here are our favorite earnings and benefits that the card features:
The Amex Platinum card also takes the level of protection you receive to another level by offering travel insurance benefits like rental car insurance, trip delay protection, and trip cancellation protection, plus purchase benefits like return protection, purchase protection, and extended warranty protection.
Bottom Line: The Amex Platinum card offers some of the very best travel and lifestyle benefits of any rewards card on the market.
Here is a head-to-head comparison of the Amex Gold card and Amex Platinum card to help you determine which card is a better fit for you.
| Benefit | Amex Gold Card | Amex Platinum Card |
| Airfare purchases | 3x | 5x |
| Dining purchases | 4x | 1x |
| Supermarket purchases | 4x | 1x |
| $120 annual dining credit | X | – |
| Rental car insurance | Secondary: $50,000 | Secondary: $75,000 |
| Foreign transaction fees | $0 | $0 |
| Baggage insurance | $1,250 per person | $3,000 per person |
| Trip delay insurance | $300 per trip | $500 per trip |
| Purchase protection | $10,000 item/$50,000 year | $10,000 item/$50,000 year |
| Extended warranty protection | X | X |
| American Express Hotel Collection | X | X |
| American Express Fine Hotels & Resorts | – | X |
| $200 airline fee credit | – | X |
| $200 annual Uber credit | – | X |
| $100 annual Saks Fifth Avenue credit | – | X |
| Airport lounge access | – | X |
| Hotel elite status | – | X |
| Rental car elite status | – | X |
| Amex International Airline Program | – | X |
| TSA PreCheck/Global Entry credit | – | X |
As you can see, the strength of the Amex Gold card is that it has a much lower annual fee than the Amex Platinum card and is significantly better at earning points if you’re someone who regularly spends money on dining and groceries.
On the other hand, the main appeal of the Amex Platinum card is that it is absolutely loaded up with fantastic benefits like access to 6 different airport lounge networks, hotel elite status, a variety of annual credits, and many more perks that frequent travelers are sure to love. Further, eligible Amex Platinum military members won’t be charged the annual fee.
Bottom Line: Are the added benefits of the Amex Platinum card worth the additional $300 in annual fees? Well, that is for you to decide, and if you need extra help doing so, we’ve got you covered in our ultimate guide to the Amex Platinum vs. Amex Gold.
Requesting an upgrade with your Amex Gold card is a very straightforward process, and you have 2 options for doing so.
The first option is by calling the customer service number on the back of your Amex Gold card and telling the representative that you’d like to upgrade to the Amex Platinum card. Your second option is to use the chat feature on the American Express website, though be advised that they might still ask you to call the customer service line to finalize the upgrade.
We’ve outlined the benefits of each card and explained how to go about asking for an upgrade, but should you actually do it? Here are a few tips to help you make that decision.
Due to the Credit CARD Act of 2009, credit issuers are not able to increase the annual fee of a cardmember if their account is less than 1 year old. So if you haven’t had your Amex Gold card open for at least a year, you will not be eligible to upgrade it to the Amex Platinum card.
Traditionally, when you upgrade to a new card, you are not eligible for the public welcome bonus that the card currently offers. So if you’ve never received a welcome bonus for the Amex Platinum card before, you’d be much better off just applying for the card outright as the welcome bonus offer is often worth more than $1,300 in travel based on our valuations.
If you’ve already received a welcome bonus on the Amex Platinum card, though, then you would not be forfeiting any points should you decide to upgrade your Amex Gold card.
Occasionally, American Express will send cardmembers an offer to upgrade their card and receive a bonus for doing so. We’ve seen offers as high as 60,000 Membership Rewards points (valued at $1,320) to upgrade from the Amex Gold card to the Amex Platinum card. So if you’ve received such an offer, that would be a great reason to upgrade.
Hot Tip: You’re still eligible for upgrade offers even if you have already received a welcome bonus for the Amex Platinum card. However, if you accept an upgrade offer and you’ve never had a welcome bonus for the Amex Platinum card, you’ll no longer be eligible to receive one should you decide to apply for the card outright.
If you’ve weighed the benefits of each card and decided that the Amex Platinum card is a better fit for you, then it might make more sense to ask for an upgrade. But just make sure you don’t leave any Membership Rewards points on the table if you do so.
When you ask for an upgrade on an Amex card, American Express does not perform a hard pull, meaning you will not receive a new inquiry on your credit report, and it will not impact your 5/24 status for those who are trying to stay eligible for certain Chase cards.
Ultimately, while the process of upgrading your Amex Gold card to the Amex Platinum card is an easy one, the decision on whether or not it makes sense to do so is a lot more situational. On one hand, upgrading might offer you a nice bonus without adding an inquiry to your credit score. On the other, you might be forgoing the large boost of Membership Rewards points you could have received from the welcome bonus by applying for the card outright.
Either way, you should do whatever makes the most sense for you. You might even decide that is worth holding both the Amex Gold card and Amex Platinum card so that you can take advantage of the point-earning and luxury travel benefits of both cards!
For rates and fees of the American Express® Gold Card, click here.
For rates and fees of The Platinum Card® from American Express, click here.
Yes, you can easily upgrade your Amex Gold card to the Amex Platinum card by calling the customer service number on the back of your Amex Gold card or using the chat feature on the American Express website.
American Express does not perform a hard pull to your credit when you upgrade your card. This means it will not add a new inquiry or a new account to your credit history.
Neither card is necessarily better than the other — it depends on what you value more. The Amex Gold card is a much stronger point-earner, especially if you spend a lot of money on dining out or grocery store purchases. Meanwhile, the Amex Platinum is loaded up with top-notch benefits that provide outsized value to cardmembers, especially those that are frequent travelers.
Yes, you can downgrade your Amex Platinum card to the Amex Gold card. But just like with upgrades, you’ll want to make sure that you’ve had the card open for at least 1 year or more. This is a great way to save yourself some money if you no longer find the benefits of the Amex Platinum card to be worth the fee.
It can be! If you think the benefits of the card you’re upgrading to are better, you have a lucrative upgrade offer, or you’re trying to avoid any new credit pulls, then upgrading could be a great option. But you should first make sure that you’re not adversely impacting your eligibility for future welcome bonuses.
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Boasting a portfolio of over 20 cards, Jarrod has been an expert in the points and miles space for over 6 years. He earns and redeems over 1 million points per year and his work has been featured in outlets like The New York Times.
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3 comments
Drew
April 25, 2021
You should update the gold card benefits to include Uber cash and 100$ airline credit (though that’s going away soon).
Paul S
May 02, 2023
I just got a 75,000 upgrade offer. It came a week after upgrading my Blue Cash to Blue Cash Preferred. Probably not a coincidence.
However here is a real issue. T-Mobile just started penalizing customers $5 per line for using CC. They want debit cards. I think Verizon does this too. Since I consider the Platinum card’s phone protection a major benefit, we cell phone customers have a choice. In my case, pay an extra $15 per month to keep using a CC with cell protection. Some people have 10 lines. That would be $ 50 per month. It will greatly reduce use of CC for cell phone payments.
It’s a real problem. I suggest AMEX add a multiplier when paying cell phone bills via CC, to keep customers that value the Platinum cell protection.
There is an active Reddit blog on this issue.
Jacque Salternorris
September 01, 2023
I have been with Amex for 22 years. Platinum for years then down graded to Gold during Covid. I just called to upgrade and they would only give me a 25,000 Pt bonus. They really need to be fair and kinder for loyalty. I may just cancel the card!
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