The American Express Green Card
A powerful, flexible, and truly underrated travel credit card.
When looking for a new travel credit card, the American Express Green Card is seldomly considered as a viable option. But, why? The truth is that it actually offers much more than meets the eye.
Multipliers
The Amex Green offers 3x points per dollar on ALL travel. This includes airfare, hotels, tours, campgrounds, car rentals, cruises, vacation rentals (like Airbnb), and more. It also offers 3x points per dollar on Transit, including trains, buses, ferries, subways, rideshare, and more. Finally, it also offers 3x points per dollar on Dining at Restaurants, including takeout and delivery in the US only.
Annual Fee
Owning the card comes with a $150 annual fee; not the cheapest option out there among the most popular travel credit cards, but far from the most expensive. As of the time of writing this blog, the sign-up bonus you’ll get is 40,000 American Express Membership Rewards points after spending $3,000 within 6 months. You could easily meet this quota with 1-2 trips, or, if you eat out often, by simply doing that.
Other Perks
Like any travel card, it has no foreign transaction fees, meaning you can take it abroad without any financial surprises. You also get a nice $209 Clear+ credit annually. The additional perks stop here, however, which makes sense since it is American Express’ lowest tier travel card.
My Take
I’ve been rocking the Amex Green Card for about 7 months now, and truly, it is hard to see myself without it. My wife and I book Airbnb fairly often when we travel, steering away from higher end hotels. We also typically Lyft / Uber to and from our home airport when traveling, and sometimes when we don’t want to rent a car, we will Lyft / Uber abroad. It’s also very hard to want to cancel the card because of how low the annual fee is. It also gets us into the American Express rewards system, which is very rewarding (haha), but that’s for another blog post.
TLDR
Annual Fee: $150
Sign-up Bonus: 40,000 points after spending $3,000 within 6 months
Multipliers:
3x on ALL Travel
3x on Transit / Rideshare
3x on Restaurants
Pros:
Affordable compared to other travel cards.
Encompasses several, broad categories in its multipliers.
Cons:
Low amounts of additional credits offered.
Low multipliers on flights and hotels compared to other cards.
Get if you…
…use public transportation / rideshare often.
…typically book Airbnb’s, cruises, tours, or other types of travel not normally available on travel portals.
…want a quick, relatively cheap sign-up bonus.
Don’t get if you…
…typically book hotels when you travel.
…are looking for luxury travel perks.
