As an Amazon Affiliate, we may earn a commission on eligible purchases made through our referrals. Advertiser Disclosure: Frequent Floaters is part of an affiliate sales network and receives compensation for sending traffic to partner sites, such as CreditCards.com. Some or all of the card offers that appear on the website are from advertisers. Compensation may impact how and where card products appear on the site. This site does not include all card companies or all available card offers. Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed, or approved by any of these entities. All information related to any credit cards below was collected independently by Frequent Floaters and was neither provided nor reviewed by the respective card issuers.
One of my favorite travel rewards cards is the one you see above: the American Express® Gold Card. You, too, will probably like it if you eat food and need to fly on airlines! I’ll explain why.
(Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers. Enrollment may be required for select American Express benefits and offers. Visit americanexpress.com to learn more.)
Annual Fee
Let’s get the housekeeping out of the way.
The American Express® Gold Card‘s annual fee is $250. (See Rates and Fees.) But it’s pretty easy to recoup that — if you travel and eat. You’ll see how below.
Now, on to the fun! (Oh, you also have your choice of card colors: gold or rose gold. Oooh, ahhh!)
Points, Points, and Points!
The American Express® Gold Card earns Membership Rewards points. We value these at around 1.8 cents each. Some people value them higher, others lower. So, I think that’s a happy middle ground.
It earns 4X Membership Rewards points at restaurants worldwide — plus takeout and delivery in the United States. (Though, I’m guessing if you’re at a restaurant somewhere outside of the U.S., you could earn points for your order to go. Ergo, it’s takeout for you, but the charge still codes as a restaurant.)
Interesting aside: we once got takeout from a restaurant called Soup Kitchen. (Can you guess what their specialty is?) That purchase didn’t code as a restaurant — Amex thought I was being a do-gooder and donating to a soup kitchen.
You can earn 4X points on the first $25,000 you spend each calendar year at U.S. supermarkets. (When/if you meet the $25k threshold, your supermarket purchases will earn 1X per buck until the following year.)
Travel-wise, the American Express® Gold Card earns 3X on flights purchased directly with airlines and at amextravel.com.
In my experience, the 3X isn’t limited to buying an actual flight reservation. It’s worked for me on in-flight food and beverage beverages, too. You should earn the 3X on most purchases when an airline is the stated vendor.
You can also earn 2X on prepaid hotel bookings made at amextravel.com
The potential downside to this is that because Amex Travel is an online travel agency, the hotel might not recognize any elite status benefits you have with that particular property.
All other eligible purchases earn 1X.
Statement Credits and Travel Features
I blow through these statement credits every month. Be aware that they are if-used and do not roll over to the next month.
$120 Dining Credit
Cardholders can earn up to $10 in monthly statement credit when using their card to pay for purchases at these select restaurants and delivery services:
-
- Grubhub
- The Cheesecake Factory
- Goldbelly
- Wine.com
- Milk Bar
- Select Shake Shack locations
(My kiddo loves Daddy-and-Daughter lunch dates at The Cheesecake Factory; that’s often where my monthly $10 is spent.)
$120 Uber Cash
American Express® Gold Card members receive $10 in Uber Cash each month when their card is enrolled as a payment method for Uber or Uber Eats. The Uber Cash is valid for Uber Rides or Uber Eats deliveries in the U.S.
I use the Capital One SavorOne Cash Rewards Credit Card to pay any cash balances because it earns 10X on Uber Rides and Uber Eats orders.
The Hotel Collection Benefit
There are about 700 hotel properties that participate in Amex’s “The Hotel Collection” program.
If you’re an Amex Gold (or The Platinum Card® from American Express or The Business Platinum Card® from American Express) cardholder, you can receive a $100 experience credit for eligible dining, spa, and resort activities. You may also receive a room upgrade, if available. However, you must book a stay of at least two nights in order to receive these benefits.
Add It Up
I use the dining and Uber credits each month — that’s $240 in value right there. And with all the points I earn from dining and supermarket shopping, I easily earn back the $250 annual fee — and then some.
The points are worth even more because I can use them with the Business Platinum Card‘s 35% Pay with Points rebate.
Final Approach
The American Express® Gold Card is a great points-earning product for people who love Membership Rewards points, travel, and dining. I’ve held the card for years — and will as long as it continues to give me an excellent value.
For rates and fees of the American Express® Gold Card, please visit this link.
Advertiser Disclosure: Frequent Floaters is part of an affiliate sales network and receives compensation for sending traffic to partner sites, such as CreditCards.com. Some or all of the card offers that appear on the website are from advertisers. Compensation may impact how and where card products appear on the site. This site does not include all card companies or all available card offers. Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed, or approved by any of these entities.
Responses are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.
I have this card and I do “like” it but I don’t “love” it. First I’m a typical rural American who buys the majority of my groceries from Walmart, yes THAT Walmart. I know I’m a loser or whatever but we have very limited actual grocery stores around us and even the few we have are SUPER expensive. Sure we use Aldi occasionally when we can travel that far for groceries but that is very limited and it ain’t no $25k a year. Our small-town local mom-and-pop grocery store doesn’t take American Express at all so that’s fun. So now that you know that back story how often do you think we get the use Grubhub or eat at Cheesecake Factory? We travel a lot to larger cities all over the world but I’m not trolling suburban shopping malls to get my free cheesecake when I do that. Shake Shack? Goldbelly? I barely even know what that is. It’s like a white tiger in my world. Uber can be handy with our travel but I’m sure as heck not booking hotels through Amextravel and I’m sure as heck not pre-paying those hotels, yikes! So I enjoy the 4x on restaurants and that is the main reason I downgraded my Platinum card but this card isn’t great for a majority of Americans at least. I also don’t know why Amex doesn’t give 4x for restaurants on the Platinum card. Many of the Amex benefits for either card remind me of the weekly Chase CSR emails about how I can eat with some chef or attend some hipster band or attend some art event with cool people if…If I only lived in New York or LA. Amex doesn’t care that much about me or people in my demographic but if they could come out with a card that gave 4x on restaurants and gas stations, 3x or 2x at big box stores like Walmart, Lowes, Costco, etc. Then I’d be all in. I don’t need a free slice of cheesecake at a big city chain restaurant but I’d sure eat up a free cone at DQ or how about 2% back at all truck stops and airports purchases.
Are all these benefits also on the Business Card version? If not, which ones apply to the Business Card?
The Amex Business Gold Card is a different beast — but you can actually earn more points on dining if it’s one of the two categories in which you spend the most during a billing cycle.
It has a $240 Annual Flexible Business Credits feature — and Grubhub is one of the eligible partners.
The Amex Business Gold Card’s annual fee jumps from $295 to $375 on February 1, 2024. So, if you’re interested in getting it, you’ll want to apply within the next month-ish.