Great for holiday shoppers: Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card review
Editor’s note: This post has been updated with the latest credit cards information and benefits.
Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card overview
The Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature is a solid earner, featuring a 5% return on Amazon.com and Whole Foods Market purchases, 2% on restaurant, gas station and drugstore purchases and 1% back on everything else, making it a strong contender for those who spend big with Amazon companies. Card rating*: ⭐⭐⭐½
*Card rating is based on the opinion of TPG’s editors and is not influenced by the card issuer.
While this card doesn't charge an annual fee, you can only apply if you are a current Amazon Prime member. So you can think of your Prime membership fee as your credit card annual fee.
In this post, we’ll review this Amazon Prime credit card and see if it’s worth applying for, especially if you’re looking to save big on your online shopping this holiday season.
The information for the Amazon Prime Rewards and the Amazon Rewards cards has been collected independently by The Points Guy. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.
Who is this card for?
The Amazon Prime Rewards credit card is meant for those who participate significantly in Amazon’s ecosphere.
Available exclusively for Amazon Prime members, it rewards those loyalists with best-in-class earnings of 5% back on purchases on the Amazon website and at the Whole Foods grocery store chain. As a no-annual-fee card, it’s an obvious contender for a spot in your wallet if you’re a Prime member anyway, and deserves respect from even the most hard-core points-and-miles enthusiasts. After all, who doesn’t shop at Amazon at this point?
It also is subject to Chase’s 5/24 rule, which means if you’ve opened a lot of other cards in the past two years, you might not be approved for it until you fall back below that limit.
The card offers a solid return on purchases made within Amazon’s wheelhouse, but it is best suited for those who prefer simplicity in their credit card rewards and aren’t interested in maximizing every dollar they spend.
Sign-up bonus
At the moment, this Amazon Prime credit card is offering a solid bonus — a $150 Amazon gift card valid for purchases at Amazon that is available as soon as you are approved.
That's money you can instantly put towards your next big holiday purchase.
Main benefits and perks
The Amazon Prime credit card features several solid consumer-focused benefits.
Among them, its purchase protection ranges up to $500 per claim and $50,000 per account, while its extended warranty protection provides an additional year of coverage on eligible purchases with a manufacturer’s warranty of three years or less.
The card also has a host of benefits for travelers, including no foreign transaction fees, travel and emergency service, lost luggage reimbursement (up to $3,000 per passenger for you and your immediate family), baggage delay insurance (up to $100 per day for three days if delayed by six or more hours), travel accident insurance and roadside dispatch (for a fee).
It also includes auto rental collision damage coverage — although unlike credit cards such as the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card, which offer primary rental car coverage, this card only offers secondary car insurance, which kicks in after filing with your personal insurance company.
These benefits come as a result of its Visa Signature status, which also provides access to the Visa Luxury Hotel Collection. This allows members to book more than 900 hotels around the world with perks that imitate elite status, such as room upgrades and late checkout. You’ll also be able to use the Visa Signature Concierge Service, which can help you with a variety of requests.
How to earn points
The main perk of this card is its spending structure — it offers a 5% return on Amazon and Whole Foods purchases. It also earns 2% back at restaurants, gas stations and drugstores, which is similar to other no-annual-fee credit cards.
Purchases made anywhere else earn a flat 1% back. This adds up to a fairly generous return on spending, but those who don’t already have Amazon Prime will need to consider whether the $139 annual cost for the subscription is worth it, especially if they don’t shop with Amazon often.
How to redeem points
When you’re ready to redeem the points you’ve earned with this Amazon credit card, there are a number of different tracks you can take. No matter what you do, you’ll receive a flat value of 1 cent per point for your redemptions. The easiest method is simply redeeming your rewards for Amazon purchases. There is no minimum amount of points required, and you can use them for all or part of your purchase.
If you’d prefer cash back, you can deposit your rewards straight to your Chase account. You can also redeem for gift cards with a minimum of 2,500 points.
Perhaps the most intriguing and least-talked-about option is the ability to redeem your points for travel through Chase, although you’ll have to call in to use your points. Here you get a value of 1 cent per point, so it’s not as much as if you had the Chase Sapphire Reserve, which lets you redeem points at 1.5 cents each through the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal.
But you’re not missing out on value with this card in particular by redeeming points for travel versus Amazon purchases. And airfare purchased through a third-party site will still accrue bonus miles and elite credit, in addition to granting elite status perks you’ve earned on the airline. The same can’t be said for hotels, which will often disqualify bookings made via online travel agencies from any kind of earning.
The Chase travel portal also offers tours and activities, which means that you can finance an entire vacation with points earned from your Amazon Prime Rewards card. At a 5% earning rate, these points will stack up quickly.
Alternative cards
You won’t find a better return on your spending at Amazon and Whole Foods with other credit cards, though there are some products that come close.
The Blue Cash Preferred® Card from American Express
The Blue Cash Preferred Card from American Express offers 6% back on U.S. supermarket purchases (on up to $6,000 in purchases per calendar year, then 1%).
It’s a fairly lucrative card overall, also offering 6% on select streaming services in the U.S. and 3% on transit and gas stations. Cash Back is received in the form of Reward Dollars that can be redeemed as a statement credit. The card comes with a $0 intro annual fee for first year, then $95 (see rates and fees).
The Amex EveryDay® Preferred Credit Card from American Express
The Amex EveryDay Preferred Credit Card earns 3 Membership Rewards points on U.S. supermarket purchases (on up to $6,000 a year). It also accrues 2 Membership Rewards points per dollar at U.S. gas stations and 1 point per dollar on other purchases. Plus, when you use the card to make 30 transactions or more per billing period, you get a 50% points bonus, which can really improve your earning potential.
What’s more, this card earns Membership Rewards points that you can transfer to the program’s various airline and hotel partners, making it a strong choice for folks who want to rack up rewards for travel, specifically, rather than just cash back.
The annual fee is $95.
The information for the Amex EveryDay Preferred card has been collected independently by The Points Guy. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.
Chase Freedom Unlimited
If you’re not a Prime subscriber and still want a solid return on your spending, your best bet would be to go with the Chase Freedom Unlimited. The Freedom Unlimited provides 1.5% cash back on non-bonus purchases (plus 5% on travel booked through Ultimate Rewards, and 3% on dining and drugstores).
You could potentially double the value of your rewards by pairing the Freedom Unlimited with a Chase Sapphire Reserve, Chase Sapphire Preferred Card or Ink Business Preferred Credit Card. By doing so, you’ll be able to redeem your cash back as full-fledged, transferable Ultimate Rewards points, worth 2 cents apiece, based on TPG’s monthly points valuations.
The card has no annual fee.
Bottom line
If you’re a big Amazon shopper who already subscribes to Prime, the Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature could be a good option for you — especially with a gift card as a sign-up bonus.
With an unbeatable 5% return on Amazon and Whole Foods purchases and a simple redemption system, this Amazon credit card is geared toward those who prefer to stay away from the intricacies of points and miles, opting instead for the ease of using a no-annual-fee credit card that earns cash back.
Additional reporting by Ryan Wilcox and Stella Shon.
For rates and fees of the Blue Cash Preferred card, click here.