7 reasons you might want the Amex Business Platinum Card instead of the Amex Platinum Card

The Business Platinum Card® from American Express is not only one of the best small-business cards, it’s one of the best cards for travel rewards in general. Cardmembers pay for all that excellence, though, since it charges a $695 annual fee (see rates and fees).

However, despite a plethora of valuable benefits and some excellent opportunities to earn bonus points, the Amex Business Platinum Card still tends to be overshadowed by its personal counterpart, The Platinum Card® from American Express. It has a $695 annual fee of its own (see rates and fees).

Amex Business Platinum Card details

First, here's a quick rundown of the Amex Business Platinum’s features:

Current welcome offer

Earn 120,000 Membership Rewards points after spending $15,000 on eligible purchases within the first three months of card membership. That’s 30,000 more points than the previous public offer. TPG values Amex points at 2 cents apiece, so the welcome bonus alone is worth $2,400.

Earning

The Amex Business Platinum earns points at the following rates:

• 5 points per dollar spent on flights and prepaid booked through Amex Travel.
• 1.5 points per dollar on up to $2 million in eligible purchases in the U.S. per calendar year of over $5,000 each as well as on U.S. purchases with construction material and hardware suppliers, shipping providers, electronic goods retailers and software and cloud system providers.
• 1 point per dollar on all other eligible charges.

Unique benefits

The Amex Business Platinum has a number of perks in common with the personal Amex Platinum Card, but it boasts the following unique perks (enrollment is required for select benefits):

• 35% rebate when you Pay with Points for a first- or business-class ticket on any airline or an economy ticket on one selected airline of your choice (up to 1 million points back per calendar year).
• Up to $400 in annual statement credits per calendar year for U.S. Dell technology purchases – up to a $200 credit for January through June and another $200 credit for July through December.
• Up to $360 in annual statement credits ($90 per quarter) on all Indeed hiring and recruiting products and services to post open positions and find talent.
• Up to $150 in annual statement credit on select Adobe purchases, including Adobe Creative Cloud and Acrobat Pro DC.
• Up to $120 in annual statement credits ($10 per month) for purchases made directly from any U.S. wireless telephone provider.

Related: 9 things to do when you get the Amex Business Platinum Card

Annual fee

The annual fee is $695.

Related: Is the Amex Business Platinum worth the annual fee?

Amex Platinum Card details

Next, let's take a look at the personal Amex Platinum Card, which has also undergone some major refreshes over the past two years.

Current welcome offer

Earn 80,000 Membership Rewards points after you spend $6,000 on purchases on the card in the first six months of cardmembership.

Also note that you could potentially score a welcome offer as high as 125,000 bonus points if you apply using the CardMatch tool (offer subject to change at any time).

Earning

This card earns points at the following rates:

• 5 points per dollar on airfare booked directly with airlines or through Amex Travel (on up to $500,000 of these purchases per calendar year).
• 5 points per dollar on prepaid hotels booked through Amex Travel.
• 1 point per dollar on all other eligible purchases.

Unique benefits

The personal Amex Platinum Card extends these specific perks that the business version does not have (enrollment is required for select benefits):

• Up to $200 in Uber Cash for U.S. rides or Uber Eats orders each calendar year: $15 per month plus an extra $20 in December.
• Up to $100 in annual Saks Fifth Avenue statement credits per calendar year: $50 to use from January through June and $50 to use from July through December.
• Up to $200 annual hotel statement credits: Must use for prepaid Amex Fine Hotels + Resorts or The Hotel Collection bookings made through American Express Travel.
• Up to $300 annual Equinox credits: Valid on eligible Equinox memberships or digital subscriptions to the Equinox+ on-demand fitness app, available as a one-time credit.
• Up to $240 in annual digital entertainment credits: Up to $20 in statement credits per month toward purchases or subscriptions to Audible, Peacock, Sirius XM, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+ or the Disney Bundle (which includes Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+).
• Up to $155 in annual statement credits to cover the cost of a monthly Walmart+ membership (subject to auto-renewal). Plus Up Benefits not eligible.
• Up to $300 in statement credits when purchasing one SoulCycle at-home bike (must purchase in one transaction), up to 15 bikes per calendar year.

In terms of the sheer volume of statement credits, this card far surpasses the Amex Business Platinum. However, these credits aren’t for everyone — far from it. For example, if you don’t live near an Equinox gym or have no desire to pay for a digital membership via the Equinox app, this credit is largely useless to you. If you don’t regularly subscribe to one of the participating digital entertainment merchants, that credit is not of much value, either.

Related: 10 things to do when you get the Amex Platinum

Don’t let all the dollar signs persuade you to open the card if its benefits and perks won’t be applicable to your lifestyle. You may just use them because they're available but not find them truly worthwhile.

Annual fee

The annual fee is $695.

Related: High annual fee with big rewards: A full review of The Platinum Card from American Express

Perks offered by both cards

For context, here are the main benefits that both cards offer their members in common (enrollment is required for select benefits):

• Annual airline fee statement credit of up to $200 on charges with the airline you select.
• Up to $100 as a statement credit for your Global Entry application fee or a statement credit of $85 for TSA PreCheck every four years (every 4.5 years for PreCheck).
• Up to $189 as a statement credit to reimburse your annual Clear Plus membership fee. Use your card to pay for a Clear Plus membership (it doesn’t have to be for you) and be reimbursed automatically.
• Access to the American Express Global Lounge Collection, which includes Centurion Lounges, Priority Pass lounges, Delta Sky Clubs when flying on a same-day Delta flight, Airspace lounges, Escape lounges, Plaza Premium lounges and Lufthansa lounges.
• Register for complimentary Gold elite status with both Hilton Honors and Marriott Bonvoy.
• No foreign transaction fees (see rates and fees for the Amex Platinum and rates and fees for the Amex Business Platinum).
• Various travel protections and purchase protections.

Related: Guide to lounge access with the Amex Platinum and Business Platinum

Comparison of the Amex Platinum and Amex Business Platinum

Here's an overview of the key differences between the two cards:

Related: Platinum showdown: Amex Platinum vs. Amex Business Platinum

reasons to choose the Amex Business Platinum over the Amex Platinum

Now that their similarities are out of the way, let’s focus on their differences and how those might sway you to choose the Amex Business Platinum Card instead of the Amex Platinum Card.

You have or already had the personal Amex Platinum

Like many other issuers, American Express has increasingly restricted who is eligible for the welcome bonuses on its cards. The offer terms for the Amex Platinum Card, for instance, say the following:

“Welcome offer not available to applicants who have or have had this Card or previous versions of the Platinum Card. We may also consider the number of American Express Cards you have opened and closed as well as other factors in making a decision on your welcome offer eligibility.”

So if you already have the Amex Platinum, or even if you carried it in the past but have since closed it, you might be precluded from taking advantage of its current welcome offer. If you want to regain some of its benefits, as well as the chance of scoring tens of thousands of additional Membership Rewards points, you might have to opt for the Amex Business Platinum instead.

You can spend enough to earn the Amex Business Platinum’s higher welcome offer

The Amex Business Platinum’s introductory terms are fairly straightforward: Earn 120,000 bonus points after spending $15,000 within the first three months. That’s a considerable amount, but it's not outside the budget of many small businesses. After meeting the minimum spending requirements, you’d end up with at least 165,000 points.

By contrast, the Amex Platinum Card currently offers a lower welcome bonus: 80,000 points after spending $6,000 within the first six months of card membership.

On the surface, the personal card’s terms might seem better. Consider you have twice the time to spend less than half the amount of money for the bonus points. Moreover, if you leverage the full spending potential of the Platinum Card's bonus categories, you could snag an extra 250,000 points.

You spend a lot on flights and hotels

The two cards have very similar earning structures with two subtle (but significant) differences.

First, the personal Amex Platinum Card earns 5 points per dollar on flights booked not just through Amex Travel but also directly with airlines, while the Amex Business Platinum only earns 5 points per dollar on flights booked through Amex Travel. The personal card’s bonus earning on flights is capped at $500,000 in spending per calendar year, while the business version has no such ceiling. Both accrue 5 points per dollar on prepaid hotel bookings with Amex Travel.

Related: The best credit cards for paying taxes and fees on award tickets

If you tend to just book flights directly with airlines, the personal card is a better choice. However, if you actually use Amex Travel for a lot of your travel plans – or if you have that option – then you at least won’t be missing out by charging your reservations to the Amex Business Platinum.

Plus, if you book a lot of flights – more than $500,000 worth per year – with your card, then you’re definitely better off with the business card since its bonus-qualifying spending isn’t capped at that amount.

You can maximize the Amex Business Platinum’s large-transaction and business category bonuses

The Amex Business Platinum has a unique earning structure. Previously, you could earn 1.5 points per dollar on purchases of $5,000 or more, up to 1 million bonus points per year (so $2 million in spending). Now, however, the card also earns 1.5 points per dollar on U.S. purchases from construction material and hardware suppliers, electronic goods retailers, software and cloud system providers and shipping providers. There is the same combined $2 million annual spending cap with these purchases and the large-transaction bonus.

If you make these types of business purchases — or regularly use your card for transactions of $5,000-plus — then the Amex Business Platinum blows the personal version out of the water.

You might also find some creative ways to leverage this purchase bonus on one-off expenditures. For example, TPG contributor Jason Steele leveraged this perk to earn 1.5 points per dollar on the purchase of a new car.

Related: The best credit cards to maximize large purchases

You use Pay with Points for premium travel

One of the major ways the two cards diverge is that the Amex Business Platinum offers cardmembers a refund of 35% of the points they redeem through Amex’s Pay with Points feature while the personal version does not. There are a few stipulations, though.

First, you only receive the 35% points refund on two types of flights: business- or first-class tickets with any airline or on tickets in any class with the same airline you preselect for your annual $200 airline fee rebate. That might hamstring your options if you don’t actually plan to spend points on a ticket with the same carrier.

Even if you seldom redeem Membership Rewards this way, this one benefit can save you tens of thousands of points on a single ticket. That makes carrying the Amex Business Platinum instead of the personal card well worth it since the latter won’t provide any points rebate when you use Pay with Points.

Here's another way to think about this perk. Instead of getting 1 cent per point in value when you use Pay with Points for flights, carrying the Amex Business Platinum and redeeming this way bumps their value up to 1.54 cents apiece — a 54% premium.

Related: Amex Business Platinum for flights: When to transfer vs. when to pay with points

You prefer the business card’s statement credits

Both the personal Amex Platinum and Amex Business Platinum offer a plethora of unique annual statement credits.

The personal card offers up to $100 in annual statement credits on Saks Fifth Avenue purchases, which is split into $50 for the first half of the year and $50 for the second half. However, the card added several new perks during its recent lifestyle refresh. Those include various statement credits for things like Clear Plus, Equinox memberships, Walmart+ membership and digital entertainment purchases. (Enrollment is required for select benefits). But if those aren’t things you actually use (or plan to), why bother trying to keep track of them or paying the personal card’s annual fee?

The Amex Business Platinum confers up to $400 back in statement credits on U.S. Dell purchases — split into $200 for the first half of the year and another $200 for the second half. The card also offers hundreds of dollars in annual statement credits for things like Indeed services, Adobe products and U.S. wireless provider charges. If your business uses any of these services, the card’s benefits can help you save quite a bundle of money each year. Enrollment is required for select benefits.

Related: 10 items you can get with the Amex Business Platinum’s $100 Dell statement credit

And it's not just computers and printers that you can purchase with these Dell credits. You can buy gaming consoles, technology, accessories or even a new laptop case.

Related: More than just computers: I used my Amex Business Platinum Dell credit for a carry-on bag

You don’t use Uber that often

The personal Amex Platinum Card includes up to $15 in Uber Cash each month for rides and Uber Eats orders in the U.S. and includes an extra $20 in December. That's a total yearly benefit of up to $200. That’s pretty substantial. But remember that these credits don’t roll over from month to month. So if you don’t actually use Uber on a regular basis, you might not be taking full advantage of it.

Another factor to consider: You might have another card that offers significant benefits to using different ride-hailing and food delivery services. For example, perhaps you already carry the American Express® Gold Card. It offers up to $10 per month in Uber Cash for Uber rides and Uber Eats orders in the U.S. and also earns 4 points per dollar on these purchases. The Gold Card also offers up to $10 per month in credits for dining purchases at select merchants. These two perks might make the Gold Card more worthwhile than the personal Amex Platinum (enrollment is required in advance for some of these benefits).

Related: 8 reasons to keep your Amex Business Platinum Card

Whatever your situation, think about whether the Uber benefit would be worth carrying the personal version over the business version or whether this is one benefit you can leave on the table, so to speak.

Bottom line

Both the Amex Platinum and the Amex Business Platinum are excellent rewards cards with a variety of benefits from which members can reap tremendous value. Which card is right for you will come down to understanding which card has the right combination for you when considering the introductory offer, everyday bonus opportunities and ongoing benefits. Consider which card best matches your financial habits and needs as well as which card's other perks you’re most likely to leverage year after year.

That said, you might want to consider carrying both the personal and business Amex Platinum cards since there are plenty of ways the two cards don’t overlap. Having both cards can add up to a lot of extra statement credits and points per year.

Official application link: Business Platinum Card from American Express with a 120,000-point welcome bonus.

Official application link: Platinum Card from American Express with an 80,000-point welcome bonus.

Additional reporting by Ryan Smith.

For rates and fees of the Amex Platinum Card, click here.
For rates and fees of the Amex Business Platinum Card, click here.