What are American Express Membership Rewards Points worth?

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American Express cards earn either Membership Rewards® points or cash back. Whether you're considering which type of card to get or looking to get the maximum value from your American Express points, you may be wondering how much American Express Membership Rewards points are worth.

As you'll see in detail below, American Express redemption options generally range between 0.5 cents and 1 cent per point. However, you can get much more value than that through American Express' many airline and hotel transfer partners.

You earn Membership Rewards points by spending on eligible American Express rewards cards. The fastest way to accumulate American Express points is by earning the welcome bonus you'll receive after applying for a card and meeting the bonus offer requirements.

Some of the best travel cards for earning Amex points include:

• The Platinum Card® from American Express: Earn 80,000 Membership Rewards® points after spending $8,000 within the first six months of card membership
• American Express® Gold Card: Earn 60,000 Membership Rewards® points after you spend $$6,000 on eligible purchases with your new card within the first 6 months of card membership
• American Express® Green Card: Earn 60,000 Membership Rewards® Points after you spend $3,000 on purchases on your new Card in your first 6 months of Card Membership. Plus, earn 20% back on eligible travel and transit purchases made during your first 6 months of Card Membership, up to $200 back in the form of a statement credit.

American Express cardholders can redeem Membership Rewards points to offset card charges at a rate of 0.6 cents per point through Cover Your Card Charges. That's a pretty poor redemption rate for your American Express points, and yet this option still comes with several restrictions.

Not all charges are eligible for Cover Your Card Charges. To be eligible, the purchase must be at least $1 and have occurred in the U.S. or U.S. territory, and the charge must appear in your account under 'Recent Activity' or in your current statement. Partial redemptions aren't allowed, you'll need to have enough points to cover the entire purchase.

As if those aren't enough restrictions, you can't use Cover Your Card Charges to offset purchases if they exceed your latest statement balance. So, you'll need to wait until your statement posts, and you may still be limited on which charges you can cover. Also, note that you'll get a statement credit in your account that reduces your card balance — not cash back.

American Express Membership Rewards can be redeemed for an array of different gift cards. For many gift card options, you'll get 1 cent per point in value by redeeming points this way — or potentially more when there's a special offer.

However, not all redemptions are as valuable. Some redemption options yield only 0.7 or 0.85 cents per point. It depends on which retailer's gift card you are redeeming points for. For example, at the time of this writing, a $100 Best Western gift card costs 11,765 points, while you can get a $100 Delta Air Lines gift card for 14,286 points.

Worst of all, you'll only get 0.5 cents per point in value when redeeming points for American Express gift cards.

American Express cardholders generally get either 0.7 or 1 cent per point when using Membership Rewards points to pay for travel booked through the Amex Travel site — depending on what kind of travel you're purchasing. However, after factoring in a points rebate, certain American Express business cards can effectively get up to 1.54 cents per point toward eligible flights.

Booking flights with Amex points

The best value is found when booking flights through Amex Travel or when using points to upgrade your flight. In both cases, American Express cardholders can redeem points at 1 cent per point. This can be a useful redemption option, particularly for inexpensive flights:

Even better, certain American Express business cards can receive a points rebate when cardmembers use Pay With Points to book flights. To be eligible for the rebate, you must either book an economy flight on your selected qualifying airline or business or first class on any airline.

The Business Platinum Card® from American Express cardmembers get a 35% points rebate, up to 1,000,000 points back per calendar year. After factoring in the rebate, Amex Business Platinum cardmembers effectively get 1.54 cents per point in value. Meanwhile, American Express® Business Gold Card cardholders get a 25% points rebate of up to 250,000 points back per calendar year. That effectively yields a 1.33 cents per point redemption rate.

Once you book your flight — whether through American Express or not — you can use Membership Rewards points to upgrade your flight. The Upgrade with Points redemption option lets you use points to bid for an upgrade on over 20 airlines.

Booking hotels with Amex Points

One of the perks of holding The Platinum Card® from American Express or The Business Platinum Card® from American Express is access to luxury hotels via the Fine Hotels & Resorts (FHR) program. By booking one of these hotels through Amex Travel, cardmembers get a slew of perks — including free breakfast, room upgrades, a $100 on-site credit, late checkout and more. Additionally, personal Amex Platinum cardholders get up to $200 back as statement credits per year for eligible prepaid FHR or The Hotel Collection bookings (Hotel Collection requires a minimum two-night stay).

Plus, if you use points to pay for an FHR booking, you can get a redemption rate of 1 cent per point. For all other hotel bookings through Amex Travel, almost all American Express cards get a redemption rate of 0.7 cents per point. That means 10,000 Membership Rewards points would cover $100 towards a stay at a Fine Hotels & Resorts property or $70 at another hotel booked through Amex Travel.

Booking other types of travel

American Express cardholders can also use points to book rental cars, cruises, vacations, and more through Amex Travel. For these types of redemptions, most American Express cardholders get a redemption rate of 0.7 cents per point.

That means 10,000 Membership Rewards points would cover $70 towards other types of travel booked through Amex Travel.

In addition to using points to Cover Your Card Charges, you can redeem points at checkout at several online retailers. With two exceptions noted below, the Pay With Points redemption option provides 0.7 cents per point in value.

That redemption rate is an ever-so-slightly better rate than the 0.6 cents per point that you get when using points to offset card charges. So, if you're planning on redeeming points through Cover Your Card Charges, it's worth seeing if you can make the purchase through one of the participating retailers and use Pay With Points instead.

 You'll get a redemption rate of 0.7 cents per point when using points at checkout at the following retailers:

• Amazon
• Best Buy
• Dell.com
• Grubhub
• JustGiving
• Newegg
• NYC Taxi
• PayPal
• Rite Aid
• Saks Fifth Avenue
• Seamless.com
• Staples

The only exception to this Pay with Points redemption rate is NYC Taxi (1 cent per point).

There's also an option to shop with Membership Rewards points. However, you'll only get 0.5 cents per point with this option, which is an even lower rate than what you'd get by redeeming for a statement credit.

So far, all the redemption options we've covered have provided no more than 1 cent per point in value. Yet, American Express Membership Rewards points are considered some of the most valuable points available. And that's because of American Express' valuable airline and hotel transfer partners.

You can transfer Amex points to 21 airline and hotel partners. With few exceptions, points transfer at a 1:1 ratio. American Express transfer partners include the following:

• Aer Lingus AerClub
• Aeromexico Premier
• Air Canada Aeroplan
• Air France/KLM Flying Blue
• ANA Mileage Club
• Avianca LifeMiles
• British Airways Executive Club
• Cathay Pacific Asia Miles
• Delta SkyMiles
• Emirates Skywards
• Etihad Guest
• Hawaiian Airlines HawaiianMiles
• Iberia Plus
• JetBlue TrueBlue
• Singapore KrisFlyer
• Qantas Frequent Flyer
• Qatar Airways Privilege Club
• Virgin Atlantic Flying Club
• Choice Privileges
• Hilton Honors
• Marriott Bonvoy

Transfer partners are where the real value of Membership Rewards is found. For example, you can transfer 60,000 Membership Rewards points to Aeroplan to book a one-way business class award to Europe on United, Lufthansa, TAP Air Portugal or any other Star Alliance partner:

As of writing, that one-way business class flight between Newark and Lisbon on TAP is currently priced at over $2,400, meaning you'd be getting an amazing value of roughly 4 cents per point once you factor in the taxes and fees.

Or, transfer 90,000 Membership Rewards points to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club to book a round-trip business class award on ANA from the U.S. West Coast to Japan.

Just keep in mind that not all of American Express' transfer partners are as valuable. Choice Privileges and Marriott Bonvoy points typically provide less than 1 cent per point in value. So, you'll generally want to avoid using points for these programs — unless you find a particularly valuable redemption or need to top off your account with a few more points.

Delta SkyMiles

As Delta uses dynamic award pricing, the value of SkyMiles is limited to an average value of around 1.2 cents per mile — although you can sometimes get a higher value than that. So, it's a good idea to check the cash price of any Delta flights before transferring miles. Consider booking cash flights through Amex Travel at 1 cent per point rather than transferring points to Delta SkyMiles to book an award flight. After all, you'll also earn SkyMiles and elite status credits when you use American Express points to buy a cash airfare.

However, for the right redemption, it can make sense to transfer points to Delta. After all, it's hard to beat paying as little as 4,000 points for a one-way award flight:

As of writing, that ticket costs $69, meaning you'd be getting nearly 1.6 cents per point with this redemption after factoring in taxes.

The least-valuable American Express redemption options only provide 0.5 cents per point in value. As there are so many more valuable ways to use Membership Rewards points, these redemption options should be avoided:

• Excise Tax Offset Fee: American Express collects excise tax when you transfer points to U.S.-based airline mileage programs. You have the option to use points to cover this cost, but the redemption rate is only 0.5 cents per point. So, it's better to pay this excise tax out-of-pocket. 
• American Express Gift Cards: The redemption rate for travel, retail and dining gift cards varies between 0.7 and 1.0 cents per point. However, you'll only get 0.5 cents per point when redeeming points for American Express gift cards.
• Shop with Membership Rewards Points: You can buy various merchandise products directly from American Express through the Shop with Membership Rewards Points website. However, you'll only get a value of 0.5 cents per point. So, it's better to purchase merchandise directly and use Cover Your Card Charges to get 0.6 cents per point. Or, you can Pay With Points at Checkout at Amazon, Best Buy, and other retailers at 0.7 cents per point.

For most redemption options, American Express Membership Rewards points are worth no more than 1 cent per point. And some redemptions only provide 0.5 cents per point in value.

However, by maximizing American Express' airline and hotel transfer partners, you can get much more value than this — whether it's booking domestic Delta flights from 4,000 miles each way or a one-way business class trip to Europe for 60,000 miles. These redemptions are often much more valuable.

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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.

For rates and fees of the Blue Business® Plus Credit Card from American Express, click here.

For rates and fees for the Business Platinum card for Amex, click here.

For rates and fees for the American Express Business Gold Card, click here.

For rates and fees for the American Express® Green Card, click here.