Amex Gold vs. Chase Sapphire Preferred Rewards

Most card comparisons make you scroll to the bottom for a verdict. This one opens with it. The American Express Gold Card and the Chase Sapphire Preferred are two of the most popular rewards cards for everyday spending, but they are built for different people: one rewards households that put serious money through restaurants and supermarkets, the other rewards travelers who want flexible points at a low fixed cost. For most readers, a handful of honest questions about where the money already goes settles the choice quickly.

Start with the two sections below. Whichever one reads like a description of your actual spending is almost certainly your card. Everything after that is the supporting analysis — fees, credits, earning rates, and point values — laid out so you can check the call against your own numbers.

Get the Amex Gold if...

Restaurants and supermarkets dominate your budget. The Gold earns 4x Membership Rewards points at restaurants worldwide on up to $50,000 in purchases per year, then 1x, and 4x at U.S. supermarkets on up to $25,000 per year, then 1x. Those are the highest everyday rates available in either category, and the caps are generous enough that most households never brush against them. The Sapphire Preferred tops out at 3x on dining and 3x on online groceries, so every food dollar simply works harder on the Gold.

You will actually use the monthly credits. Amex offsets the $325 annual fee with statement credits worth up to $424 a year in total: up to $120 in Uber Cash ($10 each month), up to $120 in dining credits at select partners ($10 monthly, enrollment required), up to $84 at U.S. Dunkin' locations ($7 monthly, enrollment required), and up to $100 in Resy dining credits split across two halves of the year. When Uber rides, Dunkin' stops, and Resy reservations already show up in your statements, those credits come close to paying for the card. When they do not, the effective cost stays near the full $325.

You book flights and chase airline awards. The card earns 3x on flights booked directly with airlines or through Amex Travel and 5x on prepaid hotels booked through Amex Travel. More importantly for award travelers, Membership Rewards transfers to around 20 partners, a roster that skews heavily toward airlines — more routes, more alliances, and more sweet spots for anyone hunting premium-cabin redemptions.

You are comfortable managing a card actively. The Gold is built for engaged users. Its best-case math depends on enrollment, monthly credit tracking, and steering food purchases to the right card, and the people who do all three are the ones who come out well ahead of the fee. If that sounds like a system you would enjoy running rather than a chore, the ceiling is higher here.

Get the Sapphire Preferred if...

You want strong rewards without homework. The Sapphire Preferred charges $95 a year and asks almost nothing in return. Its $50 annual hotel credit applies to stays booked through Chase Travel, and its 10% anniversary points bonus is calculated automatically from the prior year's spending. There are no monthly coupons to enroll in, no merchant lists to memorize, and nothing to forget in a busy month.

Your spending is spread across categories. The card earns 5x on travel booked through Chase Travel, 3x on dining, 3x on online groceries (excluding Target, Walmart, and wholesale clubs), 3x on select streaming services, and 2x on all other travel. That breadth keeps points flowing even in months when restaurant spending dips, which is exactly where the Gold's earning goes flat.

You redeem for hotels — or want a guaranteed value floor. Chase points are worth 1 cent each as a statement credit and up to 1.5 cents on eligible travel through Points Boost, with select premium-cabin flights reaching higher still. The transfer list of roughly 14 partners includes World of Hyatt, widely regarded as one of the most valuable transfer options available — and one with no equivalent in the Amex program.

You spend moderately and value simplicity. For most people with moderate spending, the Preferred is the easier card to justify, because none of its value depends on capturing coupons before they expire. The anniversary bonus posts on its own, and the Points Boost floor applies whenever you book eligible travel — no enrollment, no calendar reminders.

Welcome offer (verified June 11, 2026 on the issuer's site): 75,000 bonus points after $5,000 in purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.

Still Torn? Run the Break-Even Math

The fee gap between the cards is $230 a year: $325 for the Gold against $95 for the Preferred. On restaurant and U.S. supermarket spending, the Gold out-earns the Sapphire Preferred by exactly one point per dollar — 4x versus 3x. At the 1-cent redemption floor both programs share, that extra point is worth roughly a penny per dollar of food spending. Closing a $230 gap a penny at a time takes about $23,000 a year in combined restaurant and supermarket purchases ($230 ÷ $0.01) before the Gold's richer earning, on its own, pays for its higher fee.

Few households clear that bar on earning alone, which is why the statement credits carry so much weight in this comparison. Consider a household that puts $1,000 a month — $12,000 a year — through restaurants and supermarkets:

At that level the Preferred leads by $110 before any credits enter the picture. Capture at least $110 of the Gold's $424 in available credits — the $120 in annual Uber Cash alone would do it — and the Gold pulls ahead. Let the credits lapse and the Preferred's lead holds. Double the food spending to $24,000 a year and the gap nearly closes on earning alone: 96,000 Gold points worth $960 against 72,000 Preferred points worth $720 leaves the Gold ahead by $10 after both fees, before a single credit is used.

The example also flatters the Preferred on groceries. Its 3x grocery rate applies only to online orders, and in-store supermarket purchases fall outside every bonus category, earning just 1x. A household that buys groceries in person is really comparing 4x against 1x on that slice of the budget, which widens the Gold's lead beyond what the table shows.

One wrinkle cuts the other way. Preferred points redeemed through Points Boost can be worth up to 1.5 cents apiece on eligible travel, so the 36,000 points from the worked example could stretch to $540 instead of $360. If portal redemptions are your style, the bar the Gold has to clear rises accordingly; if you transfer points to partners instead, the comparison tightens again.

Fees and Credits, Line by Line

The Gold's $325 fee looks steep until you tally the credits behind it — and looks steep again once you read the delivery terms. Used in full, the four credits total $424 a year:

None of it is automatic. Most of these credits require enrollment, arrive in small monthly increments, and apply only at specific merchants, so the value materializes only when your routine already includes those purchases. A useful discipline when running your own numbers: count any credit you would not naturally spend as worth zero. Coupons that change your behavior are not savings.

The Sapphire Preferred's $95 fee comes with a shorter, simpler ledger — the $50 Chase Travel hotel credit and the 10% anniversary points bonus. Neither requires enrollment or monthly attention, which is precisely why the Preferred's advertised value is so much easier to capture in full.

Earning Rates in Detail

Outside the food categories, the two cards behave very differently. The Gold's travel earning is portal-specific: 3x on flights booked directly with airlines or through Amex Travel, 5x on prepaid hotels through Amex Travel, and 1x on everything else — including travel booked anywhere else. The Preferred covers travel more broadly at 5x through Chase Travel and 2x on all other travel, then adds 3x on select streaming. Both cards earn 1x on general purchases, and neither charges foreign transaction fees.

The pattern is plain in the table: the Gold spikes high in two categories and goes flat nearly everywhere else, while the Preferred earns 2x–5x across a wider footprint. Concentrated food spending favors the spike; varied spending favors the spread.

Both 4x categories carry annual ceilings — $50,000 at restaurants and $25,000 at U.S. supermarkets — after which earning falls to 1x. Track your totals if your food spending runs unusually high.

Point Value and Transfer Partners

Earning rates are only half of any rewards equation, because redemption decides the real return. Chase Ultimate Rewards points carry a dependable floor — 1 cent each as a statement credit, up to 1.5 cents on eligible travel through Points Boost, and more on select premium-cabin flights. American Express Membership Rewards points redeem at a flat 1 cent through Amex Travel, so the program leans almost entirely on transfers for outsized value.

Both programs reward transfers over portal redemptions for travelers willing to plan award bookings, but the partner lists pull in different directions. Amex's roughly 20 partners skew toward airlines, which suits flyers working award charts across multiple alliances. Chase's tighter list of about 14 includes World of Hyatt — and for travelers who prioritize hotel redemptions, that single partnership can outweigh the larger airline lineup.

Frequently Asked Questions