American Express · Last verified September 8, 2026
American Express Platinum
The best lounge access, if you can use the credits.
TRI Score
89.0
Excellent
#3 Best Premium Credit Cards
Overview
Our assessment
Platinum's benefit stack is the widest we evaluate and also the most fragmented. Its score reflects real friction: many credits are monthly, merchant-specific, and easy to forget.
Best for
- Frequent flyers wanting lounge access
- Travellers who use hotel status
Not ideal for
- People who dislike tracking credits
Score breakdown
Why it scored 89.0
- Capability30%
- 94
- Value20%
- 80
- Ease of Use15%
- 84
- Reliability15%
- 92
- Professional Utility10%
- 90
- Momentum10%
- 86
How much the product can actually do, and how well it does the core job.
What you get for the price, including what the free plan really covers.
Time from signup to useful result, without training or a consultant.
Consistency, uptime, support responsiveness and predictable behaviour.
How well it fits real professional workflows, not demos.
Rate of meaningful improvement over the last two evaluation cycles.
Trade-offs
Strengths and weaknesses
- Best lounge network
- Strong hotel and airline benefits
- Highest fee in the category
- Coupon-book credit structure
Score history
How the score moved
- Jan 202686.6
- Apr 202687.4
- Jun 202688.2
- Sep 202689.0Latest evaluation cycle.
Head-to-head
Compared with
- No published head-to-heads yet.
Alternatives
Others in this category
Evidence
Sources
- Public dataPublic pricing and documentation
Where a claim could not be verified, we label it rather than estimate it. Read the methodology.