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American Express Membership Rewards (US) (Edit)

American Express's Membership Rewards program offers a wide variety of partners. Members can directly redeem points for travel on airlines or transfer points to airline frequent flyer accounts, allowing flexibility in choosing rewards. Points are earned on a $1 = 1 point basis and frequent promotions offer bonus points or double points on purchases with AMEX partners.

Features

Membership Rewards is a good choice for those who are not concerned with point transfers to American and United (but see below). There is a reward available at every possible point level, for both frequent and infrequent travelers alike.

Membership Rewards offers the widest variety of rewards of any similar credit card program. Members can choose travel-related rewards such as frequent flyer miles, air, car or hotel certificates, multi-night hotel stays or cruises, or they can redeem points for thousands of non-travel rewards including books, gift certificates, pool tables, electronics or tickets to the Masters and two rounds of golf at Augusta.

Point transfers to airlines and hotels take approximately three business days. Redemption of points for merchandise can take up to several weeks, but shipping is free so there is no cost to redeem points.

American Express's airline partners for direct point to mile transfers are All Nippon Airways, LatinPass, Mexicana, Aeromexico, Korean Air, Virgin Atlantic, Hawaiian Airlines, Continental Airlines, US Airways, Delta Air Lines, El Al Israel Airlines and Southwest Airlines. Conspicuously missing from this list is any airline from one of the two major worldwide alliances, OneWorld. This may be a deal-breaker for people committed to American Airlines, since there is no efficient way of getting miles from AMEX to American or any other OneWorld airline. The situation with Star Alliance is a bit different. While it's not possible to transfer points to United or many other Star Alliance programs, it is possible to obtain free flights on just about any Star Alliance airline via All Nippon Airways or US Airways by transferring points into one of those programs, and then obtaining a free ticket on any eligible Star Alliance airline, including United, Lufthansa, Singapore Air, and many others.

Pros

Huge variety of rewards, something for everyoneFree shipping on all rewardsPoint transfers to other programs only take about three business daysRewards are available from one point to 1,000,000 pointsAbility to turn points into money with MilePointOnline redemption.

Cons

Not partnered with OneWorld at all or the most common Star Alliance airline, United. Poor transfer ratio to some programs (e.g., 3 points = 1 Starwood point). Must call to register other frequent traveler programs with AMEX before making first transfer to that program. Cannot transfer points to other people's airline or hotel programs unless they are additional cardholders. AMEX annual fee + $40 Membership Rewards fee is at least $95 per year, making it more expensive than most airline or hotel branded Visa/Mastercard cards.