20,159 grads of the Ultimate Military Credit Cards Course already know why the
American Express Platinum Card® is my #1 recommended card
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American Express generously provides special military protections on their cards for active duty and military spouses. These benefits apply to all Amex personal cards, no matter how many you have.
This includes American Express Platinum Card®.
In general, you can only earn a welcome offer once per card per lifetime, so opening multiple American Express Platinum Cards® won't allow you multiple welcome offers.
Why Have Multiple Amex Platinum Cards®
Usually, if a benefit is per card account, such as the up to $300 per year lululemon credit (enrollment required), the benefit “stack,” so each account you have open adds more annual benefits.
| Number of Cards | x up to $300 lululemon credit | x up to $75 per quarter lululemon credit |
| 1 | $300 | $75 |
| 2 | $600 | $150 |
| 3 | $900 | $225 |
| 4 | $1,200 | $300 |
| 5 | $1,500 | $375 |
| 6 | $1,800 | $450 |
| 7 | $2,100 | $525 |
| 8 | $2,400 | $600 |
| 9 | $2,700 | $675 |
| 10 | $3,000 | $750 |
Here is an example of splitting a $461 lululemon purchase across 6 Amex Platinum Cards®.
In the lululemon credit example, instead of receiving $75 per quarter in credit, you could receive up to $750 per quarter or up to $3,000 per year, if you had 10 Amex Platinum Cards® open.
Amex has rules about how many cards you can have per person.
In general, you can have 10 cards without a preset spending limit (such as the American Express Platinum Card®, the American Express® Gold Card or the American Express Green Card) and 5 credit cards (such as the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card).
So a military family might have:
- 20 American Express Platinum Card® (10 for each person in the marriage)
- 10 Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card (5 for each person in the marriage)
The Amex special military protections apply to all personal card accounts. We did a podcast episode explaining the state of military credit cards:
How to Open Multiple Amex Platinum Cards®
There are 2 easy ways to open multiple accounts of American Express Platinum Cards®:
- Directly apply – You can directly apply for another Amex Platinum Card® every 91 days.
- Upgrade lower tier cards – You can upgrade your American Express® Gold Card or the American Express Green Card
When directly applying, simply go through my link American Express Platinum Card® (thanks!) or use a friend's referral link. You probably won't be eligible for another welcome bonus offer, but you can open up another account.
If you're having trouble applying for another Amex Platinum card, try an incognito browser. You'll be able to add the card to your American Express login at americanexpress.com after you are approved for the new card account.
You can upgrade your lower tier American Express cards, the American Express® Gold Card or the American Express Green Card, to additional Amex Platinum Cards®. You can do this either while you're logged into your primary Amex account or sometimes you'll need to separate the cards into a secondary Amex login account. See details of that process in these links:
Are you saying you can have a regular vanilla Plat card and apply for another 91 days after? Tried that today through incognito and received a message that they need more information. Is that a common process when trying to grab a second platinum?
Yes. I’m not sure, what information did they ask for?
Spencer, first of all, thank you so much for making this website – it is so informative and helpful!!!! I currently have the AMEX Platinum, Chase Sapphire Reserve, and just signed up for the AMEX Gold (I was eligible for a 60,000 point sign on bonus).
1) Is it useful to sign up for the AMEX Green, and then upgrade to Platinum if we can receive a sign on bonus with the Green, similar to how I did with the Gold?
2) My credit score right now is in the 820s; I had some unexpected expenses and had to slowly pay down my cards over about a year, so demonstrated that I could carry debt and pay it off over time if needed, which boosted my score). Have you found that opening multiple credit accounts has impacted your credit score, even if you aren’t using them / paying them off every month?
3) The fact that we can have multiple AMEX Platinum cards and stack these rewards (lululemon, resy, saks fifth avenue, united travel bank, uber, digital entertainment credit.. and oura ring since if you had more than one platinum and stacked them, you could afford one…) seems like a fluke / something they aren’t quite realizing… Aka, it seems too good to be true. How is this true? Sorry, I am truly flabbergasted that this is “allowed” (I’m not complaining… I just don’t believe it).
Hey Ken, first off well done on the cards so far!
1. Yes, that is useful. It was lucky you were eligible for the Amex Gold welcome offer after already having an Amex Platinum. Check the Amex family language rules.
2. I have 30+ credit cards and an 800+ credit score. I use maybe 3-10 of them in any given month. Having multiple cards actually helps your score. Not using them has no impact. I never carry a balance. I never recommend you carry a balance.
3. I don’t know. It’s been allowed for over 10 years now. Perhaps they will close the loophole one day. I still have 6 Amex Platinums with fees waived 3 years after I separated from the military. I know one guy who has 26 Amex Platinums between him and his wife. As long as you play by the rules of the game, it seems to be allowed for now.
Spenser,
When you say “stack” do you mean that you would have to split the purchases across 10 different cards or could you use one card with 10 open and get a $750 credit for just one card?
Currently only have 1 platinum and weighing the mental cost of trying to balance that if it is the former.
Thanks – Ty
Split the purchase across 10 different cards. Mental cost is pretty minimal when annual fees are reduced to $0.