Chase, Amex, Citi, Capital One and Bilt Points on Amazon

The five checkout rates Amazon prints, side by side

Amazon runs a program called Shop with Points, and each participating bank has its own page inside it. Amazon's help text says the value of points at Amazon is set by the bank, can change, and is shown under your enrolled programs. The numbers below come from those program pages, read on October 23, 2026. They are the conversion rates at checkout, not a valuation of the currency, and they say nothing about what the same points return on a flight.

A column is added for the dollars one thousand points or miles buy, because that is the unit most people carry in their head. The last column converts the rate into points needed per $100 of Amazon purchase, which is the number that matters when you stand at checkout with a balance.

How to read a rate that the bank can change

Two of the five pages say it in the same words: the bank has the right to change point to dollar conversion rates at any time. Chase's supplement says so, and so does the Citi program page. That sentence matters more than the number beside it. The table is a snapshot, and a snapshot is only useful alongside the habit of reading the rate on your own checkout screen before you click. If the screen shows a different figure than the table, the screen governs.

The second thing to read is what the rate is a rate of. Amex's wording is a statement credit: your card is charged the full purchase and a credit for the points follows. Chase and Citi describe points being debited from the balance as the order is placed. Bilt says points are deducted from the order total and shown as Rewards Points in the order summary. The mechanics differ, but the arithmetic you do is the same: points used multiplied by the rate gives the dollars removed from your bill.

Finally, read what the rate leaves out. None of the five pages promises that every item on Amazon is eligible. Amazon's help text says rewards cannot be used for all purchases and points to an exclusions list. Amazon also says only one rewards program can be applied to a single order, so a household with two banks cannot split one order between Chase and Amex points. And there is no fee for using points at Amazon, which means the rate in the table is the whole cost.

What each bank says about the mechanics

The rates are only half of each bank's terms. The other half decides whether the redemption goes smoothly, and a few of those clauses are easy to miss.

Amex's November 2026 Membership Rewards terms describe Pay with Points at Amazon as a charge plus a credit. The terms give an example from another merchant: spend $500 and use points to cover $300, and your card shows a $500 charge and a $300 statement credit. The terms add that using Pay with Points requires a charge to your card account and is subject to your cardmember agreement, so a card that cannot make a purchase cannot use points either, and that the credit can appear in a different billing cycle from the charge. You must still pay the minimum due on each statement by its due date, even when you expect a credit.

Amex also requires the Rewards Account to be linked to your Amazon account. The terms say to allow up to 72 hours for the link, and that if you want to use points immediately after adding the card you should link through the Learn More option at checkout. A person who adds a card the night before a purchase and sees no points balance has probably met this clause, not a bug.

Amex has a version limitation as well: if the only card linked to your Rewards Account is a legacy card, Pay with Points is available for Amex Travel but not for third-party brands such as Amazon. Check that your own card is eligible before relying on the option.

Chase's supplement says the enrollment is limited to the Chase credit card account you select, that authorized users on the card can redeem points from the account through Shop with Points once they complete registration, and that Chase will debit the points as the order is placed. Citi's page lists the eligible Citi cards by name and says there is no fee to redeem at Amazon. Capital One says you can apply as many miles to a purchase as you have, with your Capital One card paying the rest if you fall short.

Bilt's page adds a sentence about comparison that is worth quoting in spirit: it says Bilt Points redeemed at Amazon are worth the same or more than the cash equivalent of redeeming them as a statement credit in the Bilt app. That is Bilt describing its own two options, not a claim about any other bank, but it tells you the Amazon rate is not a penalty relative to Bilt's own cash option.

Gift cards and cash back: the rates that are printed, and the ones that are not

Amazon is one way to turn points into dollars. Gift cards, statement credits and deposits are the others, and the banks are less consistent about printing their rates. Here is what could be read on October 23, 2026 without logging in.

Chase's education page says points are typically worth 1 cent each when redeemed for cash back or gift cards, and that the point value is 1 cent when redeeming for gift cards, though Chase sometimes discounts certain gift cards, which raises the value per point for those cards. The same page says 10,000 points are typically worth $100 when redeemed toward gift cards, cash back or a statement credit. So for Chase the gift card and cash rate is $0.01 a point, and Amazon checkout is $0.008. The 0.2 cent gap is the cost of buying Amazon items directly with points instead of buying an Amazon gift card with them, where the gift card is available.

Amex's terms print a rate for one redemption: for a checking account deposit, 1,000 points buy an $8 deposit, and a Business Checking account with a linked Business Platinum Card gets $10 per 1,000 points for the first 1,000,000 points a calendar year. The terms do not print a per-point rate for statement credits or gift cards. They do print the rules: you must redeem points worth at least $1 for a statement credit, the credit usually appears within 48 hours while the points leave your balance immediately, all redemptions are final, and gift cards have no cash value and cannot be reversed once redeemed. Digital gift cards live in a wallet, and the terms warn that if you close all of the products on the Rewards Account you redeemed from, you lose access to the wallet, so keep the gift card details before closing; the terms say to call the number on the back of the card if you can no longer reach it.

For Citi, Capital One and Bilt the pages read this run did not print a per-point rate for gift cards or statement credits. Capital One's guide says you can redeem miles for gift cards, for cash back as a statement credit or a check, with the credit appearing in as little as two to three business days and checks mailed within three business days. Citi's card page points to thankyou.com for gift cards and cash back. The honest summary is that the redemption screen is the only place those rates are visible, and that no rate for them is printed here because none could be read.

Same bank, different exits: the printed rates side by side

A bank's Amazon rate is one of several fixed rates it prints, and the spread between them is the real decision. The table collects every per-point dollar figure the pages read show for each bank. A dash means the pages read printed no figure, not that none exists. The Amex travel-portal figures come from this site's Pay with Points on Amex Travel guide, which quotes Amex's published rates for flights and prepaid hotels.

The spread is widest at Amex. Its flight rate on Amex Travel is 1 cent a point and its Amazon rate is 0.7, so the same point is worth 43 percent more on a portal flight than at Amazon checkout. A holder with an Amex checking account has a third printed exit: $8 per 1,000 points, or 0.8 cents, with $10 per 1,000 for a Business Checking account linked to a Business Platinum Card up to 1,000,000 points a year. Chase prints a smaller spread, 0.8 cents at Amazon against 1 cent for gift cards and cash back, a 25 percent premium for not buying from Amazon with points. Bilt says Amazon redemptions are worth the same or more than its in-app statement credit, which makes Amazon the floor for Bilt rather than a penalty. Citi and Capital One print only the Amazon figure on the pages read.

Worked example: one $150 order at five banks

This is an arithmetic illustration with stated inputs. The order is a $150 item with free shipping and no sales tax, to keep the division clean. The question is how many points each bank spends, using the rates printed above on October 23, 2026. If your screen shows a different rate, replace the rate column and redo the division.

The division is the order price divided by the dollars per point. At Chase's $0.008, $150 divided by $0.008 is 18,750 points. At Amex's $0.007 it is 21,428.57, which rounds to 21,429. Bilt's $7 per 1,000 gives the same 21,429. Citi's $8 per 1,000 gives 18,750, and Capital One's 125 miles per dollar gives 18,750 miles.

The spread between the cheapest and the dearest of the five is 2,679 points, about 14 percent more points at Amex and Bilt for the same item. That says nothing about which bank is better overall. It only says that if you hold balances in two currencies and both are eligible, the one with the higher printed rate spends fewer points for this purchase. Since Amazon allows one program per order, the choice is made before checkout.

The floor test: when a travel booking beats the checkout rate

The checkout rate matters most as a floor. If a booking you are considering returns less per point than what Amazon pays, you would be better served spending the points on a $150 order and paying for the booking another way. Taken alone, that sentence sounds obvious. The useful part is to run it with real numbers for the booking in front of you, using the site's method: cash price minus the cash that survives, divided by the points required.

Suppose a one-way flight costs $320 in cash, and an airline partner prices the same flight at 24,000 points plus $5.60 in fees that survive (the fee is the September 11 Security Fee Delta prints per one-way trip, used here as a stated assumption). The value on this booking is ($320 minus $5.60) divided by 24,000, which is 1.31 cents per point. That is higher than $0.008, so the transfer clears the Amazon floor by 0.51 cents a point at a 1:1 ratio. At a 5:3 ratio such as the one Capital One prints for JetBlue, the same 24,000 partner points cost 40,000 bank miles, and the value drops to ($320 minus $5.60) divided by 40,000, or 0.79 cents per mile, which is below the 0.8 cent checkout rate by a hair. The floor test is how a ratio quietly turns a good-looking booking into a break-even one.

The other direction of the same test is why the floor is only a floor. A $320 flight that also costs $320 at the checkout of a travel portal, at a rate of 1 cent a point, needs 32,000 points. Neither the portal nor Amazon is wrong; they are two ways of spending, and the arithmetic is simply how you see which one uses fewer points. The Cash or Points Calculator runs this division for a booking you enter, and the points versus cash back guide sets out when the plain cash option wins on its own.

Returns, refunds and what comes back as points

A rate only tells you the price of buying. The return rules tell you what you get back, and they differ in ways that change the real cost of an impulse purchase.

Amazon's help text says purchases made with points follow Amazon's standard return policies and that the bank, not Amazon, handles the points side. Amex's terms say that if any portion of a purchase made with Pay with Points is refunded, you receive a statement credit for the refund and you should call the number on the back of your card if you want points reinstated instead. That means the default for an Amex refund is dollars, not points, and getting points back is a request. The same clause governs a Ticketmaster order paid with Pay with Points, which the comparison of points for event tickets sets beside the refund terms of the Chase, Citi and Capital One ticket programs. Citi says that if products are returned you are refunded the amount charged to your card first, followed by a refund of your ThankYou Points, and that if the points cannot be refunded you may be reimbursed another way. Chase's supplement defers to additional Chase and Amazon terms. Capital One says purchases made with its rewards follow Amazon's standard return policies.

The consequence is a small but real preference. If you expect a return, the bank that gives points back automatically is the one whose points you are sure to keep. If the bank gives you dollars, you have turned points into cash at the printed rate and the round trip is closed. Neither is a loss, but the second can change what you intended to do with the points. Flights bought in a travel portal split the same way, and the portal flight cancellation guide sets out the Amex and Chase windows and what each portal's documents print about points.

Targeted offers, promotions and how to price them

Amazon's help text says Shop with Points promotions can be applied alongside other Amazon promotions, coupons and gift cards unless otherwise noted. Banks run promotions from time to time that change what a point buys at Amazon: a limited-time boost, a one-point-per-cent offer for selected cardholders, a discount for using a particular card. This site records none of them as standing policy. They are dated and often targeted, which means two readers can see different offers on the same day.

The way to price one is to turn it into an effective rate. If an offer reduces the order from $150 to $135 and you pay with points at $0.008, you spend 16,875 points for $150 of goods, an effective rate of $150 divided by 16,875, or 0.89 cents a point. If the offer is a bonus in points rather than a discount, divide the order by the points you actually spent after the bonus. Writing the effective rate down lets you compare it to the floor, and to the return of a flight, without relying on a headline.

Two cautions. A promotion that requires spending first and returns points later is a reward on spending, not a rate for redemption, and it should not be mixed into the table above. And a promotion on a particular category can change what is eligible, so read the offer's terms before assuming that the rate applies to the item you want.

Where points at Amazon are the wrong tool

There are four situations where the printed rate says you should stop. The first is when you are about to transfer: points that leave a bank cannot come back, so the Amazon rate is a floor you check before transferring, not an alternative after. The second is when the purchase is one you would not otherwise make; points that turn a planned trip into an Amazon order are not being spent efficiently, they are being spent because they are there.

The third is when your balance is small and a bank's expiry or closure rule will erase it. The small balance guide works through that case, and when points expire records each issuer's rule. The fourth is when an Amex statement credit would land after you want to use the credit line; because the charge hits the card at full price first, a card near its limit may decline the purchase, and the terms say you cannot use Pay with Points if you cannot make the charge.