American Express cards offer genuinely excellent rewards in the UK, often significantly better than Visa or Mastercard alternatives. The catch, as anyone who’s had an Amex declined at their local pub knows, is that acceptance can be patchy. The question is whether the rewards are good enough to justify the hassle of carrying a backup card.
The acceptance situation has improved substantially over the past few years thanks to Amex’s OptBlue programme, which integrates Amex processing through standard payment terminals at lower fees. Current estimates put UK acceptance at around 70% of merchants overall, though this varies considerably by type of business. You’ll have no issues at Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Amazon, or Shell stations. Major chains have almost universally accepted Amex at this point. Where you’ll run into problems is independent restaurants, small shops, and tradespeople.
The reason for limited acceptance is simple economics. Amex charges merchants 1.5% to 3.5% in processing fees, compared to 0.3% to 1.5% for Visa and Mastercard. A small restaurant operating on thin margins simply can’t afford to give up an extra 2% of revenue just to accept Amex. You can’t really blame them, even if it’s inconvenient for you.
The regional variation is quite pronounced. In central London, you’ll find Amex works at 80-85% of places. Major cities like Manchester and Birmingham are around 70-75%. But if you live in a rural area or small town, you might struggle to use Amex for more than half your purchases. This matters when deciding whether an Amex card makes sense for you.
Here’s the practical reality: you absolutely cannot rely on Amex as your only card in the UK. You need a Visa or Mastercard backup, full stop. The approach that works is to start every transaction with your Amex to earn the superior rewards, and if it’s declined, immediately switch to your backup without making a fuss. This happens often enough that most cashiers don’t even blink. Within a few weeks, you’ll have a mental map of which places accept Amex and which don’t in your regular routine.
The maths on whether Amex makes sense despite the acceptance issues is actually quite favourable. Let’s say you have an Amex Gold card with its £195 annual fee, and you spend £2,000 monthly. Even if Amex is only accepted 70% of the time, you’re still earning dramatically more points than a standard cashback card would give you on that same spending. The rewards on groceries and restaurants alone typically outweigh the annual fee and acceptance limitations.
Where Amex stops making sense is if your spending is primarily at places that don’t accept it. If you mostly shop at independent businesses, live in a rural area, or just find the two-card juggling act annoying, you’re probably better off with a straightforward Mastercard or Visa credit card.
The international picture varies wildly. In the United States, Amex is accepted virtually everywhere and you’ll have zero issues. In Europe, acceptance is similar to the UK at 50-70% depending on the country. In most of Asia outside of Japan, forget it. You absolutely need backup cards when travelling abroad. That said, Amex typically charges a 2.99% currency conversion fee, so you may want to have a card which either allows you to have ‘wallets’ in different currencies - Wise and Revolut for example - or that does not charge a currency conversion fee.
The bottom line is that Amex in the UK works well if you’re organised and spend primarily at larger retailers and chains. The rewards can be very good, often with strong signing up bonuses. But if you value simplicity over optimisation, or if your lifestyle involves mostly smaller independent businesses, it may not be worth the annual fee.