The card and the membership are one decision

The rewards card pays its top rate at Amazon and Whole Foods only while you hold an eligible membership; without it, the same card pays a lower rate (5% versus 3%, checked 2026-10-03). So "is the card worth it" and "is the membership worth it" cannot be answered apart. Most calculators price one and ignore the other. This one does the pair.

The method

Rewards are computed on annual spend: 5% at Amazon and Whole Foods with an eligible membership, 3% without, 2% on gas, restaurants and transit either way, 1% on everything else. Points are worth $1 per 100 points when redeemed at Amazon — worth less if redeemed for cash back. The one-time sign-up gift card is reported but never netted into the yearly comparison, because it happens once and the fee happens every year.

Worked examples

1. $400 a month at Amazon — the upgrade does not pay for itself

Annual qualifying spend: $4,800. The 5% rate earns $240.00; the 3% rate earns $144.00. The higher rate is therefore worth $96.00 a year — less than the $139.00 annual fee.

Break-even spend: $139.00 ÷ the 2% gap between 5% and 3 = $6,950.00 of qualifying spend per year, about $579.17 a month. Below that, the card's higher rate is not paying for the membership on its own; the membership has to earn its keep through delivery, video and the rest, which the other calculator prices. The section below explains why other pages quote a lower number for the same card.

2. $700 at Amazon plus $200 at Whole Foods — the upgrade clears the fee

Annual qualifying spend: $10,800. At 5% that is $540.00; at 3% it is $324.00. The higher rate is worth $216.00 a year, which clears the $139.00 fee with $77.00 to spare — and it means the membership is effectively paid for before you value delivery, video, or anything else.

Net comparison: card plus membership, $540.00 − the $139.00 annual fee = $401.00 a year; card without a membership, $324.00. The membership wins here because the spend is big enough.

Why this card has two break-even numbers

Search for this card and you will meet two different break-even figures. The pages that rank highest print one of them and explain neither figure, so here is the working behind both. They are arithmetic on the same two published rates, and they answer different questions.

• $6,950.00 of qualifying spend a year (about $579.17 a month) is the figure this site publishes in the worked example above. It is the honest one for "does the membership pay for itself through the card", because a membership lifts the rate by 2% (5% against 3%) and the same card still pays the lower rate without one. Only that 2% gap is attributable to the fee, so the fee has to be earned back at the gap: $139.00 ÷ 2% = $6,950.00.
• $2,780.00 a year (about $231.67 a month) is the figure the card reviews print. It treats the membership as creating the whole 5% rate and ignores the 3% the card pays anyway: $139.00 ÷ 5% = $2,780.00. That is the right number only if you would not carry the card at all without a membership.

So the lower figure is not a correction of the higher one and the higher one is not a mistake: they price two different decisions. If you are asking whether the membership is worth buying to improve a card you would hold regardless, the $6,950.00 figure is yours. If the membership is the only reason you would open the card, the $2,780.00 figure applies. Neither figure credits the delivery, the video, or anything else in the membership — the membership calculator prices those separately.

Both figures are derived from two numbers, and both of those numbers are dated and sourced like every other figure on this site: the card's rates were read from the card's own page and the membership price from the plan page, both on 2026-10-03. When the pages ranking for this card were checked on 2026-10-03, the reviews printed the full-rate figure, one card site printed the gap figure, and none of them said which comparison it was making.

The warning that matters more than the rewards

The card's variable interest rate is 18.74% to 27.49% (checked 2026-10-03; confirm it on the issuer's page before applying). Rewards are paid on spending; interest is charged on balances, and it is charged at a much higher rate than any reward. Carrying a $1,000 balance for a year costs roughly $187 at the low end of that range or $275 at the high end — more than the entire reward in either example above. If you would carry a balance, no rewards rate on this page is worth it. That is arithmetic, not a lecture.

Who should NOT get the card

• Anyone who would carry a balance. Covered above, and it is the most common way a rewards card loses money.
• Anyone whose main spending is not at the two retailers named. Below the break-even spend, a flat-rate cash-back card usually beats it.
• Anyone who would open the card because of the one-time sign-up gift card. One-time money is the weakest reason to take on a credit account.
• Anyone shopping for a mortgage or loan soon. A new credit account affects your credit file; that is a real cost this calculator cannot price.
• Anyone hoping the card makes the membership free. At low spend it does the opposite: the higher rate is worth less than the fee.

Questions we get

Rates and thresholds on this page were read from Amazon's card page, Amazon's card-rewards help page and the issuer's card page on 2026-10-03. The full list with links is on the method page.