Navy Federal More Rewards American Express Card

Rewards by category

Our take

The gate comes first, because it is absolute. Navy Federal Credit Union's field of membership is closed: the armed forces, veterans, Department of Defense personnel, and their family members. There is no donation and no association you can join to work your way in, which is precisely what separates it from PenFed, whose door is open to the general public. If you qualify, the More Rewards American Express deserves a serious look; if you do not, there is no workaround worth chasing.

It charges no annual fee and earns 3 points per dollar at supermarkets, on gas, on transit, and on dining, with 1x on everything else. Points are worth a cent apiece, so 3x is a straight 3% with no points-currency guesswork to do. The remarkable part is what is missing from that sentence: there is no cap. Most no-fee cards advertising 3% meter it at a few thousand dollars a year and then pay base rate, while this one holds the rate all year across four of the biggest lines in an ordinary budget. There is also no foreign transaction fee.

To position it honestly: our grocery and dining tables are led by cards paying more than 3%, so this is not the top of either list. But those higher rates almost always arrive with caps, an annual fee, or both, and this card has neither. For a member who wants one card to cover the supermarket, the pump, the train, and the restaurant tab without doing arithmetic in the checkout line, it is one of the strongest no-fee everyday cards in our catalog. Carry it as the wallet's workhorse and add a flat-rate card to catch the 1x purchases.

The math

Run $400 a month of dining through this card and you're earning about $144 a year at our conservative valuations. There's no annual fee to earn back — everything above the 1x base rate is pure upside.

Where it lands in our rankings: #5 for transit & rideshare

Key benefits

• No annual fee
• No foreign transaction fees

Common questions

Does Navy Federal More Rewards American Express Card have an annual fee?

No — Navy Federal More Rewards American Express Card has no annual fee.

What does Navy Federal More Rewards American Express Card earn on dining?

3x on dining.

What rewards does Navy Federal More Rewards American Express Card earn on everything else?

1x on all other purchases, in Navy Federal More Rewards.

Can you join Navy Federal without a military connection?

No. The field of membership is closed to the armed forces, veterans, Department of Defense personnel, and their family members. There is no charity donation, association membership, or other route in, which is the key difference from PenFed, where the general public can join. If none of those descriptions fit you or a family member, the More Rewards Amex is not obtainable, and no application strategy changes that.

Are the 3x categories on the More Rewards Amex capped?

No, and that is the whole point of the card. Supermarkets, gas, transit, and dining all earn 3 points per dollar with no annual spending limit, and each point is worth a cent, so it behaves as a flat 3% that never steps down partway through the year. Everything outside those four categories earns 1x, so keep a flat-rate card alongside it for general spending.

Related reading

• How we value points and miles (and why our numbers are lower than everyone else's)SwipeCaddy ranks cards by reward rate × a conservative cash value per point: 1¢ for cash back and transferable points (Chase, Amex, Citi, Capital One, Bilt), 1.1–1.3¢ for airline miles, 0.4–1.4¢ for hotel points, and 0.8–0.9¢ for store currencies. Optimistic transfer values are recorded for context but never ranked, because most people never achieve them.