Amex Blue Cash Everyday

The Blue Cash Everyday is American Express's no-fee household card, aimed at people whose spending concentrates in the supermarket aisle, at the pump and in online checkouts. It pays 3% at US supermarkets, 3% on US online retail and 3% at US gas stations, each capped at $6,000 a year, with 1% on everything else. Approval generally starts at good credit, roughly 670 or higher. Because it runs on the American Express network rather than Visa or Mastercard, acceptance is broad across the United States but thinner at small independent merchants. The caps are the part most applicants overlook. Each 3% category tops out at $6,000 of annual purchases, which is $180 of cash back per category and $540 across all three if you fully use every one. That is a solid return for a card that costs nothing, but it also means the card is sized for an average household rather than a heavy spender: a family spending $12,000 a year at the supermarket earns 3% on half of it and 1% on the rest. The welcome offer is personalized and runs as high as $200 back after $2,000 in the first six months, so the offer you are actually shown when you apply may be smaller than the headline. There is no annual fee, so nothing needs to be recovered. The trade is that the free version deliberately earns less than Amex's paid grocery card, and that gap only matters if your supermarket spending is large enough to push past these caps every year. On the borrowing side, the regular APR is 19.49% to 28.49% variable, toward the higher end of the no-fee market, softened for new cardholders by a 0% intro APR for 15 months on purchases and balance transfers. Treat that window as a fixed term with a hard deadline rather than as breathing room, because the rate that follows will overwhelm 3% earnings quickly. Pass on it if your grocery bill is large enough that the caps bind every year, in which case the fee-charging version does the same job better, or if you shop mainly at warehouse clubs and superstores, which frequently do not code as supermarkets. It is also the wrong pick if you cannot live with Amex acceptance at small merchants, or if you prefer one flat rate on everything, since roughly three quarters of a typical household budget still earns 1% here.