American Express is cutting one of its longstanding but lesser known lounge arrangements, and it’s a change cardmembers likely won’t be happy about.
Continue reading: Amex Cuts Lufthansa Lounge Access As Of October 2026
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Lufthansa lounges aren't great and at many airport locations, AMEX cardholders could only access them during non peak hours.
Problem is you can’t buy first class tickets for intra eu flights
Downgraded lounge experience loading. Goodbye first class lounge, hello senator lounge.
On the bright side - I no longer need to prioritise LH tickets in Europe or force MUC/FRA stopovers
What makes you think that the percentage of AMEX customers in those lounges is 'very small'? Had it been negligible, the arrangement would've carried on due to inertia/status quo bias.
This isn't about keeping the DUS lounge empty during a cold Tuesday afternoon in February - it's about stopping FRA lounges getting swamped with hordes of intercontinental visitors during periods of peak demand, particularly in the summer season. This would be especially true if, as travel-dealz has noted, the exclusion only seems to apply to cards issued in the USA.
I think it's a rare customer-friendly move by the airline as it demonstrates a commitment to prioritising frequent LH/*A pax (even including those who only hold FTL status, whose AFKL/IAG equivalents don't get any access) over casual visitors.
Actually, any reduction in overcrowded LH lounges is welcome.
They aren't great, true, but for those who have to have a proper ticket to enter in such lounge only to find that there is no seat available, this new rule not so bad.
May of the LH outstation lounges are dumps (I'm looking at you, IAD), so no great loss.
The CDG one is a dungeon (or at least used to be one when I visited in 2019- I'm still recovering from the trauma).
Back in 2019, my family and I were connecting through Frankfurt, and I remember how amazed my parents were when I showed them that we could get free lounge access just from the credit card that they held! I think this was one of the first times that they saw the benefit to me reading so much about this stuff growing up, and they are now much more interested and ask about potential lounge access and other perks before any trip that they do. It's a shame that the partnership is going away, especially since it seemed to be a small group of passengers accessing it this way, but I'm glad that we at least had it for so long.
My cousin quite often took short haul flights on Lufthansa for work, and this Amex benefit worked really well for them at LHR and MUC.
Shame to see it end!
As a German Amex Plat user based in Frankfurt, this benefit was one of the main reasons to keep the card despite crappy transfer ratios and loss of other benefits plus the increase of the annual fees. Time to get rid of the card
In Europe this was super handy benefit. I have been to lounges in FRA, MUC, DUS, LHR while traveling Y. So losing this benefit is a bummer.
Are we sure? I have not seen the exact language, but in the past (and for some reason I think Ben has reported on this, but not going to go digging), the arrangement has only been for short periods at a time (6 months or so) with an expiration date, and then an extension is (quietly) announced.
It was just a few months ago when the benefit expanded to any LH Group airline. Was originally limited to pax flying LH, LX, OS. Expanded to EN, WK, EW, 4Y. That's Air Dolomiti, Edelweiss, Eurowings, Discover. Not sure where Brussels fell in this before/after expansion.
Going to suck, and it's one of the reasons I held onto the Platinum. One less benefit in the aggregate makes it continually less valuable to me.
Even I didn’t go often, this has been a unique benefit of the Amex Platinum card which other premium cards did not offer. It will be one more reason not to renew my Platinum.
I am still wondering how widely it was used. While the LH lounges have a good amount of visitors, I was always able to find a seat even at peak times.
Have you ever been to the one in ATH? It's a small lounge without any remarkable features, but the food and beverage offerings are remarkably well thought out and arguably better than what Aegean offer next door...resulting in mayhem at peak times.
Premium credit card dumping their relationship with a formerly premium airlines. Amex gotta keep up their high standards.
I was referring to the LH lounges in Germany. I have never been to the one in Athens or other outstations.
There had always been the option to exclude lounges from this benefit. I remember initially the number of participating lounges was much smaller.
I remember once having been denied entry to the FRA SEN one due to capacity restrictions, although there might have been capacity constraints relating to the pandemic. Other than that, I have always found a seat but then, unless I'm flying Air Dolomiti in business class, I'm always been sent to the SEN side which must be the less crowded of the two.
LH lounges are not that great, and in certain places, overwhelmed and crowded....
No great loss
Spoken like a loser who had his plastic devalued. Better for us with direct access with M & M and Star Alliance. I'll toast your absence on Friday, flying to BA.
Spoken like a loser who had his plastic devalued. Better for us with direct access with M & M and Star Alliance. I'll toast your absence on Friday, flying to BA. I will close with this from Aseop Fables: The Fox and the grapes. When the fox could not reach the grapes, he loudly proclaimed that they were no good anyway. Sounds familiar.
That's why I never take early flights from MLA to FRA. Always seems like dozen flight from North America land at same time.
After a convoluted process I managed to acquire an Aspire card
At the time it provided free lounge access to PP I think.
Within a month Amex announced that lounge access would no longer be part of the perks.
I was planning to switch to Platinum but this announcement shrieks "buyer beware" as a sign of future devaluations.
Sad.