Hilton Surpass Vs. Hilton Business Card Comparison

Link: Apply now for the Hilton Honors American Express Business Card

American Express and Hilton have a suite of four co-branded credit cards. As you’d expect, each card targets a different market segment. In this post, I wanted to compare the mid-range personal and business products, because you really should consider one of these cards if you don’t have them already.

Comparing Hilton Surpass & Hilton Business

Amex and Hilton have two credit cards with identical annual fees:

• The Hilton Honors American Express Surpass^® Card (review) has a $95 annual fee
• The Hilton Honors American Express Business Card (review) has a $95 annual fee (Rates & Fees)

Since one is a personal card and the other is a business card, in this post I wanted to look at how the two cards compare, given their identical annual fees. There are a surprising number of differences between the cards, given the identical annual fees.

Comparing Hilton Amex welcome bonuses

The welcome offers on the two cards are significantly different:

• The Hilton Surpass Card has a welcome offer of 130,000 Hilton Honors points after spending $2,000 within the first three months
• The Hilton Business Card is offering a bonus of 130,000 Hilton Honors points after spending $3,000 within the first three months

Personally I value Hilton Honors points at ~0.5 cents each, so I value 130,000 points at $650. In and of itself that’s a good bonus.

Comparing Hilton Amex return on spending

Both Hilton Amex cards feature some useful bonus categories, and offer either 12x points, 9x points, or 3x points. The exact bonus categories differ, though.

The Hilton Surpass Amex offers:

• 12x points per dollar spent with Hilton
• 6x points per dollar spent at U.S. restaurants, U.S. supermarkets, and U.S. gas stations
• 3x points per dollar spent on everything else

The Hilton Business Amex offers:

• 12x points per dollar spent with Hilton
• 6x points per dollar spent at U.S. gas stations, on wireless phone services with U.S. service providers, on U.S. shipping purchases, at U.S. restaurants, on flights booked directly with airlines or with amextravel.com, and on car rentals booked directly from select car rental companies
• 3x points per dollar spent on everything else

The personal card exclusively offers 6x points at U.S. supermarkets, while the business card exclusively offers 6x points on wireless phone services, shipping purchases, flights booked directly with airlines, and rental car spending.

Which bonus categories are better very much depend on your spending profile.

Comparing Hilton Honors status perks

Both the Hilton Surpass Card and Hilton Business Card are identical in terms of the opportunities to earn status:

• You receive Hilton Honors Gold status for as long as you have the card
• When you spend $40,000 on the card in a calendar year you receive Hilton Honors Diamond status

Comparing free night award certificates

Both the Hilton Surpass Card and Hilton Business Card offer a free night reward when you spend $15,000 on the card in a calendar year. However, the business version of the card exclusively offers a second free night reward if you spend a total of $60,000 on eligible purchases on the card in a calendar year.

This creates some nice spending thresholds on the business version of the card, since:

• You get a free night award after $15,000 of spending
• You get Diamond status after $40,000 of spending
• You get another free night award after $60,000 of spending

The free night reward has just a small list of excluded properties.

Comparing Hilton Amex Priority Pass perks

Both Hilton Amex cards offer 10 free visits to Priority Pass lounges per year (enrollment required). Additional visits cost extra.

This is a nice entry-level Priority Pass benefit, though keep in mind that there are other great cards offering Priority Pass memberships with unlimited visits, including The Platinum Card® from American Express (review), the Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card (review), and the Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card (review), so I don’t personally value this benefit all that much.

Hilton Amex no foreign transaction fees

Both the personal and business (Rates & Fees) versions of the Hilton Amex card have no foreign transaction fees, making them good cards for purchases abroad.

Hilton Amex approval odds

For those with excellent credit, I find both of these cards to be pretty easy to be approved for. The major restriction is that Amex limits you to five credit cards per person, though this excludes charge cards and hybrid cards (though it doesn’t matter if the cards are personal or business).

Assuming you’re within that limit, you have good odds of approval. One advantage of the Hilton Business Card is that applying for an Amex small business card generally won’t count toward your total as far as the Chase 5/24 rule is concerned, in the event that’s something you’re trying to stay under.

Bottom line

The Hilton Surpass Card and Hilton Business Card are largely similar, despite being branded differently — both cards have the same annual fee, and mostly comparable perks.

However, there are also some differences between the cards, including the welcome bonus spend requirement, the bonus categories for spending, and the ability to earn free night awards. If you’re trying to choose just one card, personally I think the business version of the card is the way to go.

Do you have either of these Hilton Amex cards, and if so, which do you prefer?

The following links will direct you to the rates and fees for mentioned American Express Cards. These include: The Hilton Honors American Express Business Card (Rates & Fees).