American Express Credit-card count limit

April 10, 2026

Reports of the five-card cap being relaxed for some customers

Doctor of Credit noted reports of the five-credit-card limit being relaxed for some customers, with no change to the ten-charge-card rule.

April 25, 2021

Cap relaxed from four back to five credit cards

The limit was relaxed again to five credit cards, requiring manual approval until the system updated; Doctor of Credit suspected the earlier tightening was pandemic-related.

February 1, 2021

Green card reclassified as a credit card for the limit

Date approximate (month only). Doctor of Credit records that in February 2021 the Green card came to be considered a credit card for purposes of the cap.

May 19, 2020

Tightened to four credit cards; 10-charge-card cap confirmed

Reconsideration reps began citing a four lending-product limit, and Amex confirmed the four-credit-card and ten-charge-card limits on May 19, 2020. An Amex spokesperson told TPG the change was made because few customers actively use four or more cards at once.

March 14, 2018

Reports of sixth-card approvals

Doctor of Credit noted that for a year or two most people had been approved for a fifth credit card, often automatically, implying the effective limit had become five.

April 1, 2016

Long-standing four-credit-card cap relaxed to five

Doctor of Credit described the rule that a customer could not hold more than four Amex credit cards at once, and collected reports of fifth-card approvals.