Anyone who makes a definitive statement about which credit card is the best for lounge access is frankly wrong, or at best, naive.

Picking the right card for airport lounge access depends a lot on the airports you frequently visit and your family size.

There have been changes to the airport lounge landscape in 2025, with even more coming in 2026.

Today I'll walk through everything you need to know to help you find out which card makes sense for you if you want to enjoy airport lounges.

Welcome back to Points for Normal People.

I'm Katie and I'm here because I know that travel costs add up, especially for a family.

But I believe travel isn't just for the rich.

That's why on Points for Normal People I share the tips and tricks that my family has been using for over a decade to help you use your everyday expenses and credit card welcome offers to supercharge your travel points so that you can pay for entire vacations every year.

Most normal people, in my experience, when they start getting into points, can stomach a$95 annual fee.

And people understand that the welcome offer you're getting is worth far more than$95.

And if you tuned into season one, I talked in depth about benefits on my favorite beginner's card, the Chase Sapphire Preferred card.

And to me, all those benefits add up to way more than$95 a year, which is why we consider that card a keeper.

But there's a whole group of premium cards with annual fees of$395 to$895.

And when we first got into points, I could not fathom spending that much on an annual fee.

Because even$395, that's enough for a round trip flight to Europe if you wait for a fair sale.

But about 10 years ago, we got our first premium card, and there is one benefit in particular that hooked us, and that's the airport lounge access.

Through the years, we've had a lot of different cards that give us lounge access.

That first one we got was the now discontinued City Prestige.

When the Chase Sapphire Reserve was released in 2016, we got that one too.

We've held the American Express Platinum card as well.

Right now we hold way too many of these cards due to some overlapping welcome offers and perks.

So in our household, we currently hold the Capital One Venture X Rewards credit card, the Ritz Carlton card, the Sapphire Reserve, and the Sapphire Reserve for Business.

I get asked a lot which card is best for lounge access.

And the answer is resoundingly, it depends.

Today I want to walk through how you can make a decision on which card is best for you.

So let's talk a little bit first about the lounge options in the US.

Airport lounges can vary in quality a lot.

Typically, lounges will offer some free snacks and drinks, as well as decent internet and a quieter spot to wait than the terminal.

We love the free snacks and drinks, but I didn't know how much I'd love the lounge for the relative quiet.

You really don't realize how incessant the noise and announcements are in the airport until you have a chance to get out of it.

It used to be that there were barely any lounge options in the US.

Or if there were, they're what our family calls fruit snack lounges.

Now, to be clear, our kids love fruit snack lounges.

A few examples of these lounges would be like the Plumeria Lounge in Honolulu is one, and the Swissport Lounge in Chicago at O'Hara is one.

So for snacks, these ones often have really basic snacks, like fruit snacks, chips, and maybe granola bars, and then a coffee machine, soft drinks, and maybe beer and one or two types of wine.

Now, this is still a nice treat compared to paying airport prices.

But this pales in comparison to some of the full-service lounges that you can find that have full meal buffets, full complimentary bars, serving specialty cocktails, or even showers or sleeping suites.

The experience can vary so much by lounge and location.

And many airports have no lounges.

So I just want to set your expectation that even if you get a premium credit card, that doesn't mean you will always get to go to a lounge on every trip.

But there are a variety of types of lounges you might be able to access.

So first of all, there are airline-based lounges.

So United and American and Delta all have their own lounges.

Even Southwest just announced that they are opening a lounge eventually in Honolulu.

Now, these airlines won't have them at all airports, but they certainly usually have them at their hubs.

And for all of these, with the exception of Southwest, which is new and we don't have information, there are specific credit cards that can give you access to these airline-specific lounges when you hold the card and fly on that airline.

So if you're extremely loyal to a big airline, that airline's cards with lounge access very well might make sense for you.

Now, business class passengers on these airlines also get access to these lounges.

And sometimes international airlines will group together to operate a lounge for their business class passengers together.

So that's one type of lounge.

Next, there are various independent lounges operating at airports.

Some of these are chains of lounges, like there's one chain called the club that operates lounges in a variety of airports.

And then a third group, there's a growing group of lounges that are operated essentially by banks.

So American Express has the Centurion Lounges, Capital One now has Capital One lounges, and Chase has Sapphire Lounges.

Different credit cards are going to give you access to different lounge networks.

And sometimes they overlap.

They also have different policies as to whether you can bring guests in, and if so, how many?

And this is complicated further by the fact that lounge networks are not represented equally across all major airports.

So the airport you travel to can make a big difference as to which lounges you'll be near.

The lounge network that has the largest number of lounges in its membership is called Priority Pass.

But even Priority Pass can't keep it simple.

Priority Pass has actual airport lounges in its membership network.

Again, what an airport lounge entails can vary.

They can be very basic fruit snack lounges, or they can have more food options.

And then to add another layer of complexity, Priority Pass also has some restaurants and what they call quote unquote experiences.

And the Priority Pass membership you get with any given card might give you access to some, but not all priority pass locations.

So this is what I mean about this starts to feel really complicated.

But I'm going to walk through all the variables today so that if you decide you do want to enjoy lounge access, you're more confident about which of these cards is best for you.

And you may end up like me and pick more than one in the end.

So I already mentioned the airline specific lounges.

If you always fly United or American or Alaska or Delta and fly them frequently, I think it might make sense sometimes to pick a card that gives you access to those specific airline lounges.

I don't have that kind of brand loyalty personally, except a Southwest, which isn't yet operating any lounges.

For United, for instance, there's a card called the new United Club card, which has an hefty annual fee and a bunch of credits you could use, but it does give the card member access to United Clubs when flying United.

Plus, you can bring one adult guest and all dependent children under 18.

This is still a pretty narrow list of lounges, but if you're really devoted to United, and especially if you fly a lot as a family on United, it might be worth it.

The Sapphire Reserve also added a way to visit select Air Canada lounges if you're flying a Star Alliance airline.

And since Star Alliance includes United, this could work for some domestic United flights in the US, if you're flying out of LaGuardia, Los Angeles, LAX, or San Francisco.

But those are the only Air Canada lounges included in the US at this time, so it's not a huge list.

And you only get that access for the cardholder plus one guest.

But I just wanted to say that because it's good to know if you have the card and if you're flying Star Alliance, including United, out of one of those three airports.

As far as I can tell, this is only available on the personal Sapphire Reserve, not the Sapphire Reserve for business.

So that's kind of the United options.

If you are dedicated to flying American, there are some new card options to get access to the American Airlines Admiral's Clubs.

For unlimited access, you can still get the City A Advantage Executive World Elite Mastercard.

All of these cards are such a mouthful.

That card gives you access to the Admiral's Club if you're flying American or any one world airline, which now includes Alaska as well.

This card has a high annual fee and relatively few credits, but you do get access for the card holder, plus either two guests or your whole immediate family, which they define as a partner or spouse and all children under 18.

For$175, you can add up to three authorized users who will also get this same kind of lounge access with guests included.

Then City also released two new cards that have some more limited access to Admiral's Clubs, but I think they can be an interesting option.

One of these cards is a new card, the City Strata Elite card.

And I'm going to talk about this more in season three when I do a full episode on City Thank You Points.

But just to talk about lounge access here, so this card has priority pass access, but also gives you four Admirals Club passes per calendar year.

Anytime a benefit is calendar year, your ears should perk up a little bit.

Because that means if you got that card in June, you'd have the benefits right away.

And then they'd reset on January 1st with the new calendar year and you'd get them again.

Which means that in the first 12 months of card membership, that can be extra valuable because you can get that perk twice.

Beyond that, these four passes are actually 24-hour passes when you activate them, and up to three children under 18 can enter with an adult.

So if you're a flying American with a few layovers, this could be a great option for a long day of travel because you can get into multiple Admiral's clubs.

You can even use Admiral's clubs on arrival to an airport according to the terms.

So the four passes could get a family into lounges for two full days because you'd redeem one for each parent on the way there, and then the kids are free.

And then on the way home, you could do the same: redeem one for the cardholder, one for the other parent, and then the kids are free.

And those are for 24 hours that you're using those.

These same four passes are also available on a new American Airlines card called the City A Advantage Globe Mastercard.

So this one has a$350 annual fee.

The Globe card doesn't include any other kind of lounge access, but it could be a good option to hold for a year, especially if you can also work that calendar year timing in to get those benefits twice.

I think both of those are really interesting options, especially to hold for a year to get the welcome offer and then use those lounge benefits for a year that you have some travel planned on American.

You might not find it worth it to hold them long term unless you're flying American a lot, but again, for that one year it could be useful.

Another new card since last year is the Atmost Reward Summit Visa Infinite.

So this is the new card for the new combined loyalty program for Alaska and Hawaiian.

This one gives you two passes per quarter for Alaska Lounges when you fly One World Airlines.

And like the Admiral's passes, you can use them for 24 hours once they're activated.

And you can also get in two kids under 21 for free.

But I don't like this one as much because the fact that you only get two per quarter makes it a lot harder to use for people who may not have their travel spaced out regularly through the year like that.

So overall, I don't think that that new Atmos card is as useful, but people can certainly find use for it, and maybe the welcome offer will be worth it too and get the extra perk of those lounge benefits.

The last airline specific scenario I want to mention is Delta.

There's actually a number of cards that American Express issues that can give you access to Delta lounges when you fly Delta.

These rules got even more specific this year with having to fly a certain class on Delta.

The Platinum cards removed any free guest access, and the Delta cards have very limited guest access.

So of all of the airline-specific options, these are the most restricted.

As I said before, generally speaking, these airline-specific options can make sense for people who are very committed to a certain airline.

But also these newer options for four passes per year for the Admiral's Club can even make sense for a traveler who has some very specific trips planned on One World Airlines.

Especially if you're researching and realizing there aren't lounge options at some airports you plan to go through.

So let's go now into bank-specific lounges.

I'll talk about American Express first because it's the oldest of these bank-operated lounges.

American Express operates at Centurion Lounges, and overall, these are great lounges.

They have been having issues with overcrowding for years.

So to handle this, American Express removed almost all guest access.

And that makes it a tough sell for me.

If you want access to Centurion Lounges, you need to have a platinum card, and the annual fee is now$895 a year.

And that just gets you access for yourself.

If you want to have access for a guest, you have to either pay$50 per visit for an adult or$30 per visit for a child$2 to 17.

Or you could add them as an authorized user on your card.

If you add them as an authorized user on your card, that's going to cost you another$195 per year per authorized user.

If you're using the Centurion Lounges a lot, it might make sense for you.

But overall, you'd have to be a very heavy user of Centurion Lounges, more than four times a year for your guest, to make the math work in your favor.

You can also spend$75,000 a year on your Platinum card to unlock some guest access, but that's a lot of spending to dedicate to one card.

The Platinum Card raised its annual fee this year and also added a ton of coupon-like benefits.

And there is plenty of value to be had there if you're willing to put in the effort to use your benefits and if they match some of your regular spending.

Interestingly, you do actually get some lounge access with guests on this card.

Platinum cards actually give you and two guests access to a smaller lounge network, which is the escape branded lounges, as well as to priority pass lounges.

So most escape lounges are actually also in the Priority Pass network, so it's a little redundant, and you're usually generally better off getting priority pass access through another card.

But there are a few escape lounges that are only accessible with a platinum card.

So if you happen to frequent Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach, or Reno, very specific, but if you do, you may want to look at a platinum card so you can access those specific escape lounges.

Still, a family of four would need to get a platinum card for$895, plus add an authorized user for$195.

So you'd still only find that worth it if you're a heavy user of those lounges.

Even knowing I probably wouldn't use the lounge access because it doesn't get my whole family in, I've still been considering the current platinum card, but personally for me, I've decided to hold off for now because as I said, we're already juggling a lot of different premium cards.

And so I decided to pass on it because I can only manage so many benefits and coupons at a time.

Next, I want to talk about the Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card, which is the card I used to recommend the most often for lounge access.

This used to be such a strong card for families, but that's all changing in February 2026.

Now it still has a much lower annual fee than the Platinum.

The annual fee on the Venture X is currently$395 a year.

You also get a$300 credit each year to use at Capital One Travel.

It's basically like a coupon, so it's really easy to drop the annual fee mentally.

But while this used to have very generous guest access for Capital One lounges and Priority Pass lounges, it will very soon have none.

Starting February 1, 2026, you don't automatically get any guest access to Capital One or Priority Pass Lounges.

And even worse, your authorized users won't even have the option to get any lounge access for either network.

If you want access for guests, Capital One copied American Express and now says if you spend$75,000 a year, you can get two guests again.

Or you could pay$45 for an adult guest to visit the Capital One lounge or$25 for a child.

And if you really want an authorized user to have lounge access, you could choose to pay a$125 fee per year for that.

Now I've said since this card came out that we'd see changes because there were too many benefits for the annual fee.

So this isn't a surprise, but it was a surprise to me to see such a pendulum swing.

From some of the most generous guest access to the absolute worst.

If you're going to be a frequent user of Capital One lounges, it still might make sense to pay the$125 fee to get access for your authorized users, but you really have to do that math for yourself.

And the card is certainly no longer a slam dunk, and it is certainly no longer one that I recommend point blank to everybody.

In a future episode, I'll actually dive more into some changes on the Venture X and with VentureMiles in general.

The last major network of bank lounges are the Sapphire Lounges that Chase has been opening.

Now, these lounges are almost all technically in the Priority Pass network.

So if you have another card with Priority Pass Access, you'd be able to access them.

But they're very restricted in the Priority Pass network, so you can actually only visit these one time with your Priority Pass membership per year, and you can't bring any guests with you.

If you're at one of the airports with a Sapphire Lounge frequently and you want to use these lounges more often, you'll need to either get a Chase Sapphire Reserve, a Sapphire Reserve for Business, or a Ritz-Carlton card.

Now, the Ritz-Carlton card is a more secret card option because it's not available for new signups.

I'll talk more about that one in a minute because you do have to jump through various hoops to get it.

The Chase Sapphire Reserve and the Sapphire Reserve for Business are both premium cards.

And I did dive into these cards in the season one updates.

You can go back and find those if you didn't listen.

We currently hold both of these, but I'm not sure we will keep them both, the personal and the business, long term.

Though for us, actually, the coupon benefits actually match up pretty well for us to get value and at least break even on the annual fee.

So I might keep them both.

I mentioned before that the personal version does give you access to Air Canada lounges in San Francisco, LaGuardia, and LAX if you're flying on a Star Alliance flight.

Both personal and business versions also let you, as the primary cardholder, bring two guests in with you to Sapphire Lounges and Priority Pass lounges.

If you have more than three people in your family and you have the personal version, you can add an authorized user for$195 and get those same access and guest benefits for that authorized user.

I mean, you can do this even if you don't have more than three people in your family.

You could just do it.

You could add an authorized user.

The business card, though, does not give you any option to add an authorized user that could then get lounge access benefits.

And the priority pass you get is better.

You get access to more priority pass options than you do with the Venture X or the Platinum card.

That's because while the Venture X and Platinum cards only let you into priority pass locations marked as lounges, the Sapphire Reserve lets you access ones that are called experiences.

So those experiences are not typically super exciting, but they do include things like the Be Relax Lounge where you can sit in a chair massager for 30 minutes.

Or some airports have gameway locations where you can play video games and pick out snacks like chips and candy as part of your free perks.

My kids love gameway lounges when we can find them.

If you're a family of four, you could also potentially have one adult in a household hold the personal version and the other one hold the business version, and between the two of you, you'd be able to get enough guest access for a family of actually up to six.

Now, there's one more, even better option to get into Sapphire Lounges and Priority Pass lounges, and that's the Ritz Carlton card.

This card is no longer available for signups, but you can upgrade to it if you have a Chase Marriott card.

You would have to hold that card for more than a year before you'd be eligible to upgrade.

And some data points recently have said you can only upgrade directly from a Marriott Bonvoy Boundless credit card, which is the one with a$95 annual fee.

If you have the Marriott Bonvoy bold credit card, which has no annual fee, you can still get that card and hold it for a year, and then upgrade to the boundless card, wait a week, and then upgrade from that card to the Ritz card.

It's only when you first get the card that you need to wait a year before doing a product change to upgrade or downgrade a card.

So if you have a bold card and you're trying to upgrade to a Ritz and they won't let you, just upgrade to the boundless, wait a week, and call back.

The Ritz Carlton has a much lower annual fee than the Sapphire Reserve does.

It's$450 a year.

In addition to the lounge access, I'll talk about in a minute, you get a$300 annual flight incidental credit as well as an annual free night certificate for Marriott properties.

The airline incidental credit is a little harder to use, but if you Google what counts for Ritz$300 credit, you can get some good ideas on how to use that credit.

After you account for the$300 credit, the effective annual fee is only$150.

And for that, you're getting lounge access along with this Marriott Annual Free Night certificate, which is good for a property at up to$85,000 points.

And as of now, the lounge access you get is the best lounge access around.

So with the Ritz Carlton card, you can add unlimited authorized users for free.

And the priority pass access it gives you allows you to get in unlimited guests.

Ultimately, though, some lounges will cap this access, and it's up to the lounge if they decide to cap it.

Just like the Sapphire Reserve, you get access to Priority Pass experiences in addition to the lounges.

And remember how the Sapphire Reserve limits you to two guests for the Sapphire Lounges?

The Ritz Carlton gives you unlimited guests at the Sapphire Lounges, and you even get to skip the wait list at some of the Sapphire Lounge locations.

I was able to do this for myself in Phoenix.

I just showed my Ritz card when I got up to check in, and there was a big wait list, and they said, oh, because you have that card, you don't wait.

The only small exception is there is a Sapphire Landing in Austin that won't let you in with a Ritz card.

So these benefits aren't publicized widely because, again, this card isn't open to new applicants.

But it's pretty easy to open a Marriott card, wait a year, and then upgrade to it.

You just have to have a little patience.

So I have a full guide to the Ritz card on my blog if you're looking for more info, and that's linked in the show notes.

The last little detail I want to go into is Priority Pass restaurants.

When you search in the Priority Pass app, you'll find some restaurants listed in there.

It used to be, back in the good old days, that a lot of cards gave you$28 per person to eat at these.

Now almost all of them have pulled this benefit.

But if you're looking at priority pass options at your home airport, and if you see a lot of restaurants, it is possible to get access to those$28 per person credits.

You just need a very specific card strategy.

As of now, the main cards that offer this that I'm aware of are these two.

First, the Bank of America Premium Rewards Elite credit card, which has a$550 annual fee.

This one actually gives you four Priority Pass memberships for that fee, and each one has unlimited guests.

This also gives you access to restaurants, and there are other benefits that help make up that annual fee.

So this can be a really strong option.

And of course, for Priority Pass restaurants, this is also a very strong option.

The US Bank Altitude Connect is another great way to get access to Priority Pass restaurants, but your visits will be capped at four per year.

You can use your visits for guests who are with you.

So it's limited, but this card has no annual fee.

So because of that, I actually added this card to my three-year plan because it's a card you can open and then keep for a long time, even if you're only occasionally using the Priority Pass restaurants or lounge access.

It also even has$100 in statement credits toward your application fee for trusted traveler programs like TSA Precheck and Global Entry once every four years.

As I close out here, I also want to say that lounges are always in flux.

New ones open and other ones will drop out of the Priority Pass Network.

So you do need to be prepared for that.

We're so excited that Chicago Midway got its first lounge this fall, and that's in the Priority Pass Network.

So Midway is our home airport and used to have some decent cheap eating options, but not when I'll upscale with the restaurants and the prices have been crazy.

It's a small lounge, so it usually has a long wait list, though.

Which is another thing that's important to note.

Sometimes lounges are full or at capacity, and you need to wait to get in, or for a tight connection, they won't always be an option.

But when they are, they're great.

Like so many things in travel, it's best to just keep your expectations low when it comes to lounges and be pleasantly surprised if you get to use them.

Let's talk action steps.

I know this is a lot of information.

There's a lot of cards I mentioned in this episode.

You'll want to take a few minutes to figure out which card, if any, matches your travel style and patterns.

To see the best overview, you can check out our blog post, which has a chart to compare each major airport and the bank lounges it has.

I listed them out in this episode, but I know it's easier to read through a chart.

Those bank lounges are generally going to be much nicer than any other US-based lounge.

So if you frequent one of those airports with a bank lounge, you might want to look at the cards that can get you in.

Then you'll also want to look at PriorityPass.com to see if there are other specific lounges in the airports that you frequent.

If your home airport only has a Priority Pass restaurant, you may want to consider that Bank of America or US bank card.

If you have your site set on the Ritz card, you'll need to open a Chase Marriott card and wait a year to upgrade.

For us, I'm still trying to figure out if I'm going to keep our Ritz card, which I was so excited to get.

But now that we have the Sapphire Reserve and my husband has a Sapphire Reserve for business, I'm trying to figure out if that's now redundant.

When I have space in my 524 account, I probably will get that Altitude Connect card for the occasional priority pass restaurant visit.

And I'm still undecided about my Venture X.

I was really disappointed about the Venture X because we use the Capital One lounge in Denver a few times a year.

And now it feels like we won't be able to, or we're just going to have to pay a lot more in order for our family to do that.

Remember that there's no right answer to this, because it depends on where you want to go and who you travel with.

If you want to be able to gift Priority Pass access to other people, it might be worth it for you to get the Ritz card or to get the Bank of America card, which allows you to do that more easily.

If you're single or you travel solo a lot, the Venture X or the Platinum cards might make a lot of sense for you.

This is a very personalized decision.

And remember that no card is permanent.

You can upgrade a sapphire preferred to a reserve for a year and see if you find it worth it.

A year later you could downgrade again.

You just have to find what's best for you.

Thanks so much for spending time with me today, and I look forward to seeing you next time where we will continue to unlock these secrets of travel points together.