My Best Buy Credit Card vs Amazon Store Card: Which Wins?

Research-based comparison: I haven’t personally held either card. This comparison is based on verified issuer data and research into real cardholder experiences. Verify all figures at the official issuer websites before applying.

The short answer is: My Best Buy Credit Card wins for most spending patterns, thanks to a Visa variant that earns something in every category, however thin. Amazon Store Card wins for one specific household: an Amazon Prime member who runs most of their shopping through Amazon.com and Whole Foods. Here’s why.

Amazon Prime membership status is the single biggest swing factor in this whole comparison. Amazon Store Card earns 5% back at Amazon.com and Whole Foods with an eligible Prime membership, but only 3% without one. That 2-point gap decides whether Amazon Store Card can even compete with My Best Buy Credit Card’s broader earning spread.

I’ve run the numbers across 3 real spending profiles, and the results split 2-to-1: a modest or non-Prime Amazon shopper comes out ahead with My Best Buy Credit Card in both profiles I tested, while a Prime household that concentrates its grocery and general shopping at Amazon and Whole Foods actually earns more with Amazon Store Card. Here’s the math on all 3.

At a Glance

Both cards are $0-annual-fee store cards carrying the same “Fair” credit-score label, but they earn in structurally different ways. My Best Buy Credit Card’s Visa variant spreads thin rewards across every category, from a 1% catch-all rate up to 5% at Best Buy. Amazon Store Card pays a real 5%, but only at Amazon and Whole Foods; everywhere else, it earns nothing. For how these two stack up against other store cards, see our roundup of the best store credit cards.

How the Rewards Work

My Best Buy Credit Card

My Best Buy Credit Card pays 5% back (2.5 points per $1, worth about 2 cents per point) at Best Buy on Standard Credit. Add a paid My Best Buy Plus or Total membership and that climbs to 6%, though that’s a smaller side detail here since none of the 3 spending profiles below build in a paid membership.

The Visa variant is the only one of these two cards that earns anything outside its home retailer. On top of the 5% Best Buy rate, it adds 3% back on gas, 2% back on dining, bars, and grocery stores, and 1% back on everything else, including Amazon.com purchases, since Amazon isn’t a named category on this card. That last point matters more than it looks: it’s the reason this card still earns something on a household’s Amazon spend, even though Amazon Store Card obviously wins on rate there.

Redemption comes with a real limitation worth knowing up front. Rewards pay out only as Best Buy reward certificates ($5 per 250 points), not cash and not a transfer option, and unused certificates expire. And if a purchase gets financed through Best Buy’s deferred-interest promotional plans, that’s a real trap: interest applies retroactively to day one if the balance isn’t paid off inside the promo window. Our guide on how deferred interest works breaks down exactly how that math turns against you.

The sign-up bonus is refreshingly simple: 10% back in rewards on first-day purchases, on Standard Credit, with no minimum spend, just a 14-day window from account opening. Here’s the math: since that’s double the normal 5% Best Buy rate for one day, the whole bonus is calculable in advance. Spend $50 on day one and the bonus alone is worth an extra $2.50, on top of the $2.50 the normal rate already earns.

Amazon Store Card

Amazon Store Card’s rate structure comes down to one question: is Prime active? With an eligible Prime membership, it earns 5% back at Amazon.com and Whole Foods Market. Without Prime, that drops to 3%. There’s no third tier and no way around it, which makes this the single biggest swing factor in the entire comparison.

Outside Amazon and Whole Foods, Amazon Store Card is 100% closed-loop: it earns exactly $0 everywhere else, no gas, no groceries elsewhere, no catch-all rate at all. That’s a stricter limitation than My Best Buy Credit Card’s Visa variant, which still earns something (a thin 1%) on spend anywhere else. Our guide on what Synchrony Bank actually is covers the issuer behind this card if you’re unfamiliar with it.

The sign-up bonus is an Amazon Gift Card, loaded automatically on approval with no minimum spend required, instant on the day of approval. But Synchrony doesn’t publish the exact amount anywhere: not “it varies,” not a typical range, genuinely undisclosed. Worth stating plainly rather than softening, since it’s a real, distinct weakness next to My Best Buy Credit Card’s fully known 10% first-day rate.

One more change worth knowing: Amazon discontinued deferred-interest special financing for new purchases as of February 16, 2026. What remains is Equal Monthly Payments, interest-free installment financing on select purchases, which can’t be combined with the card’s own cash-back rewards on the same purchase.

The Math: 3 Spending Profiles

I’ve run the numbers across 3 realistic spending profiles below. No estimates, just the math, category by category.

Profile 1: Occasional Best Buy shopper, Amazon Prime household

$50/mo at Best Buy, $300/mo at Amazon.com & Whole Foods (has Prime, earns 5%), $150/mo on gas, $200/mo on dining and grocery elsewhere, $500/mo on everything else. Monthly total: $1,200.

Annual earnings:

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $228.00/year
• Amazon Store Card: $180.00/year (this profile has an active Prime membership, earning the 5% rate)

Year 1 (with sign-up bonus):

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $228.00 + $2.50 (5% x $50 incremental first-day bonus) = $230.50
• Amazon Store Card: $180.00 + sign-up bonus (amount not confirmed) = $180.00 + sign-up bonus

Year 2+ (ongoing):

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $228.00/year
• Amazon Store Card: $180.00/year

Break-even: N/A, neither card carries an annual fee, so whichever card leads in a given year for a given profile also leads every year after, since neither card’s rate changes with tenure.

Takeaway: My Best Buy Credit Card wins here by $48.00/year on ongoing earnings alone, and that gap only grows once its fully-known bonus is added in. Even with an active Prime membership, $300/month at Amazon isn’t enough on its own to overcome a card that earns something in every other category this household spends in.

Profile 2: Big-ticket electronics buyer, minimal Amazon spend, no Prime

$150/mo at Best Buy, $80/mo at Amazon.com & Whole Foods (no Prime, earns 3%), $120/mo on gas, $150/mo on dining and grocery elsewhere, $400/mo on everything else. Monthly total: $900.

Annual earnings:

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $226.80/year
• Amazon Store Card: $28.80/year (no Prime membership in this profile, so it’s capped at the 3% rate)

Year 1 (with sign-up bonus):

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $226.80 + $7.50 (5% x $150 incremental first-day bonus) = $234.30
• Amazon Store Card: $28.80 + sign-up bonus (amount not confirmed) = $28.80 + sign-up bonus

Year 2+ (ongoing):

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $226.80/year
• Amazon Store Card: $28.80/year

Break-even: N/A, neither card carries an annual fee, so whichever card leads in a given year for a given profile also leads every year after, since neither card’s rate changes with tenure.

Takeaway: The clearest win of the 3 profiles. Without Prime, Amazon Store Card is stuck at 3%, and this household barely shops at Amazon anyway. My Best Buy Credit Card leads by $198.00/year on ongoing earnings, and its bonus is worth more in dollar terms too.

Profile 3: Family of 5, Amazon Prime household running most groceries through Amazon/Whole Foods

$50/mo at Best Buy, $600/mo at Amazon.com & Whole Foods (has Prime, earns 5%), $250/mo on gas, $150/mo on dining and grocery elsewhere, $700/mo on everything else. Monthly total: $1,750.

Annual earnings:

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $312.00/year
• Amazon Store Card: $360.00/year (Prime active, and this household routes most of its shopping through Amazon and Whole Foods)

Year 1 (with sign-up bonus):

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $312.00 + $2.50 (5% x $50 incremental first-day bonus) = $314.50
• Amazon Store Card: $360.00 + sign-up bonus (amount not confirmed) = $360.00 + sign-up bonus

Year 2+ (ongoing):

• My Best Buy Credit Card: $312.00/year
• Amazon Store Card: $360.00/year

Break-even: N/A, neither card carries an annual fee, so whichever card leads in a given year for a given profile also leads every year after, since neither card’s rate changes with tenure.

Takeaway: For a family of five that runs most of its shopping through Amazon and Whole Foods, Amazon Store Card wins, by $48.00/year on ongoing earnings, and its lead only widens once its unpublished bonus gets added in. This is the one profile where a household’s spend is concentrated enough at Amazon to beat My Best Buy Credit Card’s broader, thinner earning spread.

Where Each Card Wins

Because these two cards earn in fundamentally different shapes, broad-but-thin versus narrow-but-real, “which one wins” comes down to how concentrated a household’s spend already is at Amazon and Whole Foods, and whether Prime is active. I’ll admit that’s a less satisfying answer than a clean “Card X wins, full stop,” but this is exactly the kind of pair where the honest answer really does depend on your receipts.

Who Should Choose My Best Buy Credit Card

✅ Someone who buys electronics at Best Buy somewhat regularly but doesn’t want a card that earns $0 the moment they leave that one retailer

✅ Someone who travels or spends abroad and wants a real Visa network with no foreign transaction fee

✅ Someone who wants a known, calculable first-purchase bonus (10% back, no guesswork) instead of an unpublished-amount gift card

✅ Someone comfortable avoiding, or carefully managing, deferred-interest promotional financing

If this sounds like you, My Best Buy Credit Card is the right call.

Who Should Choose Amazon Store Card

✅ Someone who runs the bulk of their household shopping and groceries through Amazon.com and Whole Foods, especially with an active Prime membership

✅ Someone who wants a genuinely instant approval bonus with zero spend requirement, regardless of the exact undisclosed amount

✅ Someone who rarely or never buys electronics at Best Buy specifically

✅ Someone who wants a simple, single-purpose card and doesn’t need broader network acceptance

If a reader is weighing Amazon Store Card against Amazon’s other card, our Amazon Store Card vs Amazon Prime Visa comparison covers that specific matchup, and the Amazon Prime Visa review is worth a look for anyone who spends heavily outside Amazon too.

If this sounds like you, Amazon Store Card is the right call.

The Bottom Line

Here’s what I’d actually tell a friend who asked me this: get My Best Buy Credit Card unless your household is a genuinely heavy, Prime-active Amazon and Whole Foods shopper. Its Visa variant earns something in every category, which is enough to beat Amazon Store Card in 2 of the 3 profiles tested here, including one where this household had Prime active the whole time.

The one real exception is a household like Profile 3: a family running most of its grocery and general spending through Amazon and Whole Foods, with Prime active. For that specific shape of spending, Amazon Store Card’s 5% on a large recurring spend base wins out, and its unpublished sign-up bonus only widens the gap further.

Credit score isn’t a meaningful factor here, unlike some other comparisons on this site. Both cards carry the same “Fair” label with no published numeric cutoff from either issuer, so it won’t be what decides this one for you.

Neither card is worthless. Amazon Store Card’s 5% Prime rate is genuinely hard to beat for the right household, even if My Best Buy Credit Card is the better fit for most people. Start with the My Best Buy Credit Card review if that’s you, or the Amazon Store Card review if your spending genuinely leans toward Amazon and Whole Foods.