Two membership-gated cards, no card fee, very different mechanics
Amazon Prime Visa and Costco Anywhere Visa both charge $0 as a card fee — but neither one actually works at full strength without a separate paid membership. Prime Visa's best rates require an eligible Amazon Prime membership; Costco Anywhere Visa can't even be opened without an active Costco membership. Past that similarity, the two cards are built on different mechanics entirely: one pays ordinary monthly cash back, the other pays out once a year as a Costco reward certificate.
The rate table
| Prime Visa ($0 + Prime) | Costco Anywhere Visa ($0 + Costco) | |
|---|---|---|
| Home-retailer bonus | 5% Amazon.com & Whole Foods | 2% Costco & Costco.com |
| Gas | 2% (any station) | 5% Costco gas / 4% other gas & EV charging — shared $7,000/yr cap, then 1% |
| Dining | 2% | 3% |
| Travel — direct bookings | 1% (no direct-booking bonus) | 3% (flights, hotels, car rentals/agencies/cruises) |
| Travel — issuer's own portal | 5x, Chase Travel only | 3% (Citi Travel is travel-agency-coded, same as direct) |
| Travel — Amex/Bilt portals | 1% (not modeled as a bonus leaf) | 3% (both are open, cross-issuer-accessible portals) |
| Transit | 2% | — |
| Everything else | 1% | 1% |
| Foreign transaction fee | 0% | 0% |
| Payout | Monthly cash back | Annual Costco reward certificate |
Where Costco Anywhere Visa pulls ahead
Its 3% travel rate is far broader than Prime Visa's. Costco Anywhere Visa earns 3% on direct flight, hotel, and car-rental/agency/cruise bookings, and that same 3% carries through Citi's own portal plus the open Amex and Bilt portals — because "travel agencies" sits explicitly on Citi's published eligible list for this card. Prime Visa's travel bonus, by contrast, is a 5x rate locked to Chase's own travel portal; book directly with an airline or hotel, or through any other portal, and Prime Visa falls to its 1% base. Costco Visa also beats Prime Visa on dining (3% vs. 2%) and on gas — 5% at Costco stations and 4% at any other gas station or EV charger, against Prime Visa's flat 2%, up to a combined $7,000/year cap across all three.
Where Prime Visa pulls ahead
Prime Visa pays ordinary cash back every month — no waiting for an annual certificate, no requirement to redeem it at a specific warehouse chain. Its 5% Amazon.com and Whole Foods rate also beats Costco Visa's 2% Costco rate outright, so a household whose retail spend concentrates on Amazon rather than in a physical Costco warehouse comes out ahead there. Prime Visa's 2% gas and transit rates are also uncapped, while Costco Visa's strongest categories share one annual ceiling.
The membership cost neither card's rate table includes
Neither this app's model nor either issuer's marketing folds the underlying membership fee into the card's own cost. Prime Visa's 5% Amazon/Whole Foods rate assumes an eligible Prime membership; without one, those purchases fall to the plain 1% base rate. Costco Anywhere Visa goes further — an active Costco membership isn't optional, it's a precondition for holding the card at all, and Costco pays rewards out once a year as a certificate redeemable in-warehouse or online at Costco, not as a statement credit or direct deposit.
Who should pick which
- Choose Prime Visa if: you're already an eligible Prime member, your retail spend concentrates on Amazon.com and Whole Foods, and you want ordinary monthly cash back with no annual wait.
- Choose Costco Anywhere Visa if: you already hold a Costco membership, drive enough that a 4-5% gas rate matters, spend meaningfully on dining or travel, and don't mind collecting your reward once a year as a certificate you'll redeem in-warehouse.
Run the optimizer with your real spend mix to see how either of these fits alongside — or gets replaced by — a broader category-bonus card in your actual wallet.
Data verified as of September 15, 2026.
Want the live numbers side by side? See the Prime Visa vs. Costco Anywhere Visa comparison page — it renders current rates and fees straight from our verified card data.