ICICI Bank Emeralde

Fees

Waiver: Annual fee waived from the second year on annual spend of ₹10,00,000 or more in the preceding year

Rewards

Perks

• ✓Domestic lounge access: unlimited/yrUnlimited complimentary domestic airport lounge access for the primary cardholder only; add-on/supplementary cardholders are not covered
• ✓International lounge access: unlimited/yrUnlimited access via complimentary Priority Pass membership (1,400+ lounges in 145+ countries), for the primary cardholder only; ICICI Bank's own page does not state a guest-visit fee, so treat any per-guest charge as unconfirmed
• ✓Fuel surcharge waiver: 1%
• ✓Forex markup: 2%
• ✓Concierge service
• ✓1 complimentary golf round or lesson for every ₹50,000 of retail spend in the previous calendar month, capped at 4 rounds/lessons per month, booked via the Golftripz platform
• ✓Air accident cover: ₹3 crore for international travel, primary cardholder only, requires the card to have been used within 60 days prior to the incident — stated on ICICI's shared Emeralde privileges page, not differentiated by network
• ✓1% fuel surcharge waiver applies to individual fuel transactions of up to ₹4,000 each; ICICI's own pages don't state any total waiver cap per statement cycle
• ✓Reward points earn at a reduced 1 point per ₹100 on utility bill payments and insurance premiums, versus the standard 4 points per ₹100 on other retail spend; fuel purchases earn 0 points on this card
• ✓Birthday benefit: ₹5,000 TATA CLiQ shopping voucher every year the card is held — confirmed on ICICI's own page as exclusive to American Express cardholders; Mastercard cardholders do not get this
• ✓Amex-specific privilege programs confirmed directly on ICICI's dedicated American Express Privileges page: 'American Express Live the World Privileges' (up to 50% off dining, accommodation and more via Amex's own travel platform) and 'American Express Connect' (rotating offers across Travel, Lodging, Dining, Retail and Online Shopping) — these replace the Mastercard Moments program available on the Mastercard variant
• ✓Multiple aggregators (independently of ICICI's own site) report that cashback offers on the Amex variant were revoked effective 1 January 2025; ICICI's current official Amex privileges page does not separately confirm or contradict this, so it's noted here as third-party-reported rather than bank-confirmed
• ✓One aggregator review (CardExpert) describes complimentary Boingo airport Wi-Fi as an Amex-exclusive perk and also reports it frequently doesn't work in practice; this isn't listed on ICICI's own American Express privileges page, so treat it as unconfirmed rather than a guaranteed benefit
• ✓The same CardExpert review reports a materially higher effective income bar for fresh Amex-network applications — around ₹3,00,000/month salaried or ₹30,00,000 annual income — and suggests the Amex variant may now be issued mainly via upgrade from an existing high-limit ICICI card rather than direct application. This is not stated on ICICI's own site, so the eligibility figures in this record use ICICI's general Emeralde eligibility criteria, and applicants should confirm current Amex-specific issuance directly with ICICI before applying expecting the lower threshold
• ✓No-cancellation-charge benefit: waives cancellation charges up to ₹12,000 on domestic flight and hotel bookings, twice a year
• ✓24/7 concierge for restaurant reservations, hotel/flight bookings, car rentals and emergency/medical assistance
• ✓Also issued on Mastercard; core fees and reward rate are the same across both networks per ICICI's own page, but network-specific programs and the birthday voucher above are Amex-only. A Visa configuration was previously reported by some third-party sources, but ICICI's own site currently shows only Mastercard and American Express as live options for this product.
• ✓Reward point redemption value/rate and any redemption fee are not stated on ICICI Bank's own Emeralde pages and are therefore left out of this record rather than sourced from third-party aggregators