That’s right folks…the votes are in. And your new Card Madness tournament champion is…
THE CHASE SAPPHIRE RESERVE!
1st Place Matchup: American Express Gold (100 votes) vs. Chase Sapphire Reserve (126 votes)
Despite the recent overhaul to the AmEx Gold card, is still wasn’t enough to keep up with the Chase Sapphire Reserve. We left the voting open for the whole weekend on these games, to get a really good feel fro which card you guys liked better…and the CSR beat the Gold card 126 points to 100. For a $450 annual fee, the Reserve will get you triple Ultimate Rewards on travel and dining, and offers a $300 annual travel credit. Reserve holders also get a 50% bonus on the value of their points when redeemed through the portal – making UR virtually unmatched for flexibility.
The undisputed 2019 Card Madness Champ! (Don’t worry I still like the Gold card..)
3rd Place Matchup: American Express Hilton Aspire Card (83 votes) vs. American Express Platinum (58 votes)
The Hilton Aspire benefits finish their winning streak with 3rd place overall, knocking the American Express Platinum off the podium! At 83 votes, the Aspire had a decent lead over the Platinum throughout the match. The Aspire earns 14x Hilton points on Hilton stays, 7x Hilton points on airfare, car rentals, and restaurants, and 3x on everything else you pay for with the card. The card also has some great benefits to offset its annual fee: Cardholders get an annual $250 airline credit, a $250 resort credit, one free weekend night automatically, and another after $60k spend on the card in a calendar year, and automatic Hilton Diamond Status.
In the end, here’s your final line up:
- First Place: Chase Sapphire Reserve
- Second Place: American Express Gold Card
- Third Place: American Express Hilton Aspire Card
You can check out the full Challonge bracket here. There were some really close games! I’m working on something of a highlights post, you know, like the instant replay the day after the game. If there’s anything you want me to comment on, or that you enjoyed about the tournament (or that you didn’t enjoy) let me know in the comments!
Here’s all the action from Card Madness 2019:
- Pick the Best Credit Card of the Year with Card Madness 2019!
- Card Madness 2019 Bracket is up! Check the 64 Cards and Vote Now
- Vote for Your Favorite Round 1 Cards!
- AmEx and Chase Dominate the Competition!
- Two Games go into Overtime!
- Ultimate Rewards are Undefeated in Round 1!
- Flexible Points Lead the Pack, Goodbye Airline Cards!
- Hotel Cards for the Win, and Ultimate Rewards Finally Lose!
- PWaC Readers Must Like Paying Annual Fees!
- Barclays Narrowly Stays in the Tournament with its Last Card!
- A Major Win for AmEx! (and a Major Loss for Chase…)
- Vote for Your Elite Status Eight Teams Here!
- Welcome to the Financial Four – Card Madness 2019 Heats Up!
- American Express Gold vs. Chase Sapphire Reserve – Who Will Win Card Madness 2019?!
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“…like the instant replay the day after the game.”
That would just be a replay.
…touche
😉
LOVED the tournament! Couldn’t wait to vote for my favorites. Great idea.
Glad to hear that Rogbre! Hopefully we’ll have time to run it next year too!
Fascinating that three of the top four are American Express products. There has been a lot noise over the last few years around how American Express doesn’t get it but obviously they do in a travel-benefit heavy group like this.
FWIW
DLM
Personally I’m a huge AmEx fan so I was happy, but I thought the same thing you did! AmEx has done really well with it’s recent card refreshes.