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ixigo AU

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A lifetime-free 0%-forex card with 16 lounge visits and rail access — the rewards are just a coupon to ixigo.

AU Small Finance Bank·Visa·entry
Visa RuPay — Both a Visa and a RuPay variant are issued — the RuPay twin is UPI-linkable and earns on QR/UPI spends
1.3%
Effective reward rate
₹0 + GST
Annual fee
None
Fee waiver
₹0.50
ixigo AU Reward Points value →

What it's worth to you — net annual value

₹25,000
at ₹1L/month
₹55,000
at ₹3L/month
₹70,000
at ₹5L/month

Welcome: 1,000 reward points + ₹1,000 ixigo money on your first transaction within 30 days

How these numbers are computed →

Spend tiers, milestones and fee waivers included, at our house ₹/point. Portal and category multipliers can push higher — run your exact number →

The take

The ixigo AU is AU Small Finance Bank's first co-brand, and it is a genuinely strong free travel companion right up until you look at the points. Lifetime free, 0% forex markup in every currency, 8 domestic airport lounge visits a year (2 a quarter, gated at ₹50k prior-quarter spend), 8 railway lounge visits with no gate at all, a Priority Pass for one international visit on request, ₹2 lakh of trip protection and up to 10% off flights, hotels and buses booked on ixigo — for ₹0 a year that is a lot of card. Then the reward maths: a flat 5 points per ₹200 (2.5 per ₹100) that only reach their headline 1.25% if you burn them as ixigo money at ₹0.50 each, inside ixigo's own app, minus a ₹99+GST fee every time you redeem. Cash them out instead and it is 0.5%. Nothing abroad, nothing on fuel/rent/utility/insurance. Carry it for the free forex, the two flavours of lounge and the ixigo discounts; do not carry it to earn.

What's good

  • Lifetime free with 0% forex markup — a free border-crossing card
  • 16 free lounge visits a year: 8 domestic airport (₹50k/quarter gate) + 8 railway, no gate
  • 1 international lounge visit via Priority Pass (issued on request; $35+tax per visit)
  • Up to 10% off ixigo flights/hotels/buses + ₹2L trip protection

Watch out

  • Points are worth 1.25% ONLY as ixigo money in ixigo's app — 0.5% as cashback, ₹99+GST per redemption
  • Zero reward points on international spends, fuel, rent, education, government, jewellery, insurance or wallet loads
  • 10,000 RP monthly earn cap and a per-request redemption fee cap the upside
  • The whole rewards value is locked to booking travel on ixigo — no transfers, no partners

What earns, what doesn't

Flat 2.5 RP/₹100 (5 RP/₹200) on eligible online/offline/UPI spends. Official exclusion list (AU/ixigo): no RP on fuel, rent, education, government, jewellery, insurance, wallet loads or international spends. Utilities and telecom are NOT on the exclusion list — they earn base. 10,000 RP monthly earn cap.

Fuel excluded — Zero RP; 1% fuel surcharge waiver up to ₹250/month (official)
Rent & property management excluded — Rent on the official no-RP exclusion list
Government / tax excluded — Government payments on the official no-RP exclusion list
Utilities (electricity/water/gas) full — Not on the exclusion list — earns base 2.5 RP/₹100 (inferred from absence, flag)
Insurance excluded — Insurance on the official no-RP exclusion list
Education excluded — Education on the official no-RP exclusion list
Wallet loads excluded — Wallet loads on the official no-RP exclusion list
Groceries & supermarkets full — Earns base 2.5 RP/₹100 — not excluded
Telecom full — Not on the exclusion list — earns base 2.5 RP/₹100 (inferred, flag)
Jewellery / gold excluded — Jewellery on the official no-RP exclusion list
Forex / international spends excluded — Official: no RP on international spends — the 0% forex markup IS the reward
UPI (RuPay-on-UPI only) full — RuPay variant earns 2.5 RP/₹100 on UPI/QR (same as card rate)
EMI conversions / merchant EMI excluded — EMI conversions earn no RP (standard, flag)
  • Fuel · excluded Zero RP; 1% fuel surcharge waiver up to ₹250/month (official)
  • Rent & property management · excluded Rent on the official no-RP exclusion list
  • Wallet loads · excluded Wallet loads on the official no-RP exclusion list
  • Insurance · excluded Insurance on the official no-RP exclusion list

per AU Small Finance Bank T&C (community-sourced) · rank every card by spend category →

Lounge access

8/year (2/quarter) + 8 railway/year
Domestic
1/year (Priority Pass, issued on request; $35+tax per visit)
International
paid
Guests

Gate: ₹50k prior-quarter spend (domestic airport visits); railway visits have no gate

Opens 627 of 662 tracked lounge doors across 270 airports — see the full map →

DXB ×12 LHR ×12 KUL ×9 BKK ×8 BOM ×8 JFK ×8 LGW ×8 BLR ×7

Can you get it?

The cutoffs and the actual route in — not the "apply now" button, the door that opens.

Route Direct application
Income · salaried ₹25,000/month, or CIBIL 750+ (community)
Income · self-employed not published
Age band 21–60 (primary); 18+ (add-on)

Direct application — no invite list, no banking relationship required.

per the official AU Small Finance Bank MITC — figures marked (community) aren't in the PDF; the issuer won't say · filter the ranking by what you can get →

The fine print

What the MITC actually says — the rates, fees and cutoffs the brochure skips.

Forex markup 0% — zero forex markup (AU's ixigo/travel carve-out; Ananta pays 3.49%, Zenith+ 0.99%)
APR 3.75%/mo (45%/yr) — AU standard retail tier (all AU cards except Zenith+)
Late fee 15% of Total Amount Due, min ₹10, max ₹1,300
Cash advance 2.5%, min ₹500; cash limit capped at 20% of card limit
Add-on card Nil — up to 3 lifetime-free add-on cards
Overlimit 2.5% of overlimit amount, min ₹500
Redemption fee ₹99 + GST per redemption request

Lifetime free (a one-time ₹999 + GST applies only to the LED card variant). 50-day interest-free period. Flat 5 RP/₹200 (2.5/₹100) on online/offline/UPI, best redeemed as ixigo money at ₹0.50 (₹0.25 cashback, ₹0.20 vouchers); 10,000 RP monthly earn cap. Priority Pass renewal on request, $35+tax per lounge visit within India. No RP on fuel/rent/education/government/jewellery/insurance/wallet/international. AU bank-wide 1% fair-usage fees apply (rent min ₹99; utility past ₹50k/month; fuel past ₹10k/txn or ₹25k/month w.e.f. 1-Jul-2026). Income/age from community sources.

per the official AU Small Finance Bank MITC · reviewed 10 Jul 2026

What's changed for this card

Full tracker →

Devaluations and buffs that touch this card directly, its issuer, or the points and programs it earns and transfers to.

  • 6 May 2026
    Launch minor AU Small Finance Bank
    AU relaunches its card range — Ananta tops a new four-card deck
    AU's lineup led by Zenith+/Zenith/Vetta → Ananta (₹2,000), Lakshya, Tejas and Prathama join; Ananta gets 16 lounge visits and 50k milestone points

    AU's 6-May-2026 portfolio reset puts Ananta on top: ₹2,000 fee, 16 domestic lounge visits a year, an 8,000-point welcome and up to 50,000 milestone points at ₹10L. The brochure is generous; the currency isn't — AU points still redeem at ₹0.25 in a closed catalogue, so the 5X headline is 1.25% and the lounge visits hide behind an AU Rewardz flight-booking gate.

  • 10 Apr 2026
    Lounge minor AU Small Finance Bank
    AU more than doubles its domestic-lounge spend gate to ₹50,000/quarter
    Complimentary domestic lounge visits gated at ₹20,000 prior-quarter spend → ₹50,000 prior-quarter spend required (bank-wide: Zenith, Vetta, Xcite Ace/Ultra, SPONT, NOMO, ABCL Pro)

    AU's 10 April 2026 'Revision of Usage Terms & Conditions' lifts the prior-quarter spend needed to keep complimentary domestic airport-lounge access from ₹20,000 to ₹50,000 a quarter, across the Zenith, Vetta and Xcite range. The visit allotments are unchanged (Zenith 2 domestic + 2 Priority Pass international per quarter, Vetta 1+1), but the bar to earn them more than doubles — the kind of quiet, spend-gated clawback that keeps a closed-loop points card drifting toward downgrade territory.

  • 1 Apr 2024
    Devaluation moderate AU Small Finance Bank
    AU zeroes out rewards on fuel, rent, education and government
    Fuel, rent, education and government spends earned points; utilities earned accelerated rates → Zero points on fuel/rent/BBPS/education/government; utilities and insurance base-rate only, utilities capped at 100 points per transaction

    Notified on 1 March and live from 1 April 2024, AU's bank-wide exclusion list strips reward earn from fuel, rent, education, government and BBPS payments outright, and demotes utilities and insurance to the 1-point base rate — utilities with a 100-point-per-transaction ceiling for good measure. On cards already earning 0.25% at the catalogue value, the categories most households actually spend on now earn nothing at all.

  • 21 Mar 2024
    Launch minor AU Small Finance Bank
    AU unveils Zenith+ — a metal card built for the departure gate
    AU's range topped out at the ₹7,999 Zenith → Zenith+ at ₹4,999: 0.99% forex, 16 domestic + 16 Priority Pass lounge visits, 4 Meet & Assist

    AU's stainless-steel flagship gets the two numbers right that the rest of the lineup gets wrong: a 0.99% forex markup — lower than most full-service banks — and 32 lounge visits a year with airport Meet & Assist on top. The earn side stays AU: 1–2 points per ₹100 at a ₹0.25 catalogue value with no transfer partners, which is why this card is a lounge-and-forex tool, not a rewards engine.

  • 5 Jul 2023
    Devaluation major AU Small Finance Bank
    AU Rewardz devalues vouchers 20% and tolls every redemption
    E-vouchers at ₹0.25/point; free redemptions; uncapped Zenith earning → E-vouchers cut to ₹0.20/point; ₹99 + taxes per redemption; Zenith capped at 40k points/cycle (20k per category)

    AU's first big rewrite of its points program hits from three directions at once: the e-voucher rate — the redemption most cardholders actually use — drops from ₹0.25 to ₹0.20 per point, every successful redemption now costs ₹99 plus taxes, and Zenith's earning gets a 40,000-point statement-cycle ceiling. A closed-loop currency with no transfer partners just got 20% smaller and pay-per-exit.

  • 21 May 2021
    Launch minor AU Small Finance Bank
    AU becomes the first small finance bank to deal credit cards
    No small finance bank issued credit cards → Four-card range launches: Zenith (₹7,999), Vetta (₹2,999), Altura+ and Altura

    AU's spring-2021 launch made it the first small finance bank in the credit-card business, leading with Zenith's 5% on dining and a fee-waiver ladder across all four cards. The fine print aged faster than the ambition: the points redeemed only in AU's own catalogue, and every rewrite since — the 2023 voucher cut, the 2024 exclusions — has made that closed loop worth less.

Go deeper

ixigo AU Reward Points — the program hub → vs Scapia (Federal Bank) vs Kotak Air+ Welcome-bonus history → Best-of lists → The full rankings →

Sources

Every fact on this page is checked against these documents — the issuer's own paperwork first. Spot something stale? The PDF wins, and we re-verify.

Spot an error? Report it →

Model this card in the calculator →