Kotak Solitaire
Keep10% back on travel, zero forex — the wealth desk's answer to the Atlas gap.
a year at ₹40,000 a month, after the fee
Skip the arithmetic — the board, ranked → · nothing to sign up for
What it's worth to you, after the fee
Welcome: None — no joining bonus; the standing value is 10x Air Miles on travel and zero forex
Active offers: Kotak Solitaire 30% transfer bonus — 7 partners, through 30 Sep (ends today)
Priced on the everyday mix — 30% groceries · 10% utilities · 20% travel · 6% fuel · 34% everything else — with this card's published category rules applied: it earns nothing on utilities and fuel here, so that spend is dropped, not paid at the headline, and stops pacing milestones and the waiver. Plus milestones, minus the fee. No accelerator credit — the ranking model on /compare adds ~20% of spend at the card's best accelerator, so its ₹ for this card reads higher.
How these numbers are computed — and why the rankings show a bigger one →
Spend tiers, milestones and fee waivers included, at our house ₹/point. Portal and category multipliers can push higher — run your exact number →
Pays for itself at ₹83,000 a month
At ₹83,000 a month — ₹9,96,000 a year — on the everyday mix this card returns ₹25,100 gross (earn ₹25,100) against its ₹25,000 fee = ₹100 net — the first rung at or above ₹0. The ladder runs in ₹1,000 steps to ₹1,00,000 a month and ₹10,000 steps to ₹5,00,000; figures are rounded to the hundred, and the accelerator is never credited.
3 notes on the card itself: how it is issued · the network variants · why it ranks #94
Why #94 Scored the way its holders actually pay — the fee reads Nil for the Kotak Solitaire wealth clients who are the only people it is issued to — the value model rates this among the strongest cards on the desk. We seat it lower because almost none of that earn is portable: the 10% pays only inside Kotak Unbox, international spend earns zero Air Miles, eight of the nine transfer partners price at or below the flat ₹1 travel redemption they are meant to beat, and the ₹25,000 fee snaps back the day the relationship lapses.
Our joint #1 for Lounges (3 cards level); #2 for Air India miles — 2 of the 23 questions this desk ranks.
Best real exit: Accor Live Limitless (ALL) at ₹1.07/pt (2:1 transfer, above house value).
The take
Solitaire is Kotak's flagship rebuilt as a genuine travel card, and it earns where it matters: 10 Air Miles per ₹100 on flights and hotels booked through Kotak Unbox, redeemable at a clean ₹1 each — a real 10% on travel spend — plus 3 Air Miles per ₹100 everywhere else. Add zero forex markup and unlimited domestic and international lounge access, and for a Kotak Solitaire wealth client (a ₹75-lakh relationship) it lands lifetime-free. The honest asterisks: there is no sign-up bonus, the nine airline and hotel transfer partners all convert at ratios (2:1 to most airlines, 3:1 Marriott) that are worse than just booking travel at ₹1/Air Mile, and if you ever drop out of the Solitaire programme the fee snaps to ₹25,000. For the client it's built for, it's one of the strongest forex-free travel cards open today.
Your renewal — keep, downgrade or cancel
Here is the fee, the spend that clears it, and everything that has moved under this card since you last decided.
Keep, downgrade or cancel
₹25,000/yr at stake · 5 spend bands
The charge ₹0 joining, then ₹25,000/yr
Break-even ₹83,000 a month — ₹9,96,000 a year — is where this card's value crosses its fee.
At your spend
−₹17,400 a year, net of the fee, at ₹3,00,000 of annual spend
−₹9,900 a year, net of the fee, at ₹6,00,000 of annual spend
₹5,200 a year, net of the fee, at ₹12,00,000 of annual spend
₹65,700 a year, net of the fee, at ₹36,00,000 of annual spend
₹1,26,200 a year, net of the fee, at ₹60,00,000 of annual spend
Everyday earn plus milestones, minus the fee — the same model as the value panel above, so the two cannot disagree. run your exact spend →
Your copy of this card
You hold this card.
Kept on this device, in your browser. It is never sent to us, never synced, and nothing else on the site reads it yet.
The downgrade
Kotak Mahindra Bank publishes no document naming a card you can step down to, so we name none — an invented product change is a phone call you would waste. That leaves keep or cancel, and the numbers above are the whole of it.
What has changed under this card
- 23 Sep 2026 Axis EDGE brings Accor back, drops ITC, and adds Cathay, Miles & More and Hilton a program these points reach
- 8 Sep 2026 Flying Blue splits award tickets into Light / Standard / Flex — a 25% rise for the same product a program these points reach
- 25 Aug 2026 Vietnam Airlines Lotusmiles opens a broad SkyTeam status match — up to Elite Plus a program these points reach
We price what is in force today — a change that has not happened yet is not in these numbers. the full archive for this card →
If you call to cancel
What the bank offers to keep you is the one fact this desk cannot compute. We are collecting those reports — dated, and only in aggregate — before publishing any: an offer one reader was made is not one you are owed. Called about this card? Tell us what they offered →
The desk publishes subscribable .ics feeds for the dates it knows — offer deadlines, devaluations, expiry audits. Your renewal date is not one of them: only your statement knows it.
What's good
- 10 Air Miles per ₹100 on Kotak Unbox flights/hotels, redeemed at ₹1 each — 10% on travel
- Zero forex markup on all international spends — the only Kotak card with the markup waived outright
- Unlimited domestic + international lounge access for primary and add-on cards; 4 guest visits a year (2 domestic, 2 international)
- 1% fuel-surcharge waiver up to ₹10,000 an anniversary year — the biggest cap Kotak grants
- Lifetime-free for Kotak Solitaire wealth clients (₹75L total relationship value)
Watch out
- International spend earns ZERO Air Miles — the 0% forex markup is the whole overseas story (official T&C, 07-04-2026)
- ₹25,000 fee if you're not on the Solitaire banking programme
- No welcome bonus — nothing to unwrap on activation
- Transfer ratios (2:1 most airlines, 3:1 Marriott) are worse than the ₹1 fixed travel redemption
- Accelerated Air Miles capped at 1,00,000 per statement cycle
- No cashback or statement-credit redemption — Air Miles only pay out as ₹1 travel, ₹0.50 vouchers or partner transfers
What these points actually fly
You hold this — the numbers below are your own points.
These points feed 20 programmes that publish an award chart. Cheapest verified seat per cabin, priced in YOUR points with this card's own ratio already applied:
- Bengaluru → Colombo Economy 13,000 Kotak Air Miles via Avios (BA / Qatar / Finnair) at 2:1 the play
- Chennai → Colombo Business 28,000 Kotak Air Miles via Avios (BA / Qatar / Finnair) at 2:1 the play
- Delhi → Dubai First 360,000 Kotak Air Miles via American Airlines AAdvantage at 9:1 (through Marriott Bonvoy) the play
What earns, what doesn't
13 sourced rules · 10 pay zero
Base 3 Air Miles/₹100; 10 Air Miles/₹100 on Kotak Unbox travel (capped 1,00,000/statement cycle). Kotak publishes the card's full exclusion MCC table on the official rewards page — incl. gaming & digital gaming (5816, 7994) outside our 13-category schema (verified 2026-07-22).
- Fuel · excluded Zero Air Miles — official MCC table (5172, 5541, 5542, 5552, 5983); 1% surcharge waiver on txns ₹400–₹7,500, capped ₹10,000/anniversary year
- Rent & property management · excluded Zero Air Miles — official MCC table (6513)
- Wallet loads · excluded Zero Air Miles — official MCC table (6540)
- Utilities (electricity/water/gas) · excluded Zero Air Miles — official Utility/Telecom MCC table (4812, 4814, 4899, 4900); corrected from full, 2026-07-22
per Kotak Mahindra Bank T&C · rank every card by spend category →
Where the miles go
9 programs
Ratios read card points : partner miles — 2:1 means 2 points become 1 mile. Never the other way round.
every Kotak Mahindra Bank route, side by side → · the Kotak Air Miles hub →
Lounge access
735 of 793 tracked doors
Opens 735 of 793 tracked lounge doors across 294 airports , via Priority Pass India, Priority Pass Global, Visa — see the full map →
Can you get it?
the route in — no cutoffs published
The cutoffs and the actual route in — not the "apply now" button, the door that opens.
Direct application — no invite list, no banking relationship required.
The card rides on the Kotak Solitaire wealth programme: maintain a total relationship value of ₹75 lakh or more with Kotak and the Solitaire card is lifetime-free. Outside that programme it carries a ₹25,000 annual fee and there is no published spend waiver, so it's really a relationship card — bring Kotak the balances, and the card follows. Kotak publishes no separate income or age cutoff for it.
Kotak Mahindra Bank publishes no income or age cutoffs for this card. Blank means blank — we don't invent numbers to fill a grid.
per the official Kotak Mahindra Bank MITC — figures marked (community) aren't in the PDF; the issuer won't say · filter the board by what you can get →
The fine print
5 of 7 MITC rows published
What the MITC actually says — the rates, fees and cutoffs the brochure skips.
Visa Infinite. Fee ₹25,000 + GST, waived (lifetime-free) for Kotak Solitaire wealth-programme clients (₹75L total relationship value) — no published spend waiver. Zero forex markup. Accelerated Unbox travel earn capped 1,00,000 Air Miles/statement cycle. APR 3.5%/mo (42%/yr); cash advance 1% of the amount. The Solitaire KFS IS machine-readable and carries its own late-fee ladder (₹0/100/500/600/750/900/1,100/1,300) with over-limit, DCC and replacement all Nil. Kotak publishes no income/age cutoff.
per the official Kotak Mahindra Bank MITC · reviewed 10 Jul 2026
What's changed for this card
8 dated changes
Devaluations and buffs that touch this card directly, its issuer, or the points and programs it earns and transfers to. Every one is dated here; the tracker carries each one's before → after and the write-up.
- 30 Sept 2026Dream Different's unredeemed reward points expire after 30 September 2026Reward points accrued on the Dream Different Credit Card up to 31 March 2026 sitting in the account with no stated expiry date → A hard forfeiture date — "After 30th September, 2026, any unredeemed Reward Points will automatically expire"
The second half of the note that closed the programme is the part holders can still act on. Kotak's cardholder agreement gives every Dream Different point accrued up to 31 March 2026 a six-month redemption window that shuts on 30 September 2026, after which unredeemed points are forfeited outright. At the agreement's own conversion rate of 25 paise per point, a year of the card's headline 4-points-per-₹100 online earn on ₹1 lakh of online spend is roughly 4,000 points, about ₹1,000 — small money, but money that becomes zero on 1 October. Points redeem against the Kotak catalogue (flights, hotels, vouchers, merchandise) or as a statement credit through the rewards portal or the contact centre, each with its own minimum, so a last-week redemption risks missing the date on processing alone.
- 23 Sept 2026Axis EDGE brings Accor back, drops ITC, and adds Cathay, Miles & More and Hilton
- 8 Sept 2026Flying Blue splits award tickets into Light / Standard / Flex — a 25% rise for the same product
- 1 Sept 2026Kotak's Dream Different joining fee goes ₹250 → ₹424 and the waiver disappears
- 1 Sept 2026Kotak halves dynamic currency conversion on Dream Different, 3.5% to 2%
- 25 Aug 2026Vietnam Airlines Lotusmiles opens a broad SkyTeam status match — up to Elite Plus
- 20 Aug 2026IHG Hotels & Resorts becomes a Maharaja Club earning and conversion partner
- 17 Aug 2026ALL Accor+ adds a ₹2,500 dining voucher for sign-ups through 7 September
Every Kotak Mahindra Bank change we've dated → 8 events since 2022, 5 of them nerfs — worst year 2026.
Verified against Kotak Mahindra Bank's own documents on · the net-annual-value engine, at our house ₹/point
Every document behind this page — 7 of them, each with the day we read it
- official Product page — Visa Infinite, unlimited lounge, zero forex, ₹25,000 fee (Nil for Solitaire programme)
- official Rewards page — 10 Air Miles/₹100 on Unbox travel, 3/₹100 else, 1,00,000/cycle cap, transfer partners + ratios, ₹1 travel / ₹0.5 voucher redemption
- official Detailed T&C PDF (07-04-2026) — joining Nil / annual Nil (₹25,000 if downgraded from the Solitaire Program)
- official Transfer-ratio PDF (01-09-2025) — the nine partners at our-miles:partner-miles — Etihad, Qatar, British Airways, United MileagePlus, Cathay Pacific
- official Key Fact Statement — joining NIL, annual ₹25,000, add-on NIL, annual-fee waiver condition "Cardholder should be a part of the Solitaire Program"; 3.50%/month (42% APR)
- community CardInsider — ₹75L Solitaire relationship for LTF, 9 transfer partners (Etihad/Qatar/BA/United/Cathay/AF-KLM/Accor 2:1, Air India 1:1, Marriott 3:1)
- community Paisabazaar — up to 10% reward on travel, zero forex, 4 guest lounge visits/yr