SBI AURUM
KeepSBI's ₹9,999 metal flagship — a 1% engine wearing a voucher ladder and an unlimited-lounge pass.
What it's worth to you — net annual value
Welcome: 40,000 AURUM Reward Points (₹10,000 at the 4-per-₹1 peg) + a year of Club Marriott, WSJ and Mint
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
AURUM is SBI Card's five-year-old answer to Infinia, and it still hasn't answered the only question that matters: the earn. Four points per ₹100 at a flat ₹0.25 each is 1%, full stop. What the card actually sells is pacing — ₹1,500 of Tata CLiQ every ₹1-lakh month, plus ₹5,000 CLiQ Luxury, ₹10,000 Taj and ₹20,000 Apple as the year compounds — which turns a disciplined ₹12L year into roughly ₹45,000 back with the fee officially waived at that exact spend. Add unlimited international lounge access on DreamFolks, four domestic visits a quarter, a 1.99% forex markup and four BookMyShow tickets a month, and it's a comfortable card. The 2025-26 twist is that AURUM points finally transfer — Maharaja Club, Club ITC and BA Avios at 5:1, AirAsia at 4:1 — but five points per mile means handing over ₹1.25 of catalogue value for a ₹1 mile: a door, not a deal, unless you're pointing it at premium-cabin Avios or Maharaja awards. For everyone else the ladder is the product, and the ladder only pays if you pace it.
What's good
- ₹9,999 fee with an official ₹12L spend waiver — printed verbatim in SBI Card's MITC
- Milestone ladder worth ~₹33,000 on a paced ₹12L year: ₹1,500 CLiQ per ₹1L month + ₹5k CLiQ Luxury + ₹10k Taj + ₹20k Apple
- Unlimited international lounge access (DreamFolks) + 4 domestic visits/quarter + 1 international guest/quarter
- 1.99% forex markup — SBI's standard 3.5% doesn't apply here
- Transfer doors now open: Maharaja Club, Club ITC and BA Avios at 5:1, AirAsia at 4:1
- 40,000-point welcome (₹10,000) + Club Marriott, WSJ and Mint for year one; 4 BookMyShow tickets/month (₹250 cap), golf 4 games + 12 lessons/year
Watch out
- The engine is 1% — 4 RP/₹100 at a flat ₹0.25/point; everything above that is milestone pacing
- The monthly ₹1,500 CLiQ voucher needs ₹1L in that calendar month — uneven spenders forfeit rungs our annualized model credits
- Transfers cost 5 points per mile (₹1.25 of catalogue value per ₹1 mile) — worse than redeeming except premium-cabin Avios/Maharaja awards; ITC's own grid prints no ratio, the 5:1 is community-reported
- Invite-only — coverage pegs the bar at ₹30–40L income; you can't simply apply
- ₹99 + GST redemption fee per request, and domestic lounge is capped at 4/quarter while international runs unlimited
What earns, what doesn't
Flat 4 RP/₹100 with no category accelerators — the milestone ladder, not MCC, is the earn story. Exclusions follow SBI Card's standard rewards set; AURUM-specific T&C sits behind the WAF-gated aurumcreditcard.com, so category treatments are community-mapped and flagged.
- Fuel · excluded No reward points on fuel (SBI Card standard; surcharge waiver applies instead — community, flag)
- Rent & property management · excluded Rent excluded across every SBI card since 15 Apr 2024 (official issuer-wide notice)
- Wallet loads · excluded Wallet loads earn no points (SBI Card standard, community, flag)
- Government / tax · excluded Government/tax spends excluded from rewards (SBI Card standard exclusion list, community, flag)
per SBI Card T&C (community-sourced) · rank every card by spend category →
Where the miles go
Ratios read card points : partner miles — 2:1 means 2 points become 1 mile. Never the other way round.
every SBI Card route, side by side → · the AURUM Reward Points hub →
Lounge access
Opens 167 of 663 tracked lounge doors across 87 airports — see the full map →
Can you get it?
The cutoffs and the actual route in — not the "apply now" button, the door that opens.
Invite-only — there is no public application form. The bank calls you.
Invitation-only — SBI Card extends AURUM to its top clients; there is no public application. CardInsider (Jun 2026) pegs eligibility around ₹40L annual income (21+ salaried, 25+ self-employed); CardExpert's earlier hands-on cited ₹30L+ income or a ₹5L+ limit on another bank's card. Fee ₹9,999 + GST, and the renewal is officially waived on ₹12L annual spends in the preceding year — the one number SBI prints in its own MITC.
SBI Card publishes no income or age cutoffs for this card. Blank means blank — we don't invent numbers to fill a grid.
per the official SBI Card 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.
per the official SBI Card 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.
- 1 Jun 2026AU, YES and IndusInd points open transfers to Maharaja ClubAU/YES/IndusInd points locked in closed loops → Maharaja routes: IndusInd Tiger 1:1 (Pinnacle 2:1, Legend 4:1); AU Zenith+ 3:2, other AU cards 6:1; YES Marquee/Reserv 15:1
Three banks joined Air India's transfer roster at once — and the ratios are the whole story. The lifetime-free IndusInd Tiger gets the only honest 1:1 (capped 25k/month); AU Zenith+ lands a genuinely good 3:2 that triples what AU points were worth; everything else — Pinnacle 2:1, Legend 4:1, the AU 6:1 crowd, YES at a punitive 15:1 — is a decoy dressed as a partnership.
- 1 Apr 2026Maharaja Club gets cheaper awards and faster creditingHigher award costs; slow points crediting → Domestic awards from 1,500 pts; credited within 2 hours
A rare buff. Air India's post-merger programme drops domestic award flights to 1,500 points, cabin upgrades to 4,000, credits Star Alliance miles within two hours, and eases Platinum to 60 flights. The transfer target Indian card geeks care about actually got better.
- 10 Jan 2026SBI Card splits domestic lounges into tiers, adds entry feesUniform domestic lounge list, free swipe-in access → Set A/Set B lounge tiers by card, plus ₹2–25 entry charges
From 10 January 2026, SBI Card sorts its domestic lounge network into a Set A (top cards like Club Vistara SBI Card, Apollo SELECT) and a broader Set B (PRIME, Pulse, Titan SBI Card and others) — and bolts on a non-refundable ₹2 authorization charge plus a ₹25 validation hold on every visit. It's marketed as an expansion since more airports are covered, but the fine print is a two-tier system with new friction at the gate, right after SBI had already pulled complimentary air accident insurance six months earlier.
- 1 Nov 2025SBI adds 1% on third-party education and wallet loadsNo fee on education / wallet loads → 1% fee via third-party apps
Pay tuition straight to the college and you're fine; route it through CRED/Paytm and SBI now clips 1%. Wallet loads get the same treatment. Another door on manufactured spend quietly shut.
- 15 Jul 2025SBI Card pulls free air accident insurance from its top cards₹50L–₹1Cr complimentary air accident cover on top cards → Cover discontinued entirely, no replacement offered
SBI Card Elite, Miles Elite, Miles Prime, Prime and Pulse all lost their complimentary air accident insurance on 15 July 2025 — cover that ran as high as ₹1 crore on the top-end cards. No like-for-like replacement was offered; it's a straight benefit removal that quietly thins out what used to be a genuine differentiator for SBI's premium travel lineup versus HDFC and Axis.
- 25 Mar 2025IndusInd hikes redemption fee to ₹149, caps cash-outs at 50%₹100 + GST per redemption; full points balance redeemable as statement credit; fractional points on multiplier spends → ₹149 + GST per redemption (Avios, Pioneer and EazyDiner cards exempt); cash redemption capped at 50% of balance; fractional accrual gone; points clawed back on unpaid dues
IndusInd found four ways to shave the same rewards program at once: the redemption toll rose ₹100 to ₹149 + GST, cash redemptions now stop at half your points balance, fractional accrual on multiplier spends quietly ended, and points earned on a statement you don't pay get rescinded. Pinnacle and Legend holders take the full hit; the Avios card — where the points leave for BA and Qatar anyway — is pointedly exempt.
- 1 Dec 2024HSBC TravelOne arrives — a 20-partner airmiles cardNo mainstream HSBC airmiles card in India → ₹4,999 card, 4X travel/forex, 1:1 to Avios & KrisFlyer
HSBC's serious play for Indian miles chasers: 4 points per ₹100 on flights, travel aggregators and forex, and instant 1:1 transfers to British Airways and Qatar Avios plus ~20 airline/hotel partners including KrisFlyer and Air India — all from the app. A genuine sub-₹5k alternative to Atlas. (Welcome-offer window opened 1 Dec 2024.)
- 12 Nov 2024Vistara flies its last; Club Vistara becomes Maharaja ClubClub Vistara (Vistara) → Maharaja Club (Air India), points 1:1
Vistara's final flight was 11 November 2024. Over 4.5 million Club Vistara members — and the single most-loved transfer target for Indian card points — folded into Air India's Maharaja Club at 1:1. The premium-cabin sweet spots Indian miles chasers plan around all moved house overnight.
Go deeper
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.
- official SBI Card consolidated MITC PDF — AURUM annual fee ₹9,999, renewal ₹9,999 waived on ₹12L annual spends; finance charges up to 3.75%/mo (45% p.a.), cash advance 2.5% min ₹500 checked 22 Jul 2026
- official Club ITC's official AURUM partner page — transfer route confirmed (min 500 RP, increments of 500, up to 5 working days, irreversible, via SBI Card app > AURUM Rewards > Miles Conversion); NO ratio printed checked 22 Jul 2026
- community CardInsider (upd. 29-Jun-2026) — 4 RP/₹100, 4 RP = ₹1, 40,000-pt welcome + Club Marriott/WSJ/Mint, CLiQ/Taj/Apple milestones, unlimited intl + 4/qtr domestic lounges (DreamFolks, 1 guest/qtr), 1.99% forex, ₹40L income; transfer grid 5:1 Maharaja/Club ITC/BA Avios, 4:1 AirAsia checked 22 Jul 2026
- community CardExpert review (4/5) — corroborates ₹12L waiver, 40,000-pt welcome, ₹0.25/pt, milestone ladder, 4/qtr domestic + unlimited intl (DreamFolks), 4 BMS tickets/month ₹250 cap, golf 4 games + 12 lessons checked 22 Jul 2026
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