Review: Instarem Amaze Card

Once upon a time, Amaze was a must-have card for any miles chaser, allowing users to stack regular credit card rewards with excellent exchange rates, 1% cashback on virtually everything, and use cases that went far beyond just overseas spending (wink wink). Demand was so intense that Instarem struggled to ship out physical cards in time for year-end VTL travel in 2021.

Nothing good lasts forever, however, and over the years, many of those benefits were “enhanced” away. DBS and UOB removed rewards for Amaze, exclusions were added for cashback, cashback was replaced with InstaPoints, InstaPoints were excluded for card-linked transactions, and a 1% fee was added for all SGD spend.

Now, a list of nerfs this long would be enough to torpedo any other card. But it says a lot about how OP the Amaze originally was that it still remains useful today — even if it’s hard not to get nostalgic about the “good old days”.

Long story short: if you want to earn credit card miles on overseas spend, then Amaze offers one of the cheapest ways of doing so. However, if you’re just looking for the absolute cheapest way of spending overseas, then there are other options to consider too. 

Overview: Amaze Card

Apply
Use code MILELION for 3,000 bonus InstaPoints
Income Req.	None	Points Validity	12 months
Annual Fee	None	Min. Transfer	1,200 points (400 miles)
FCY Fee	None	Transfer Partners	1
Earn Rate	0.17 mpd Wallet Up to 4 mpd Card	Transfer Fee	None
Cardholder Terms and Conditions

The Amaze Card is available to anyone with an Instarem account, and has no minimum income requirement nor annual fee.

Applications can be made through the Instarem app (Android | iOS), and a virtual card is issued immediately upon approval.

Physical cards can also be requested, and usually take up to a week to arrive. If you’re waiting for the physical card, but want to make in-store spending, you can do so by adding the virtual card to your Apple Pay or Google Pay wallet and tapping your phone or watch to pay.

How does Amaze work?

Amaze is a debit card, which is funded by either:

• Amaze Wallet
• A debit or credit card

Most people should be familiar with the concept of a debit card funded by a wallet — think Revolut or YouTrip.

However, it can be confusing to think of a debit card funded by another debit card or credit card. Just imagine Amaze as a “passthrough”. Whatever you charge to it gets immediately billed to the debit or credit card that’s paired with it.

Here are the differences between the two funding sources.

You cannot combine two funding sources in a single transaction. For example, if your payment source is the Amaze Wallet, and the balance is insufficient to cover the cost of a given transaction, the transaction will be declined.

Amaze Wallet

If your Amaze is funded through the Amaze Wallet, then it works largely the same as Revolut or YouTrip.

You have the option of purchasing supported currencies whenever you wish to lock in favourable FX rates, then spending those funds later.

You do not need to pre-select a currency before spending. Amaze will automatically deduct the relevant currency, and make instant conversions from your other Wallet balances to top-up the difference if needed.

For example, if I have S$100 and 1,000 JPY in my Amaze Wallet, and I make a transaction that costs 1,500 JPY:

• 1,000 JPY will first be deducted from my JPY balance
• The equivalent of 500 JPY will be converted from my SGD balance and immediately deducted

A few points to note about the Amaze Wallet:

• You can only top-up an Amaze Wallet with PayNow or eGIRO (debit and credit cards used to be accepted, but have since been removed)
• A minimum top-up of S$1 is required, beyond which top-ups can be made in increments of just 1 cent
• The maximum amount that can be stored in the Amaze Wallet at any time is S$15,000
• The maximum amount that can be transacted through the Amaze Wallet is S$75,000 per calendar year
• Amaze Wallet balances in SGD can be withdrawn to a local bank account (if you have other currency balances, you will need to convert them into SGD first before withdrawing)

Debit or Credit Card

Amaze can be paired with any Singapore-issued Mastercard debit or credit card. A maximum of five cards can be saved on the Instarem app, and you can switch among them as you please.

Every time a transaction is charged to the Amaze Card linked with a debit or credit card, two things happen:

1. Amaze converts any FCY amounts into Singapore Dollars, based on its internal exchange rate
2. Amaze then charges the Singapore Dollar amount to the linked debit or credit card

At the end of each month, there’s no Amaze bill to pay. Instead, you settle any outstanding amounts on the credit card you linked to Amaze (if you linked a debit card, funds will be deducted immediately).

Here are some important things to know about transactions paid through Amaze.

(1) All transactions are processed online

All Amaze transactions are processed online, which means they will be eligible for the online spending bonus with the Citi Rewards Card (4 mpd on all online spend, except in-app mobile wallet and travel).

For example, a S$100 in-store transaction at a restaurant with Amaze x Citi Rewards would earn 400 miles, based on the online bonus rate of 4 mpd (spending with the Citi Rewards Card alone would earn just 40 miles).

(2) All transactions are charged in SGD

Amaze will convert all FCY transactions into SGD before charging them to the linked card. Therefore, you will earn rewards based on the local spend rate, for those cards which offer overseas spending bonuses.

For example, a S$100 overseas transaction at a restaurant with Amaze x Citi Prestige would earn 130 miles, based on the local earn rate of 1.3 mpd (spending with the Citi Prestige Card alone would earn 200 miles).

(3) All transactions retain their existing MCC

Amaze does not modify the MCC of a transaction.

If you use Amaze at a restaurant, the MCC will code as a restaurant. If you use Amaze at a hotel, the MCC will code as a hotel.

(4) All transactions have an AMAZE* prefix

Amaze does modify the transaction description.

For example, here’s what a Lazada transaction looks like when paid with Amaze. Notice how the MCC remains the same, but AMAZE* is added to the transaction description.

Therefore, if your credit card awards bonuses based on transaction description, pairing it with Amaze will lead to forfeiture of those bonuses. Fortunately, such cards are the minority (e.g. OCBC Rewards for Guardian and Watsons), and most cards award bonuses based on MCC.

What FX rates does Amaze offer?

Amaze’s FX rates depend on whether you’re making a wallet-linked or card-linked transaction.

Wallet-linked transactions incur lower costs for Amaze, and therefore the FX rate you receive is better — though the trade-off is that you won’t be able to earn credit card rewards.

Here’s an example of two transactions, made minutes apart. The one on the left is with a linked card, the one on the right is with the Amaze Wallet. Note how the Amaze Wallet rate (98.8811 JPY) is 2.37% better than the card rate (96.5857 JPY).

Amaze Wallet

Amaze’s FX rates for wallet-linked transactions are more transparent, in the sense that you can check the rate that Amaze is offering via the Instarem app before you spend.

In general, these rates will be very close to mid-market, with the exception of weekends — where there’s usually a 1% spread — and during periods of high currency volatility. You can usually expect the Amaze Wallet rates to be very similar to what Revolut or YouTrip offer.

As I mentioned earlier, you can even lock in rates by pre-purchasing currency ahead of your trip, so you’ll have more certainty about the FX rate. 

However, this assumes that you’re spending in a supported currency. 

If your transaction is in an unsupported currency, then there’s no way of locking in FX rates ahead of time. Instead, the FX rate will be based on the prevailing Mastercard rate, which usually entails a ~0.5% spread over mid-market.

Debit or Credit Card

Amaze FX rates for card-linked transactions are more opaque, in the sense that you won’t know what rate Amaze is using until the transaction is completed.

Whenever you make a foreign currency transaction on a card, you normally incur two kinds of fees:

1. The spread between the mid-market rate and the actual rate used by the card network (e.g. Visa, Mastercard)
2. A 3-3.5% FCY transaction fee, imposed by the bank

Amaze does not impose (2), which means the only “fee” you need to be concerned about comes from (1).

Let’s be clear about one thing: you should not be comparing Amaze rates to mid-market rates, unless your alternative was to visit a money changer, or use a Revolut or YouTrip type product where the rates can be very close to spot. If you want to earn miles on your overseas transactions, then the right rate to compare Amaze to is Mastercard, because that’s what you’d have incurred had you used the credit card directly.

It used to be that Amaze’s rates were almost indistinguishable from Mastercard’s, but at some point in May 2022, those started diverging. The spread is currently ~2%, depending on day and currency.

However, assuming you can earn equivalent rewards on Amaze-paired card transactions versus using the card directly, Amaze remains the better choice so long as its spread over Mastercard is less than 3-3.5%. 

Amaze’s 1% domestic fee

With effect from 10 March 2025, card-linked Amaze transactions in SGD are subject to a 1% domestic fee (with a minimum fee of S$0.50).

Don’t get confused: while all Amaze transactions are ultimately converted into SGD, this fee applies to transactions that were already in SGD when charged. You will not have to pay this fee on transactions that were originally in FCY when charged. 

Why would you use Amaze for local transactions?

• To turn in-store offline spend into online spend, and earn 4 mpd with the Citi Rewards Card
• To circumvent the Citi Rewards Card’s mobile wallet exclusion (e.g. spending with Citi Rewards on Kris+ will earn 0.4 mpd, but when you pair it with Amaze, you earn 4 mpd)

Paying a 1% fee to earn 4 mpd could make sense, under certain circumstances. Refer to the article below for more analysis.

Should you still pair the Amaze Card with Citi Rewards?

Who do I contact about fraudulent transactions?

If your Amaze is hit by a fraudulent transaction, you need to raise a dispute with Instarem, and not the bank whose card you linked to Amaze.

As far as the bank is concerned, all Amaze transactions are legitimate. When you first paired your card with Amaze and entered the OTP, you implicitly told the bank: this merchant (Amaze) is legitimate, I trust them, please continue approving all ongoing transactions.

When you get hit by an unauthorised transaction, the fraudulent action isn’t Amaze charging your bank card — it’s the fraudster charging Amaze.

Unfortunately, Instarem’s fraud handling procedures aren’t nearly as robust as banks, and there are numerous online complaints about slow resolutions, or customers not receiving a temporary credit while the fraud is investigated (to be fair, there are also positive stories too). That’s why I advise people to keep their Amaze locked whenever it’s not in use, so as to minimise the “attack surface” for would-be fraudsters. 

People tend to run into issues when they raise two concurrent disputes — one with Instarem, and another with the bank. This complicates the entire process, and I wouldn’t recommend it. If Instarem does not resolve the issue to your satisfaction, then raise a complaint with the bank whose card was charged.

While most card issuers replace compromised cards for free, Instarem may charge a fee of S$9. Some people get it waived, others don’t.

Amaze is a debit card!

It bears repeating that Amaze is a debit card. Even if you link it to a credit card, Amaze itself still remains a debit card.

This matters for two main reasons.

Card fees

It’s common practice in certain countries to levy a fee for card payments (like Australia or New Zealand, though this will soon be scrapped).

These fees are typically lower for debit cards compared to credit cards. Since Amaze is a debit card, you can enjoy the lower fee, while still earning regular credit card rewards from the linked card.

Authorisation holds

When you check into a hotel or pick up a rental car, it’s standard practice for the merchant to request a credit or debit card as security against damage or to cover incidentals.

At a hotel, for example, the front desk usually puts a hold on your card during check-in. When you check-out, assuming you haven’t spent anything at the hotel restaurants or otherwise wrecked the room, the hold will be automatically released.

If you provide a credit card, there’s no real issue here because that hold was never actually charged to your account. It was deducted from the available credit balance, but once it’s released, it’s like nothing ever happened. You won’t see anything on your credit card statement, nor do FCY transaction fees come into the picture. 

If you provide a debit card, that hold amount becomes a charge that is deducted immediately from your bank account (there’s no credit line to draw on). When the hold is lifted, that charge is refunded. You’ll see one line item on your debit card statement for the charge, and another line item for the refund.

Since Amaze is a debit card, any authorisation holds are immediately charged to the linked credit card. That’s an actual transaction which will be converted into SGD at the Amaze rate, and appear on your credit card statement.

When the hold is lifted, that amount will be refunded to your linked credit card. That’s another transaction which will be converted into SGD at the Amaze rate, and appear on your credit card statement. However, the amount that’s refunded may not be the same as the amount that’s charged.

Depending on how the transaction is processed, you may even lose money on the FX movements. For more on this issue, refer to the post below.

PSA: The pitfalls of using Amaze for hotels or rental cars

Earning rewards with Amaze

Amaze transactions will either earn:

1. InstaPoints (for wallet-linked transactions)
2. Credit card rewards (for card-linked transactions)

It used to be possible to earn InstaPoints on card-linked transactions too, but this was removed in March 2025, making it an either/or situation.

InstaPoints

Earning InstaPoints

InstaPoints are Amaze’s own rewards currency, and are earned for wallet-linked transactions only.

Here are the key points to note:

• InstaPoints can be earned on both SGD and FCY transactions
• A minimum spend of S$10 is required to earn InstaPoints
• There is no cap on how many InstaPoints you can earn in a month
• InstaPoints are credited immediately upon completing the transaction

Redeeming InstaPoints

InstaPoints can be redeemed for a discount off an Instarem funds transfer, or for KrisFlyer miles. Cashback redemption options were removed in March 2025.

InstaPoints	Reward
100 to 400	S$1.25 to S$5 off an Instarem funds transfer
1,200	400 KrisFlyer miles

Conversions to KrisFlyer miles are completed instantly, with no conversion fee. 

Given the conversion rate, it would take S$2,400 of Amaze spending to earn 400 KrisFlyer miles, so the implicit earn rate for wallet-linked transactions is 0.17 mpd.

InstaPoints expiry

InstaPoints have a hard expiry of 12 months from the date of crediting. Earning or redemption activity does not extend the life of your balance.

Ineligible transactions

The following transactions do not earn InstaPoints:

Amaze’s exclusions largely match those of banks, with education, insurance, government payments and hospitals all ineligible.

This means you won’t earn any InstaPoints should you use the Amaze to pay for overseas school fees, visa applications or medical treatment.

Credit card rewards

Amaze transactions are eligible to earn credit card rewards with all card issuers except:

• DBS/POSB
• DCS
• UOB

Do remember that standard rewards exclusions still apply. For example, insurance premiums are an excluded category for Citibank, so pairing the Citi Rewards Card with Amaze does not magically enable you to earn points on insurance payments (remember, the MCC remains the same).

So which credit card should you pair with Amaze for the most miles? Sadly, there are only three good candidates left. 

💳 Recommended Amaze Pairings
Card	With Amaze	Remarks
Citi Rewards Card Apply	4 mpd1 2% fee 0.5¢ per mile	Max S$1K per s. month
Maybank XL Rewards Apply	4 mpd2 2% fee 0.5¢ per mile	Min. S$500, max S$1K per c. month
OCBC Rewards Card Apply	4 mpd3 2% fee 0.5¢ per mile	Max S$1.1K per c. month
1. All online transactions except travel (airlines, hotels, rental cars, tour agencies, cruises etc.)  and in-app mobile wallet (T&Cs) 2. Dining, entertainment, shopping, travel (T&Cs) 3. Clothes, bags, shoes and shopping (T&Cs)

Of course, you could still pair Amaze with general spending cards like the Citi PremierMiles Card, HSBC TravelOne Card, or OCBC 90°N Card, provided you’ve decided that receiving the local earn rate with a ~2% fee (what Amaze implicitly charges; see below) is better than receiving the FCY earn rate with a 3.25% fee (what the bank charges if you paid with a “naked” card).

For additional information on how this works, I highly recommend reading the post below. 

What’s the best card to use with Amaze?

Use Amaze Card to check MCCs

The Amaze Card offers an easy way of checking MCCs without actually spending anything.

All you need to do is open the Instarem app > Card > Manage, then disable in-store purchase, online purchase, overseas transactions, magstripe transactions (technically you may not need to disable everything, but just to be safe…)

After that, proceed to attempt a transaction, either in-store or online. The transaction will fail, of course, but you can then use the Activity tab to see what the MCC would have been had it gone through. You can then select the correct card to pair with Amaze accordingly. 

Do note that this will only work if you use a card-linked Amaze. It is no longer possible to see MCCs for unsuccessful wallet-linked Amaze transactions.

Be careful with renewals!

Here’s one weird thing about Amaze: you will not automatically receive a new card upon expiry. Instead, you need to manually request for a new card through the app, under Card > Manage > Replace a Card > Card Expiring Soon.

Replacement cards can be requested within 45 days of expiry, and usually take up to a week to be delivered. 

If your card has already expired and the replacement won’t arrive in time for your trip, remember that you can always add the virtual card to your Apple or Google Pay wallet and use it for in-store payments.

A few things to note about the replacement card:

• The replacement Amaze will have a completely new card number, expiry date and CVV
• You will need to relink all your debit or credit cards with the new Amaze
• Your existing payment controls will be reset (e.g. if you’ve disabled online transactions as a fraud prevention measure, you’ll need to do it again)

Amaze changelog

Amaze has certainly changed a lot since it first launched in July 2021. If you haven’t been keeping track, here’s a detailed rundown of all the important changes that have taken place since then.

• July 2021: Instarem launches Amaze
• January 2022: Amaze adds rewards exclusions for cashback; prior to this you could earn cashback on almost anything
• March 2022: Amaze slashes cashback rates and caps
• May 2022: Amaze rates begin noticeably diverging from Mastercard’s
• June 2022: DBS/POSB adds Amaze to rewards exclusion list
• July 2022: Amaze ends cashback on SGD spend
• October 2022: Amaze replaces cashback with InstaPoints
• February 2023: Amaze adds 2% fee on GrabPay & e-wallet top-ups (Amaze Wallet exempted)
• July 2023: Amaze extends 2% fee on GrabPay & e-wallet top-ups to Amaze Wallet
• August 2023: Amaze cuts InstaPoints earn rates for card-linked transactions by 50%
• October 2023: Amaze adds 1% fee for selected SGD transactions
• April 2024: Amaze adds 1% fee for SGD transactions above S$1,000
• June 2024: Amaze caps InstaPoints earning at 500 points per month
• October 2024: UOB adds Amaze transactions to rewards exclusion list
• March 2025: Amaze adds 1% fee for all SGD transactions and removes cashback redemption option for InstaPoints. InstaPoints can now only be converted to KrisFlyer miles

Conclusion

Apply

T&Cs

Use code MILELION for 3,000 bonus InstaPoints

Despite the nerfs to Amaze over the years, it still has some important use cases.

The most obvious one is earning credit card rewards on FCY spend, while paying lower fees than what the banks would charge. After all, earning 4 mpd with a 2% fee is a much better deal than earning 4 mpd with a 3.25% fee.

I don’t rule out the possibility that Amaze may quietly increase the spread over Mastercard even further, but they’re not stupid. They know that the closer they get to the 3% mark, the more likely customers are to switch to using cards directly — and they don’t want that. 

The second is for turning offline spend into online spend. This is particularly important with the Citi Rewards Card (it used to be important for the KrisFlyer UOB Credit Card too, before UOB nerfed Amaze).

The third is for those who want to enjoy the lowest possible FX rates, but don’t want to forgo rewards altogether. In that case, using a wallet-linked Amaze would offer comparable rates to Revolut or YouTrip, while still earning KrisFlyer miles in the form of InstaPoints — albeit at a token rate of 0.17 mpd. However, I’d much rather spend on the Chocolate Visa Card first, which offers 1 mpd on up to S$1,000 of monthly spend (S$2,000 from 1 September 2026), using Visa’s FX rates with no further mark-up.

Just remember that Amaze is fundamentally a debit card, which means that you shouldn’t be using it for authorisation holds. It’s also a good idea to keep it locked whenever it’s not in use, to avoid a potentially painful fraud situation.