The Gemstone collection from ICICI Bank includes five credit cards: Coral, Rubyx, Sapphiro, Emeralde and Diamant. Sapphiro is a premium credit card positioned just below the Emeralde card. The ICICI Bank Sapphiro credit card has a joining fee of Rs 6500+GST and annual fee of Rs 3500+GST. You can expect a return of between 0.25 and 0.5% on your purchases. Among the benefits of the ICICI Bank Sapphiro credit card are complimentary access to railway and airport lounges and a waiver of fuel surcharges.
Fees
| Joining Fee | Rs 6500+GST |
| Welcome Benefit | Rs 3000 Tata CLiQ GV 4 X Rs 1000 EasyMyTrip GV 4 X Rs 250 Uber GV Rs 1000 Croma GV |
| Annual Fee | Rs 3500+GST |
| Annual Fee Waiver | Rs 6 Lakh Spend |
Depending on the banking relationship, ICICI Bank issues the ICICI Bank Sapphiro credit card LTF for Wealth savings account customers. While the welcome benefit is decent enough, Amazon vouchers would have been better. It gives more flexibility on the spend instead of moving around different merchants.
Rewards
With the exception of Amazon Pay ICICI Bank credit card, most ICICI Bank credit cards have one of the lowest reward rates when compared with other issuers. The USP has always been their merchant offers. Be it a sale on Amazon or Flipkart, you will always see ICICI Bank credit cards offering 10% instant discount. The same goes for offline offers too, we get some of the best EMI and discount offers.
| Type of Spend | Rewards | Return |
|---|---|---|
| Domestic Spends | 2 RP/Rs 100 | 0.5% |
| International Spends | 4 RP/Rs 100 | 1% |
| Utilities and Insurance Spends | 1 RP/Rs 100 | 0.25% |
| Fuel Spends | No Rewards | NIL |
Milestone Rewards
The milestone rewards are nothing great in our opinion. With these rewards, we don’t see anyone spending Rs 4 Lakh to get the first set of milestone benefits.
- 4000 RP on spending Rs 4 Lakh in a membership year ~0.25% return
- 2000 RP on every Rs 1 Lakh spend after crossing Rs 4 Lakh milestone above ~0.5% return
- Maximum 20000 bonus RP can be earned in a year
Rewards Redemption
ICICI Bank has now stopped with Payback reward points and switched to its own system. Now, we get ‘ICICI Bank Reward Points’. The value of each reward point stays at 25 paise. We get multiple categories for redeeming the reward points.
- Fashion and Lifestyle catalog
- Electronics products
- Travel and Luggage catalog
- E-Vouchers
- Home and Kitchen products
Given the reward value, e-vouchers are the only good choice. Tanishq, Kalyan Jewellers, Jockey, Marriott and Croma are some of the good options in e-vouchers. We also have e-commerce GVs like Amazon, Flipkart, and Tata CliQ.
Airport Lounge Access
- Domestic Airport Lounge Access: 4 complimentary visits per quarter. The pre-requisite to get the complimentary visits is to spend Rs 5000 in the previous calendar quarter. Check this list to see list of eligible lounges for complimentary access with ICICI Bank Coral credit card.
- International Airport Lounge Access: 2 complimentary visits per year with DreamFolks
Spa Access
- Domestic Airport Spa Access: 2 complimentary visits per year
Complimentary Golf Benefits
We also get complimentary golf benefits on the ICICI Bank Sapphiro credit card. We can get a maximum of 4 rounds and golf lessons per month. For each complimentary round/lesson, we need to spend Rs 50000 in the previous calendar month. For booking golf rounds, visit golftripz.
BookMyShow Offer
- Buy One and get up to Rs 500 off on the second ticket
- Valid 2 times every calendar month
Other Key Benefits & Charges
- Fuel Surcharge Waiver: 1% waiver for transactions from Rs 400 to Rs 4000
- Foreign Currency Transactions Markup: 3.5%+GST ~4.13%
- Rent Pay Transactions Fee: 1%+GST ~1.18%
- Reward Redemption Fee: Rs 99+GST ~Rs 117
- Interest Rates: 3.4% monthly or 40.8% annually
Final Thoughts on ICICI Bank Sapphiro Credit Card
ICICI Bank is one of the top 3 credit card issuers in India. One may find it surprising considering the rewards on ICICI Bank credit cards in comparison to other issuers like SBI Card or HDFC Bank. But, ICICI Bank has always been good in merchant offers with e-commerce and offline players. This is what makes it worthwhile to hold ICICI Bank Sapphiro credit card especially if you get it as Lifetime Free.
But the Sapphiro may not make much sense as a paid card. We end up paying Rs 3500+GST as a fee in exchange for benefits like lounge access and BMS BOGO. We hope ICICI Bank starts revising the rewards for at least the premium credit cards. For starters, the Sapphiro should have made a minimum reward rate of 2% and then extra milestone benefits.
Frequently Asked Questions
ICICI Bank Sapphiro Credit Card
9 thoughts on “ICICI Bank Sapphiro Credit Card”
I got the credit card today as LTF. They sent me both Amex and Mastercard.
I think its a good deal considering it as LTF. Just use it for 5000 per quarter. Total 20k per year.
Lounge access and Spa are good.
BookMyShow is great. I can get recliner seats at the cost of normal seats, twice per month.
Regarding Golf, I think I can try it out if I had to spend 50k in a month.
Great review! I think your ratings are very transparent and not exaggerated at all. Other wise most of the rating website give every card a 4.5. good job 👍
Thank you!!
Which network Sapphiro card is better- Visa or dual (master+ Amex)? And also do we get two seperate card in case of dual card – one master and one amex or we get both network benefits in a single card?
Sapphiro Amex is not being issued anymore. So, you only have Visa or Mastercard as of now.
Even if it’s LTF, what to choose between coral, rubyx, sapphiro, and platinum credit card.
Sapphiro
Do they give the Emeralade as LTF ?
What CC limit does one need on existing Saphiro card to ask for Emerald card?
Emeralde as LTF is also possible but your RM would need to pull some strings based on your NRV.