American Express Campus Challenge 2026 · Two Tracks · PPIs on offer
Three rounds. A MacBook Air. A campus PPI from Amex. This is the highest ROI competition of the season.
The American Express Campus Challenge 2026 is now live. No quiz. No elimination filler. The competition begins directly with a presentation deck, runs across three clean rounds, and ends with a panel pitch to the Amex leadership. The reward stack is unusual, a MacBook Air, Pre-Placement Interviews, Amex merchandise and a certificate. If you enjoy thinking about credit cards, premium customers and product experiences, read this one carefully.
Register first, then read the guide
Choose your track and register
The 2026 edition runs two distinct tracks, Strategy and Product. They share the same three-round format and the same prize stack, but the problem statement, the deliverables and the kind of thinking being tested are different. You can apply to only one, so pick the track that matches your background and the role you actually want at Amex.
📈 Strategy Track · Team of 1 to 3
Strategy Track, build the playbook
For students who like cracking customer economics, segmentation and growth strategy. You will think like an Amex strategy analyst working on the Premier Card portfolio.
For students who think in product terms, journeys, features and tech-led experiences. The recommendation must have technology at its core, this is non-negotiable.
Both tracks have different college eligibility lists
Check your campus eligibility on the Unstop page for the specific track before you register. The shortlist is national, but the eligible institute list is different for Strategy and Product. Do not assume your campus is on both lists.
What this competition actually is
The Amex Center of Excellence, and why this competition exists
The American Express India Center of Excellence has been the analytical engine of Amex globally for over two decades. The teams that run it sit across three broad capabilities, Decision Science, Strategy and Product, and they work end to end on Risk, Fraud and Marketing across the customer lifecycle. Every decision Amex makes about who to approve, what benefits to give, how to detect a fraudulent transaction and how a feature should be designed, runs through these teams.
The Campus Challenge exists to scout MBA and engineering talent for exactly these teams. Unlike open national case competitions, the Amex Campus Challenge is a hiring funnel first and a competition second. Campus PPIs are part of the design, the brief, the data, and the rounds are built to filter for the same skills the actual hiring teams test for. Treat this as a multi-week interview with Amex, not a competition you can wing.
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The prize stack
Apple MacBook Air for the winners, Pre-Placement Interviews for shortlisted teams, plus Amex merchandise and certificates. The PPI is the real prize, the MacBook is the bonus.
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Why this matters for SIP and Placements
Strong performance opens up campus-level PPIs. For first years this is a direct SIP route into Amex. For second years, it is a way to put yourself in front of the leadership team before final placement processes begin.
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No quiz, no aptitude filler
The competition starts directly with the presentation deck in Round 1. No elimination quiz, no logical reasoning test, no irrelevant gatekeeping. The bar is the quality of your business thinking and your output.
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Team size
1 to 3 members per team. Pick teammates who genuinely complement you on data analytics, business thinking and presentation craft. A weak third member is a real liability in a deck-driven competition.
The three rounds, what to expect
From the first deck to the boardroom pitch
Both tracks run the same three-round structure. The problem statement differs, the rhythm of the funnel does not. Here is what each round actually asks of you, with the prep notes that matter.
1
Round 1 · 25 Jun to 09 Jul
Measure Customer Profitability of Premier Product
You receive a data and context pack centred on Amex's Premier Card portfolio and are asked to transform that into actionable insights. The deliverable is a single submission, deck plus supporting analysis, that demonstrates you can read transaction-level data, identify what is actually driving customer profitability, and recommend where Amex should focus. Both Strategy and Product tracks open with the same Round 1 brief.
Round 1 is read by Amex evaluators for analytical clarity, not creative flair. Show your math. Segment the customer base on the right cuts, show profitability per segment, and pick two or three sharp findings that change the picture. Vague directional commentary loses to evidence on a slide.
2
Round 2 · 15 Jul to 31 Jul
Strategy Track: Elevating the Premier Card Experience / Product Track: From Opportunity to Execution
The top teams from Round 1 advance to a single, full submission against the track-specific problem statement. Strategy teams have to put together a real recommendation on how to elevate the Premier Card experience commercially. Product teams have to take the opportunity identified in Round 1 and translate it into a buildable product experience, with technology genuinely at the core. The submission is one deck addressing all the deliverables in the brief.
This is where most teams either build a moat or lose the round. Write the executive summary slide first, in one breath. If you cannot say in 25 words what you are recommending and why Amex should care, the deck is not ready. Every other slide should serve that one sentence.
3
Round 3 · Date to be announced
Bring it to Board, the Grand Finale
Shortlisted teams present live to the Amex leadership and a jury panel. You are evaluated on the problem-solving approach, the business impact of your recommendation, the originality of the insight, the quality of presentation delivery and the Q&A that follows. This is where the campus PPIs and the MacBook are decided.
Rehearse the Q&A more than the slides. Have one teammate role-play a skeptical Amex MD and stress-test every claim. Senior leaders rarely sit through every slide, they jump to the recommendation and pressure-test the assumptions. You win this round in the answers, not in the script.
From past editions, what the problem statements actually look like
The Premier Card brief, and what winning teams did
The 2026 Round 1 brief centres on customer profitability of the Premier Product portfolio. This is consistent with how Amex has set its briefs in previous editions, real data on the cards business and a clear ask to find the segments and behaviours that drive disproportionate value. The data is meaningful, you are expected to use it.
Past Strategy track briefs have asked teams to identify the most profitable customer cohorts on a specific card line, then recommend acquisition, engagement or benefit-design changes that grow the share of those cohorts. Past Product track briefs have taken the same insight and pushed for a product-led execution, a new feature in the Amex app, a digital benefit, or a tech-led experience layer that improves how those cohorts engage with the card.
The teams that won in earlier editions did three things consistently. First, they spent a disproportionate amount of time understanding the data before recommending anything. Second, they tied every recommendation back to a measurable commercial outcome, incremental spend per customer, retention uplift or acquisition cost recovery. Third, they wrote tight, scannable decks, 10 to 12 slides, every slide carrying one clear point, no decorative filler.
A note on the problem statement
Read the brief like a contract, not a story
Amex briefs are dense. Every line of the deliverable list is graded. Print the brief, highlight every explicit ask, and write your deck section by section against that list. The most common reason strong teams miss the next round is silently dropping a deliverable they thought was optional.
Common tips, regardless of the track you pick
Eight things to get right before you start the deck
1
Build the team like you would build a product team
You need three skills covered, deep data analytics, sharp business thinking and confident deck building plus presentation. If two teammates have the same strength and a critical one is missing, your output will show it in Round 2. Pick for complementary skill, not friendship.
2
Treat well-structured, detailed solutions as the baseline
Amex evaluators have explicitly said well-structured detailed solutions perform better. This is not a tip, it is a filter. Use a clear executive summary, a structured analysis section, a recommendation section with explicit tradeoffs, and an appendix for evidence. Skipping structure is the fastest way to land in the bottom half.
3
Use Amex's actual customer language
Cardmember, not customer. Premier, not premium. Spend, not transactions. Read three Amex India press releases, the latest investor presentation, and a couple of product pages before you write a single slide. The right vocabulary signals you have done the work.
4
Anchor every insight in a number
Every claim in the deck should have a number behind it, either from the data Amex shared or from a credible external source. Directional statements with no number attached are immediate red flags for an analytics-first company.
5
Write your executive summary first
Before you build any other slide, write the one-page exec summary. If you cannot crisply state the problem you are solving, the recommendation and the business impact in a single page, your deck is not ready. Use that page as the brief for every other slide.
6
Pressure-test the recommendation against cost
A winning recommendation always answers, what does this cost Amex to do, what is the payback window, and what is the risk if it fails. Ignoring the cost side is the most common rookie miss. Even a rough back-of-envelope estimate is better than no number at all.
7
Rehearse the final pitch out loud
The Round 3 finale is a live presentation to senior Amex leaders. Slides do not win this round, conviction does. Rehearse the full pitch at least four times, including the transitions between teammates. Record yourselves once, watch it, fix it.
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Plan for the Q&A as a separate workstream
Build a list of the 15 most likely tough questions a senior Amex leader could ask, and write the one-paragraph answer to each. This document is your safety net in the finale. Teams that win Round 3 always have it.
Track-specific tips, the parts where Strategy and Product diverge
The brief is the same. How you win is not.
📈 Strategy Track
Win on commercial sharpness
Lead with customer economics. Show clearly which cohort drives the most profit and why, before you propose anything new.
Use a real strategy framework where it adds clarity, segmentation, RFM, share-of-wallet, lifetime value. Skip frameworks that are decorative.
Every recommendation needs a P&L picture. Incremental revenue, cost to serve, expected payback. Estimates are fine, silence is not.
Benchmark against at least one global premium card competitor, but make the recommendation Amex-specific.
Avoid generic loyalty-program ideas. Amex already has one of the best in the world. Push for something sharper.
📱 Product Track
Win on tech-led execution
Technology must sit at the core of the recommendation, the brief is explicit about this. A non-tech solution will not advance.
Map the cardmember journey end to end before you propose a feature. Insert the new experience where the friction is highest, not where it is easiest.
Show a clear product vision, then break it into a phased build, MVP, V1, V2. Senior product leaders read for sequencing.
Use simple wireframes or low-fidelity mockups to make the experience tangible. Words alone rarely sell a product idea.
Address data, privacy and risk explicitly. In financial services, a feature that ignores these is a feature that does not ship.
A closing reframe
This is one of the highest ROI competitions of the season
Three rounds, no quiz, a direct shot at a campus PPI with Amex, a MacBook Air for the winners and a real conversation with the Amex leadership in the finale. There are very few competitions in the Indian MBA calendar with this combination of structure and reward.
If you go in treating this as a hiring interview rather than a competition, build a balanced team, pick the track that genuinely fits you, and put the work into a structured detailed submission, the odds are genuinely in your favour. Register on the track that fits, do not split your effort, and start with the executive summary.
A quick checklist before you submit Round 1
1. Every deliverable in the brief is explicitly addressed, no silent skips.
2. The exec summary fits on one slide and stands on its own.
3. Every claim has a number, with the source named.
4. The recommendation has a clear commercial impact attached.
5. The deck reads cleanly at a glance, no decorative filler, no untitled slides.
How AceMBA students prepare for case competitions
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Compare notes with peers on the Premier Card brief, swap reading lists, and get senior guidance from students who went through past Amex Campus Challenge editions.
This article references The American Express Campus Challenge 2026 for educational and informational purposes only. AceMBA is an independent MBA career-readiness platform and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by or officially associated with American Express, the American Express India Center of Excellence, Unstop, or any business school referenced. All names, brands, logos and trademarks, including American Express, Amex, Premier Card, Centurion and the American Express Campus Challenge, are the sole property of their respective owners and are used here purely for informational and reference purposes. All competition details, eligibility criteria, dates, prizes and round structures are drawn from publicly available sources, including the official Unstop competition pages and past student experiences, and may change at the sole discretion of American Express or Unstop for the 2026 edition. Always refer to the official Unstop pages for the Strategy and Product tracks for authoritative details on eligibility, format, dates, prizes and rules. References to past editions and winning approaches are based on publicly shared accounts and AceMBA mentor observations, not on confidential Amex evaluation criteria. Outcomes vary from team to team, and AceMBA accepts no responsibility for any decision, outcome, expectation or result arising from following the guidance shared here. References to external platforms are for convenience only and do not constitute endorsement, partnership or sponsorship.
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