Amex's Bigger Centurion Lounges Come With a Long Wait

American Express plans to close its Philadelphia Centurion Lounge on October 16, 2026, to make it bigger. The target for reopening is the end of 2027. If Philadelphia is part of your travel routine, that is the first detail to put in your calendar. The promised coffee bar can wait.

The closure is part of four Centurion Lounge updates Amex announced on October 8. Philadelphia and Houston are slated for substantial expansions; Newark's planned lounge has grown and moved to a later opening target; London Heathrow is set to get a second location, in Terminal 5. More space is a plausible answer to a crowded lounge. For someone buying flights now, though, a construction date, a terminal and an entry rule are more useful than a rendering of extra chairs.

Philadelphia Gets More Room, After a Long Absence

Amex plans to take Philadelphia's lounge from 6,000 square feet to more than 12,000 across two stories, with a Blue Roast coffee and wellness bar. It expects to reopen by the end of 2027 after the October 16 closure. Travelers who currently use the lounge face a straightforward trade: no Centurion Lounge there during the renovation in exchange for a larger one if the project opens as planned.

The planned size addresses one obvious constraint. A traveler cannot take a seat that does not exist. But doubling floor area does not tell us how many usable seats will be added, how quickly food and drinks will move, or how many people will try to enter at the same time. An expansion could make a cramped visit easier while still leaving a line at the door during a busy departure bank. That is a question for the finished lounge, rather than a conclusion to draw from square footage.

Philadelphia also offers a comparison you can use without pretending the biggest room always wins. The existing Chase Sapphire Lounge is reported at 20,000 square feet, with food to order, a beer garden, an arcade and spa offerings. Amex's proposed Philadelphia space would exceed 12,000 square feet and add Blue Roast. Those are different sizes and different amenity lists. They do not rank the lounges for a given passenger: entry eligibility, the flight's timing and the crowd on that day would all affect the choice. During the Amex closure, the Chase lounge is a possible alternative only for a traveler who can actually get in. A rival card logo on the airport map is not an access pass.

Newark's Bigger Plan Has a Later Date

Newark shows why a proposed footprint and a usable lounge deserve separate places in your travel plans. Its project was described as an 18,000-square-foot proposal in 2021; a 2023 announcement targeted a 2026 opening. Amex now plans a two-floor Terminal A lounge of more than 30,000 square feet and expects it to open in 2027. The larger plan may be more attractive when it opens. It cannot serve a 2026 traveler whose itinerary assumed the earlier date.

The planned Newark bars also illustrate how the offer can change while a project is pending. The earlier announcement promised a jazz bar and piano lounge with live music; the newer description includes three bar experiences, among them one drawing on New Jersey diner culture and an enclosed Terrace Bar. Treat the newer plan as the one to watch, not as a reservation for a drink you can order today. Newark's timeline is a useful precedent for the other projects: opening years are targets, and a revised design can arrive alongside a revised date.

There is a sensible case for making Newark larger before opening it. If a lounge already looks undersized on paper, changing the design first could spare travelers a newly opened space that immediately feels too small. The cost to a passenger is the delay, and the benefit remains prospective. Those two things can coexist without anyone having to declare the project a triumph or a disaster in advance.

Houston Tests More than Seating

Houston's Centurion Lounge is planned to grow from 8,000 square feet to more than 23,000, with completion expected in 2028. The design calls for more seating, showers and restrooms, a second full-service bar, Blue Roast and a dining experience inspired by Houston's food scene. The dining plan has been described as a separate area with rotating plated dishes alongside the existing buffet. That combination tackles several possible bottlenecks, rather than treating every complaint as a request for another armchair.

Consider two waits: one to enter a lounge and another to get something to eat once inside. Extra floor area and seating could help with the first if demand does not grow faster than capacity. A separate dining area and another bar could help spread people around inside. Neither effect is guaranteed by a floor plan, and the price, if any, of the specialty dining has not been confirmed. I would budget for the access I know I have, not for an unpriced meal in a lounge that is still being expanded.

Philadelphia has a stated closure date. Houston's construction plans, by contrast, leave the existing lounge's operating arrangements unclear. Someone connecting through IAH before 2028 should check the lounge's status near departure rather than assume either uninterrupted service or a full closure. Those are very different contingencies when your layover is short and airport food is the backup plan.

Heathrow Adds a Location Where You Fly

Amex plans a roughly 9,000-square-foot Centurion Lounge in Heathrow's Terminal 5 for 2028, alongside its existing Terminal 3 location. That is a different sort of expansion from making one room bigger. For an eligible traveler departing Terminal 5, a lounge in that terminal could be more useful than extra capacity somewhere else in the airport. The proposal includes work areas as well as food and seating, although the final layout and day-to-day availability will determine how useful those features are.

Heathrow's Terminal 3 lounge opened in 2021. The Terminal 5 project would extend Amex's presence across two terminals instead of relying on the older location alone. It also shows the limit of adding up network square footage as though it were one shared room: a seat in Terminal 5 and a seat in Terminal 3 serve different itineraries. Check your departure terminal before treating the new location as part of your lounge options.

Amex has other projects in the pipeline, including a planned Boston lounge, a Charlotte Sidecar and an expansion at Dallas Fort Worth; a Sidecar opened in Las Vegas in March, The Points Guy notes. Its writer also describes access becoming difficult at peak periods, an observation rather than a measured wait time across the network. More locations and bigger rooms are a reasonable response to that problem. They may also make lounge access more appealing to cardholders, so future demand belongs in any honest forecast of how roomy these spaces will feel.

Before making a card or flight decision around any of these lounges, check the access terms for your own card and trip. The Points Guy lists card-dependent guest rules and notes that Delta Reserve cardholders need a same-day qualifying Delta flight purchased with a U.S.-issued Amex card for Centurion access. A lounge can expand impressively and still be irrelevant to a traveler who cannot enter. For Philadelphia flyers in particular, the next concrete change is October 16: the existing door closes well before the larger one is supposed to open.