Marketers should use these guidelines to learn how to design best-in-class emails and how to onboard American Express M-EDS assets to their creative agencies.

Agencies should use these as an instructional guide on how to leverage the M-EDS assets to design and build clean, fresh, engaging ‘on-brand’ American Express emails.

A person receiving email via M-EDS, show them you're Golden when you share the Gold card.

Important

The updated M-EDS guidelines and email assets highlight email channel best practices including enhanced accessibility standards and Dark Mode rendering. All marketers and agencies must ensure they are no longer using old code that is not compliant with the 4.2 update that includes the Deque remediation amends. This update is vital to ensure that all emails meet Amex accessibility and compliance standards.

About the M-EDS

An example Image of M-EDS, how it would look on mobile device (iPhone)

Email is one of the most powerful channels we have to reach our customers. Today, there are over 4.5 billion email users worldwide who send and receive more than 361 billion emails per day*, so getting ours to stand out from the crowd is becoming increasingly difficult.

The first iteration of the M-EDS was launched in 2017 in close collaboration with industry-leading email design experts. The objective was to deliver a design system that would convey a strong brand identity, cater to our marketing needs, incorporate industry best practices, and integrate feedback from our research.

Key to our success has been making our emails actionable, accessible, and easy to scan for all recipients. Our Card Members have dozens of email apps to choose from and interact with us using multiple devices. They may skim our emails using the Gmail app on their iPhone on the bus to work, use Outlook 2019 on their desktop work computer, or read and action using their iPad while sitting on the sofa at home in the evening. Our challenge is to have them display correctly and be engaging across all this technology.

The clean, modern designs, produced in line with Brand Guidelines, support logical content hierarchy while being visually appealing, with strong, action-orientated headlines and evocative imagery. Most importantly, they look as good on mobile as they do on desktop.

In addition, we provide coded HTML files for agencies to use in order to reduce the number of rendering and display issues, whilst catering for the devices and clients our customers use most.

In simple terms, our emails are now much easier, quicker and more cost-effective to produce, and should ultimately get a better reaction from our Card Members too. These Guidelines explain how to achieve this.

Source: Statista 2024

Design and HTML Files

The M-EDS is available in Figma, Sketch and Photoshop formats. If using Photoshop or Sketch, please download the correct files for your market.

Figma M-EDS

The M-EDS has two library files which are available in Figma.

Follow the Design Guild figma onboarding to add the Design System Libraries within Figma.

Photoshop and Sketch Design Files - US Download

Only use this kit for emails deployed in the US market.

Files included:

Start Here PSD
Content Module Files PSDs
Kinetic Module Files PSDs
Full Kit (Sketch)

Photoshop and Sketch Design Files - International Download

Use this kit for any emails deployed in any market outside the US.

Files included:

Start Here PSD
Content Module Files PSDs
Kinetic Module Files PSDs
Full Kit (Sketch)

HTML Files - US

The HTML files can be downloaded from the US pack.

HTML Files - International

The HTML files can be downloaded from the International pack.

M-EDS Assets

The M-EDS assets, design files, guidelines, and HTML are available to download in two packs: US Pack and International Pack. Each pack contains the same core assets, with minor design variations specific to each market.

Download US Pack Download International Pack

Supporting Assets

The lists below detail all the assets and resources that are included in the downloaded file.

Email On Acid Download

Files included:

Getting Started
Manual Process
My Inbox Help
Custom Client Profiles
Auto Process
EoA Introduction EMEA
EoA Introduction JAPA
EoA Introduction LACC

Inbox Previewer Test Matrix Download

Files included:

Testing Matrix

M-EDS Updates

The Marketing Email Design System (M-EDS) ensures brand consistency and thought leadership within the email channel. Updates to M-EDS incorporate stakeholder feedback, industry best practice, and third-party research. The advancements implemented since v.4.0 are outlined below.