It has a unique ability to plant an Inspiring Flag that makes military units perform better in combat, and makes buildings construct and train units faster. Unlike other civilizations, the United States has the General unit, a powerful and heartier Explorer that can be used to create Trading Posts and Forts, with the drawback of being denied the capability of constructing Town Centers. These cards function similar to the Consulate units and bonuses gained by the Asian civilizations. The United States also have access to Immigrant cards, which grant bonuses and economic units/resources reflective of the civilizations the cards 'borrow' from, as well as Legion cards which ship powerful military units and make them trainable at Forts.

Because of the Federal Cards system, the United States has a notably smaller deck compared to other civilizations, as players can only pick up to 21 cards as opposed to the usual 25. The cards will be added to the Home City deck, and cannot be found when building the Home City deck prior to the game.

Rather than using the the Politician system like its European counterparts, United States players will instead pick a Federal State that grants not just resources, units or technologies, but two unique Federal cards, reflective of the particular Federal state.

One of the advantages of the United States is their ability to utilize Federal Cards. However, a downside of the United States' units is their emphasis of attack damage over health, such as the State Militia or the Sharpshooter, which can be problematic if swarmed by fast melee or artillery units. A major asset of the United States is that the civilization makes use of a wide variety of ranged gunpowder units that can inflict greater damage and even outrange other units with the proper upgrades. Although it does not have the economic prowess of some of its European counterparts, the United States is a powerful civilization with heavy emphasis on combat.

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