Travel credit cards offer some of the highest reward rates available - whenever you use a travel credit card, the points you earn can be used towards a future (or even past) travel purchase. A travel credit card is also useful for benefits such as first class upgrades, TSA Precheck and Global Entry paid and exclusive benefits for hotels and rental cars.
The points you accumulate are often redeemed through your credit card issuer's website (or app) or appear as a statement credit that refunds you for past purchases you made with your credit card. trip. Points or miles can also be transferred to travel partners - mainly hotels and airlines - at a fluctuating conversion rate, where they can then be used to book a flight or hotel room. More on that later.
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To choose the best travel credit card, there are a few key factors to consider:
- Annual fees. All of the travel reward cards reviewed here have annual fees, some as high as $ 550, but these fees are usually offset by monthly or yearly credits.
- Exclusive advantages. Some cards also provide access to exclusive travel benefits, such as airline lounges or VIP hotel drop-offs. The value of these benefits is subjective and something that you will need to assess according to your needs and wants.
- Transaction fees abroad. None of the best travel cards have overseas transaction fees, so it's not something you should worry about with any of the credit cards recommended below.
How do travel credit cards work?
Travel credit cards convert purchases into points or miles that can be redeemed for travel purchases, such as flights and hotel stays. Sometimes you can exchange these points for cash, but you get the best rate when you use them to book a trip. The best maps have their own travel booking portals through which you can find flights, hotels and rental cars; sometimes points are worth more when used in these portals.
The airline and hotel credit cards - which we have not included in this list - work like loyalty programs in that you stay in a closed-loop reward system. You earn rewards when you buy flights or hotels through your chosen airline or hotel company, and you can use these points for future benefits or reservations through the same airline or group of hotels.
Other Travel Credit Card Benefits
Most travel credit cards - which have high annual fees - include benefits that add value to these cards. Benefits such as collision insurance for rental cars and even reimbursement for lost luggage have become standard. Here is what is offered for the chosen cards:
- Travel accident insurance: Reserve, CapOne Venture
- Trip cancellation insurance: Reserve, Platinum,
- Refund / protection for delay in travel: Reserve, Platinum
- Refund of lost luggage: Reserve, Platinum, Gold, Propel
- Rental car collision insurance: Reserve, Platinum, Gold, Venture, Propel
How we chose the best travel credit cards
To determine our recommendations for the best travel credit card, 19 of the most popular travel reward credit cards (listed below) were searched and selected based on the best monetary value for certain customer profiles, such as than a frequent traveler, those who spend a lot on meals and groceries, or those who are looking for an easy way to travel at a reduced price with miles earned on daily expenses. We always consider overall equity to be paramount, because choosing the right rewards credit card is about saving money and being financially responsible, not being drawn into flashy or irrelevant benefits or offers.
To determine when a card makes financial sense, these cards were compared to the best free meal and travel reimbursement card, the Wells Fargo Propel. Since the Propel card offers cardholders a 3% discount on travel, public transportation and meals at no cost, it has been used as a benchmark to judge the cards below.
Sought cards
- AmEx Platinum Card
- AmEx Gold Card
- Chase Sapphire Preferred
- Chase Sapphire Reserve
- CapitalOne Venture
- Capital One VentureOne
- Bank of America Premium Rewards
- PenFed Pathfinder Rewards Card
- Uber Visa Card
- BofA Travel Rewards
- Discover It Miles
- Virgin Atlantic World Elite Mastercard
- Hilton Honors American Express Surpass
- Marriott Bonvoy Boundless
- JetBlue Plus
- Signature Alaska Airlines Visa
- United Explorer Card
- American Express Delta Reserve® Credit Card
- American Express Delta SkyMiles® Platinum Credit Card
- American Express Gold Delta SkyMiles® Credit Card
A note on airline credit cards
After considerable back and forth, we chose not to recommend best airline credit card as part of this list. The five travel cards described above will allow you to get better point redemption value overall and will more often than not be your best option as the main travel card, as you will earn points from various Airlines companies. Some airline credit cards, however, can be useful for certain spending habits, such as those that always travel with one airline and usually check baggage, and can therefore be worth their low annual fees (usually less than $ 100). for some users.
Choosing the best airline credit card (co-branded or not) is subjective based on your loyalty to a particular airline. Benefit values such as priority boarding, seat upgrades, lounge access and airline status vary depending on which airline you are loyal to and how often you fly with them . In many cases, airline credit cards are chosen based on the airlines that operate hubs at the nearest airport.
Even if you stick to one airline for all of your flights, co-branded cards are tricky when it comes to extracting value. For example, the Bank of America Virgin Atlantic World Elite Mastercard offers 3X Virgin Atlantic Flying Club miles on Virgin purchases and 1.5X Flying Club miles on all other purchases. With the latest maximum rating from The Points Guy of 1.5 cents per mile, that means you can collect up to 4.5% on Virgin purchases and 2.5% on everything else, when maximizing the value of these points. Given the difficulty of finding a perfect refund for a specific flight, we don't expect many users to maximize the value of the refund every time.
These reward rates are decent, but remember that you can only redeem these miles on a short list of airline partners, and you will rarely get the best redemption value. In addition, the best buyouts are often transcontinental flights in business class or first class, such as booking a return ticket of $ 4,000 for $ 2,000, which is a good deal but does not concern most consumers. Americans. Finally, since you only get the highest reward rate (3X) when you fly with that specific airline, you could potentially spend more on some flights than you would on a bargain hunt. If you want to go from LAX to NYC, for example, and you spend $ 100 more to fly on the airline of your choice, you are sacrificing a significant portion of the value of the rewards you generate.
That said, if you travel several times a month with the same airline, enjoy status upgrades with a specific airline and could potentially maximize the redemption value with longer flights or higher class cabins, a airline credit could be a good option for you. They can also be useful for occasional frequent flyers who want to remove checked baggage fees (free checked baggage is a common benefit for airline cards), but only when they don't fly often enough to justify the high fees. 'a premium trip. menu. There are also scenarios where it makes sense to have an air card and an unbranded card in common, but just be sure to keep an eye on annual fees and never let points or miles expire.
A note on hotel credit cards
Hotel credit cards work the same way as airline cards, because your best reward value comes when you make purchases with this hotel chain, and your refund options are limited. As with co-branded airline credit cards, we do not recommend one hotel credit card over another and we believe that the best travel reward credit cards listed above outperform the co-branded cards in the most scenarios. However, if you always book your hotel stays with only one hotel chain, it may be worth checking the available maps.
Another important factor to note with hotel cards is that the value of their points is very different from that of airline points or miles. Hilton Honors points, for example, are only worth 0.6 cents in the high end, so even if Hilton Honors credit cards have high reward rates, the value of those rewards is less than Chase Ultimate Rewards points, American Express Membership Rewards points, or airline miles.
But for those who want to get a status upgrade (which usually includes perks like free breakfast and room upgrades) with a hotel chain without having to spend above the standard threshold, a co-branded credit card accelerate your progress and help you reach higher status with the chain for less expense. Remember that you are essentially paying for these upgrades in a different way and that you could sacrifice the value of the expenses by not using another travel credit card.
And APR?
APR stands for annual percentage rate, and it is the amount of interest you will pay during the year on any balance you keep on your credit card. Since we strongly recommend that you repay your credit card balance in full every month, we do not take a close look at the APR when evaluating credit card rewards.
If you're having trouble paying off your credit card balance every month, start with low APR cards and don't worry about the rewards. Any reward you generate - whether cash back, travel rewards or whatever - disappears quickly when you pay interest every month. Also, keep in mind that while some credit cards offer an introductory APR for the first year, usually 0%, the travel category usually doesn't.
Other types of cards to consider
If you do not meet the minimum recommended spending for any of the above credit card options, you may want to consider a cash credit card instead of a travel credit card. Cash back credit cards offer rewards in the form of statement credits or cash. These are fairly easy to use cards with rewards in the range of 1.5% to 3%, often with no annual fee. They also offer connection bonuses, usually in the form of a specific amount after a spending threshold in the first few months.
Other types of cards are more suited to specific situations, such as balance transfer cards if you need to "restructure" your credit card debt, credit cards like secure credit cards if you have low credit or no credit, low - APR credit cards if you have trouble paying your bill every month, or student credit cards for those who are full-time or part-time students.
Disclaimer: The information included in this article, including the features of the rewards program, program fees and credits available via credit cards to apply to these programs, may change from time to time and are presented without warranty. Lors de l'évaluation des offres, veuillez consulter le site Web du fournisseur de carte de crédit et consulter ses termes et conditions pour les offres et informations les plus récentes. Les opinions exprimées ici sont celles de l'auteur uniquement, et non celles d'une banque, d'un émetteur de carte de crédit, d'un hôtel, d'une compagnie aérienne ou d'une autre entité. Ce contenu n'a été examiné, approuvé ou autrement approuvé par aucune des entités incluses dans le message. Les commentaires sur cet article ne sont ni fournis ni commandés par l'annonceur bancaire. Les réponses n'ont pas été examinées, approuvées ou autrement approuvées par l'annonceur bancaire. Il n'est pas de la responsabilité de l'annonceur bancaire de s'assurer que toutes les publications et / ou questions ont une réponse.
