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Rewards, sign-up bonuses, balance transfers, fees, protections, and card reviews. Pick the right card and collect more from it than it costs you.
Get the Atmos™ Rewards Summit Visa Infinite® Credit Card if you’d use its eight Alaska Lounge passes and 25,000-point companion award each year. At $65 a day pass, five lounge visits would cost $325, $25 more than the $300 gap between this card’s $395 fee and the Ascent card’s $95. For free checked bags alone, get the Ascent instead.
Get the Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card if you book five or more Wyndham nights a year with it, since the fifth night earns a 30,000-point bonus on top of its 30,000 anniversary points. With fewer nights, it beats the $95 Earner Plus only when its credits cover bills you already pay, such as streaming or a warehouse club membership.
Get the Choice Privileges® Mastercard® if you stay at Choice hotels such as Comfort Inn on road trips and want hotel points without an annual fee. It earns 5 points per dollar on stays you book with Choice and 3 on gas and groceries, and it makes you a Gold member automatically.
Get the Best Western Rewards® Premium Visa Signature® Card if you’ll stay at a Best Western at least one night a year. Its anniversary free night covers a standard room at any Best Western-branded hotel in the U.S., Canada, or the Caribbean, so spending it on a night priced above the $89 fee pays for the card.
Get the IHG One Rewards Credit Card if you stay at IHG hotels a few nights a year and want points and Silver Elite status without an annual fee. Once you’d use a free night each year on a room that costs more than $150, the $150 IHG Premier card pays you more.
Get the Wyndham Rewards Earner® Card if you stay at Wyndham hotels a few nights a year. With no annual fee, it gives you Gold status, which otherwise takes five nights a year, and cuts the points a free night costs by 10%. If you’d use a free night every year, compare the $95 Earner Plus.
Get the no-fee Apple Card if you pay with Apple Pay for most purchases. Apple Pay purchases earn 2% back as Daily Cash, or 3% at Apple, Uber, and other select merchants. The titanium card and the card number in Wallet earn 1% outside Apple, so use a card that pays 2% on everything where Apple Pay isn’t accepted.
Get the Instacart Mastercard® if your household orders groceries through Instacart every week. It pays 5% back on your first $6,000 of qualifying Instacart orders a year, worth up to $300, with no annual fee. If you buy groceries in the store, skip it, since it pays only 1% there.
Get the U.S. Bank Altitude® Go Visa Signature® Card if you eat out or order takeout often and want a card with no annual fee. It pays 4 points per dollar on your first $2,000 of dining each quarter. Use a different card abroad, since this one adds a 3% fee to foreign transactions.
Two or three credit cards cover most people: an everyday card, one that pays more where you spend the most, and maybe a backup or travel card. Before you open another, make sure it would earn meaningfully more than your current cards on what you actually buy, after any annual fee, or fill a gap they leave.
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