Featured Review: Best Rewards Credit Card Combos (before April 2015)
Updated October 19, 2014. This is a old review. Please see our updated review here.
Before mid 2013, our Top List had been a collection of best individual rewards credit cards currently available. Theoretically you need way too many cards to maximize rewards - one for gas, one for groceries, one for dining, one for airfare, one for hotels, one for general spending, and so on. In real life, not all of us can manager that. That is why here we will recommend the best two-card combos that give you much bigger rewards than a single card while keeping things easy to manage. One thing to note before we get started is that since everyone's situation is different, it is very likely that you will find none of the combos we recommend gives you the best rewards - we are just throwing out some ideas.
FIA Fidelity American Express + one category bonus cashback card
This combo is for people who love cash back! FIA Fidelity Amex has always been our benchmark because of its unlimited 2% cash back with no annual fee. You may also consider two great alternatives - Barclays Arrival Plus World Elite MasterCard (2.22% if redeemed for travel with a $89 annual fee) and the new Citi Double Cash (unlimited 2% cashback with no annual fee). No doubt you will put most of your spending on one of these three cards. However, adding a 5% category bonus card will certainly get you more cash. You need to do your math and figure out which category you spend the most and how much you can earn by carrying an extra card. Say if you spend $500 each month on a 5% category, every year you will earn $500 x 12 x 3% = $180 beyond your normal 2% cash back by carrying this extra card. Some people may say "$180 is awesome! I am in." but some may say "For the hassle of remembering which card to use, I will pass." So it is totally up to you. Now let's look into the most popular bonus categories to give you some ideas:
American Express Starwood Preferred Guest + pick one from: Chase Sapphire Preferred, Citi Prestige, American Express EveryDay Preferred, or Diners Club Card Elite
Amex SPG Card (annual fee $65) returns exactly one Starpoint per dollar spent for most purchases and two Starpoints for Starwood hotel spending. Starpoints are probably the single most valuable currency in the miles/points world due to the fact that they not only are worth a lot when redeemed for Starwood hotels but also can be transferred to around 30 airline partners including American, US Airways, Delta, Alaska, Hawaiian, Air Canada, British, Singapore, etc. at 1:1 ratio (and 1:1.25 if transferred in bulks of 20K). Many travelers value Starpoints more than 2 cents a piece (we value them at 2.25) and love the ultimate flexibility it provides, and that is how they prefer Amex SPG over those high earning cashback cards.
Chase Sapphire Preferred (annual fee $95) is another mighty player in the miles/points arena for similar reasons. Generally Sapphire Preferred returns 1.07 Ultimate Rewards (UR) point per dollar spent - we value a UR point at 1.5 cents after the 2014 devaluation thus this card returns 1.6% value, less than 2% cashback. However, Sapphire Preferred also offers powerful bonus categories - 3.21 points on airfare through Chase and 2.14 points on travel and dining. What is more important, UR has similar flexibility as SPG when it comes to redemption, which is one great reason to choose it over cashback cards, and UR's transfer partners include United, Southwest, Korean Air, British, Singapore, Hyatt, etc., many of which are not partners of SPG and this is exactly why it will make the combo so great. Another thing to note is that Sapphire Preferred has some better protections regarding Travel Accident, Travel Delay, Baggage Delay, Lost or Damaged Luggage, and Price Protection, than Amex SPG does. Also when you shop online, you will find that UR Mall provides a great opportunity to rack up huge amount of points while SPG doesn't even have a similar program.
Starting October 2014, Citi Prestige (annual fee $450) offers a 3-2-1 rewards structure very similar to Sapphire Preferred's. The first thing you will note is that seemingly high annual fee; however, since Prestige offers $250 annual airline credit, which can be used toward airfare and incidentals, the effective annual fee of Prestige is merely $105 more than Sapphire Preferred's, and for that it provides unlimited lounge access to 40+ American Admirals Clubs and 550+ Priority Pass Select airport lounges worldwide. In addition, it offers an unique annual relationship bonus, which can be very valuable for some customers (15% for Citigold and 25% for Private Bank clients). Without the relationship bonus, Prestige returns 1 ThankYou (TY) point per dollar spent for general spending, 2 TY points for dining and entertainment, and 3 TY points for airfare, hotels, and travel agencies. On the redemption side, TY points earned from Prestige are considered "hybrid" since they can either be redeemed for fixed value travel (1.6 cents per point on American/US Airways or 1.33 cents per point on other airlines) or be transferred to several airline partners including Cathay Pacific, Singapore, Malaysia, and Etihad. Even though in general TY's transfer partners are not as desirable as SPG or UR, considering both the fixed and flexible options, we currently value TY points earned from Prestige at 1.6 cents per point. In addition, Citi Prestige has the best consumer protections among Citicards, comparable and even superior in some cases to Sapphire Preferred's.
Amex Membership Rewards (MR) is another program that allows points to be transferred into frequent traveler miles/points. Amex's partners, including Delta, Hawaiian, British, Air Canada, ANA, Singapore, etc., are probably not as desirable as SPG or UR; however, since Amex still runs good transfer promotions (20-50%) often, we think this program still has its edge. Currently we value one MR point at 1.5 cents a piece. In March 2014, Amex unveiled a new card EveryDay Preferred, with a $95 annual fee, returning up to 4.5 points, 3 points, and 1.5 points, for groceries (with an annual spending cap of $6,000), gas, and other purchases, respectively, and we considered it as the most important and exciting new product Amex has brought to us in the past few years.
Diners Club Card Elite (annual fee $300), introduced in September 2014, is old wine in a new bottle. However, the significance of this "new" product lies in the fact that Diners Club finally starts accepting new applications in the U.S. after so many years. Club Rewards (CR) points, earned through Diners Club Cards, can be transferred to more than 20 partners including Alaska, Delta, Southwest, Hawaiian, British, Air Canada, Korean, Singapore, etc., and we consider them to be more valuable than UR/MR/TY points, currently at 1.8 cents per point. Diners Club Elite returns 3 CR points for groceries, gas, and drugstores, and 1 CR point for other purchases. A first glance seems to suggest that Elite can't be superior to EveryDay Preferred due to a higher annual fee and a lower earning rate for groceries; however, you have to keep these facts in mind: 1) Elite has no cap for grocery spending while EveryDay Preferred has a $6,000 annual cap; 2) CR points are generally considered more valuable than MR points, and 3) Elite does provides extra benefits such as unlimited access to over 500 airport lounges worldwide, primary rental car coverage, zero foreign transaction fees, and an embedded EMV chip.
This powerful combo is for people who prefer miles/points (flexible transfer redemption option) to cashback. Similar to the cashback combo, you need to pick one from Sapphire Preferred, Citi Prestige, EveryDay Preferred and Diners Club Elite. We recommend putting general spending on Amex SPG since it has the highest return rate among all five programs and obviously using Sapphire Preferred/Citi Prestige/EveryDay Preferred/Dines Club Elite for their particular bonus categories. In addition, when purchasing items that may have price drop within 90 days such as electronics, we recommend Sapphire Preferred or Citi Prestige for the Price Protection coverage. When shopping online, we recommend Sapphire Preferred for the extra point earning through UR Mall. When traveling abroad, we recommend Sapphire Preferred, Citi Prestige, or Diners Club Elite, for the waived foreign transaction fees and embedded EMV chip.
American Express EveryDay Preferred or Diners Club Card Elite + Chase Sapphire Preferred or Citi Prestige
You have to choose between EveryDay Preferred and Diners Club Elite as the first card, and between Sapphire Preferred and Citi Prestige as the second card. We highly recommend this combo as an alternative to the previous one, for the simple reason that the two cards complement each other in the bonus categories almost too perfectly. EveryDay Preferred covers groceries (4.5x with an annual spending cap of $6,000) and gas (3x), while Diners Club Elite covers groceries, gas and drugstores (all 3x). Sapphire Preferred covers airfare through Chase (3.21x), and dining and all other travel (2.14x), while Citi Prestige covers airfare/hotels/travel agencies (3x), and dining/entertainment (2x). So with this combo, you easily cover 5-8 categories with only two cards - that is a pretty amazing deal!
As for general spending, EveryDay Preferred seems to return the highest rewards at 1.5x (2.25% based on our current value of MR) on paper. However, all these four programs are worth considering due to their different coverage of transfer partners. Eventually, how you choose the cards is really up to which program you want to focus on and then the additional benefits they provide.
Chase Sapphire Preferred + Chase Freedom
Sapphire Preferred is pretty big by itself if you value miles/points high enough. Adding Chase Freedom will give you an extra boost in points due to its 5x bonus categories. Even though Chase Freedom is always branded as a cashback card, it actually earn UR points. Normally you won't be able to transfer UR points earned through Freedom to frequent flyer miles/points since it is considered a lower tier UR product, limiting the value of a point at 1 cent. However, the secret here is that if you have a premium UR card such as Sapphire Preferred, you can transfer the UR points earned from Freedom to Sapphire Preferred account so all of sudden these points become transferable to miles/points. This hugely increases value of Freedom. For example, we value a "premium" UR point at 1.5 cent so once combined with Sapphire Preferred, Freedom returns 7.5% value for its quarterly rotating bonus categories! To maximize rewards, you need to remember to sign up each quarter for Freedom's bonus categories and use Freedom only for those categories, since for everything else, Sapphire Preferred offers a slightly better value over Freedom - 1.07x points vs. 1x points. The last thing to bear in mind is that there is a quarterly $1,500 spending cap for 5x bonus categories on Freedom, so if you do everything exactly right, you will be earning an extra 23,580 UR points a year (6,000 x 4 x (5 - 1.07) = 23,580) by adding this non-fee card to your wallet!
Before mid 2013, our Top List had been a collection of best individual rewards credit cards currently available. Theoretically you need way too many cards to maximize rewards - one for gas, one for groceries, one for dining, one for airfare, one for hotels, one for general spending, and so on. In real life, not all of us can manager that. That is why here we will recommend the best two-card combos that give you much bigger rewards than a single card while keeping things easy to manage. One thing to note before we get started is that since everyone's situation is different, it is very likely that you will find none of the combos we recommend gives you the best rewards - we are just throwing out some ideas.
FIA Fidelity American Express + one category bonus cashback card
This combo is for people who love cash back! FIA Fidelity Amex has always been our benchmark because of its unlimited 2% cash back with no annual fee. You may also consider two great alternatives - Barclays Arrival Plus World Elite MasterCard (2.22% if redeemed for travel with a $89 annual fee) and the new Citi Double Cash (unlimited 2% cashback with no annual fee). No doubt you will put most of your spending on one of these three cards. However, adding a 5% category bonus card will certainly get you more cash. You need to do your math and figure out which category you spend the most and how much you can earn by carrying an extra card. Say if you spend $500 each month on a 5% category, every year you will earn $500 x 12 x 3% = $180 beyond your normal 2% cash back by carrying this extra card. Some people may say "$180 is awesome! I am in." but some may say "For the hassle of remembering which card to use, I will pass." So it is totally up to you. Now let's look into the most popular bonus categories to give you some ideas:
- Gas Stations: get PenFed Platinum Cashback Visa which gives you unlimited 5% cash back at gas stations.
- Groceries Stores: get Amex Blue Cash Preferred which carries a $75 annual fee but offers 6% on groceries, up to $6,000 in purchase a year, and unlimited 3% on gas and department stores. To maximize cashback, you will spend $6,000 a year on groceries and the extra cashback you earn beyond 2% is $6,000 x 4% - $75 = $165. We hate the annual spending cap but this is still the best grocery bonus cashback card out there.
- Dining and Entertainment (including Amazon): existing Citi Forward customers will continue to get unlimited 5x ThankYou points on dining and entertainment. Unfortunately the card has been discontinued for new applications.
- Airfare: get PenFed Travel Rewards Amex which offers 5x points on airfare.
- You may also consider Chase Freedom for quarterly rotating 5x categories (the quarterly spending cap for 5x categories is $1,500 thus the annual maximum extra cashback beyond 2% is $1,500 x 4 x 3% = $180) and US Bank Cash+ for two 5% categories you select from their list (the quarterly spending cap for 5% categories is $2,000 thus the annual maximum extra cashback beyond 2% is $2,000 x 4 x 3% = $240).
American Express Starwood Preferred Guest + pick one from: Chase Sapphire Preferred, Citi Prestige, American Express EveryDay Preferred, or Diners Club Card Elite
Amex SPG Card (annual fee $65) returns exactly one Starpoint per dollar spent for most purchases and two Starpoints for Starwood hotel spending. Starpoints are probably the single most valuable currency in the miles/points world due to the fact that they not only are worth a lot when redeemed for Starwood hotels but also can be transferred to around 30 airline partners including American, US Airways, Delta, Alaska, Hawaiian, Air Canada, British, Singapore, etc. at 1:1 ratio (and 1:1.25 if transferred in bulks of 20K). Many travelers value Starpoints more than 2 cents a piece (we value them at 2.25) and love the ultimate flexibility it provides, and that is how they prefer Amex SPG over those high earning cashback cards.
Chase Sapphire Preferred (annual fee $95) is another mighty player in the miles/points arena for similar reasons. Generally Sapphire Preferred returns 1.07 Ultimate Rewards (UR) point per dollar spent - we value a UR point at 1.5 cents after the 2014 devaluation thus this card returns 1.6% value, less than 2% cashback. However, Sapphire Preferred also offers powerful bonus categories - 3.21 points on airfare through Chase and 2.14 points on travel and dining. What is more important, UR has similar flexibility as SPG when it comes to redemption, which is one great reason to choose it over cashback cards, and UR's transfer partners include United, Southwest, Korean Air, British, Singapore, Hyatt, etc., many of which are not partners of SPG and this is exactly why it will make the combo so great. Another thing to note is that Sapphire Preferred has some better protections regarding Travel Accident, Travel Delay, Baggage Delay, Lost or Damaged Luggage, and Price Protection, than Amex SPG does. Also when you shop online, you will find that UR Mall provides a great opportunity to rack up huge amount of points while SPG doesn't even have a similar program.
Starting October 2014, Citi Prestige (annual fee $450) offers a 3-2-1 rewards structure very similar to Sapphire Preferred's. The first thing you will note is that seemingly high annual fee; however, since Prestige offers $250 annual airline credit, which can be used toward airfare and incidentals, the effective annual fee of Prestige is merely $105 more than Sapphire Preferred's, and for that it provides unlimited lounge access to 40+ American Admirals Clubs and 550+ Priority Pass Select airport lounges worldwide. In addition, it offers an unique annual relationship bonus, which can be very valuable for some customers (15% for Citigold and 25% for Private Bank clients). Without the relationship bonus, Prestige returns 1 ThankYou (TY) point per dollar spent for general spending, 2 TY points for dining and entertainment, and 3 TY points for airfare, hotels, and travel agencies. On the redemption side, TY points earned from Prestige are considered "hybrid" since they can either be redeemed for fixed value travel (1.6 cents per point on American/US Airways or 1.33 cents per point on other airlines) or be transferred to several airline partners including Cathay Pacific, Singapore, Malaysia, and Etihad. Even though in general TY's transfer partners are not as desirable as SPG or UR, considering both the fixed and flexible options, we currently value TY points earned from Prestige at 1.6 cents per point. In addition, Citi Prestige has the best consumer protections among Citicards, comparable and even superior in some cases to Sapphire Preferred's.
Amex Membership Rewards (MR) is another program that allows points to be transferred into frequent traveler miles/points. Amex's partners, including Delta, Hawaiian, British, Air Canada, ANA, Singapore, etc., are probably not as desirable as SPG or UR; however, since Amex still runs good transfer promotions (20-50%) often, we think this program still has its edge. Currently we value one MR point at 1.5 cents a piece. In March 2014, Amex unveiled a new card EveryDay Preferred, with a $95 annual fee, returning up to 4.5 points, 3 points, and 1.5 points, for groceries (with an annual spending cap of $6,000), gas, and other purchases, respectively, and we considered it as the most important and exciting new product Amex has brought to us in the past few years.
Diners Club Card Elite (annual fee $300), introduced in September 2014, is old wine in a new bottle. However, the significance of this "new" product lies in the fact that Diners Club finally starts accepting new applications in the U.S. after so many years. Club Rewards (CR) points, earned through Diners Club Cards, can be transferred to more than 20 partners including Alaska, Delta, Southwest, Hawaiian, British, Air Canada, Korean, Singapore, etc., and we consider them to be more valuable than UR/MR/TY points, currently at 1.8 cents per point. Diners Club Elite returns 3 CR points for groceries, gas, and drugstores, and 1 CR point for other purchases. A first glance seems to suggest that Elite can't be superior to EveryDay Preferred due to a higher annual fee and a lower earning rate for groceries; however, you have to keep these facts in mind: 1) Elite has no cap for grocery spending while EveryDay Preferred has a $6,000 annual cap; 2) CR points are generally considered more valuable than MR points, and 3) Elite does provides extra benefits such as unlimited access to over 500 airport lounges worldwide, primary rental car coverage, zero foreign transaction fees, and an embedded EMV chip.
This powerful combo is for people who prefer miles/points (flexible transfer redemption option) to cashback. Similar to the cashback combo, you need to pick one from Sapphire Preferred, Citi Prestige, EveryDay Preferred and Diners Club Elite. We recommend putting general spending on Amex SPG since it has the highest return rate among all five programs and obviously using Sapphire Preferred/Citi Prestige/EveryDay Preferred/Dines Club Elite for their particular bonus categories. In addition, when purchasing items that may have price drop within 90 days such as electronics, we recommend Sapphire Preferred or Citi Prestige for the Price Protection coverage. When shopping online, we recommend Sapphire Preferred for the extra point earning through UR Mall. When traveling abroad, we recommend Sapphire Preferred, Citi Prestige, or Diners Club Elite, for the waived foreign transaction fees and embedded EMV chip.
American Express EveryDay Preferred or Diners Club Card Elite + Chase Sapphire Preferred or Citi Prestige
You have to choose between EveryDay Preferred and Diners Club Elite as the first card, and between Sapphire Preferred and Citi Prestige as the second card. We highly recommend this combo as an alternative to the previous one, for the simple reason that the two cards complement each other in the bonus categories almost too perfectly. EveryDay Preferred covers groceries (4.5x with an annual spending cap of $6,000) and gas (3x), while Diners Club Elite covers groceries, gas and drugstores (all 3x). Sapphire Preferred covers airfare through Chase (3.21x), and dining and all other travel (2.14x), while Citi Prestige covers airfare/hotels/travel agencies (3x), and dining/entertainment (2x). So with this combo, you easily cover 5-8 categories with only two cards - that is a pretty amazing deal!
As for general spending, EveryDay Preferred seems to return the highest rewards at 1.5x (2.25% based on our current value of MR) on paper. However, all these four programs are worth considering due to their different coverage of transfer partners. Eventually, how you choose the cards is really up to which program you want to focus on and then the additional benefits they provide.
Chase Sapphire Preferred + Chase Freedom
Sapphire Preferred is pretty big by itself if you value miles/points high enough. Adding Chase Freedom will give you an extra boost in points due to its 5x bonus categories. Even though Chase Freedom is always branded as a cashback card, it actually earn UR points. Normally you won't be able to transfer UR points earned through Freedom to frequent flyer miles/points since it is considered a lower tier UR product, limiting the value of a point at 1 cent. However, the secret here is that if you have a premium UR card such as Sapphire Preferred, you can transfer the UR points earned from Freedom to Sapphire Preferred account so all of sudden these points become transferable to miles/points. This hugely increases value of Freedom. For example, we value a "premium" UR point at 1.5 cent so once combined with Sapphire Preferred, Freedom returns 7.5% value for its quarterly rotating bonus categories! To maximize rewards, you need to remember to sign up each quarter for Freedom's bonus categories and use Freedom only for those categories, since for everything else, Sapphire Preferred offers a slightly better value over Freedom - 1.07x points vs. 1x points. The last thing to bear in mind is that there is a quarterly $1,500 spending cap for 5x bonus categories on Freedom, so if you do everything exactly right, you will be earning an extra 23,580 UR points a year (6,000 x 4 x (5 - 1.07) = 23,580) by adding this non-fee card to your wallet!