Compare the Features and Benefits of British Airways Visa Signature Card and
Citi® Double Cash Card

On top of a generous sign up bonus, the British Airways credit card by Chase earns 3x Avios on British Airways, Iberia, LEVEL, and Aer Lingus and 2x Avios on hotel accommodations booked directly with the hotel. Avios can be shared between any Avios program, which also includes Qatar Airways (home of the QSuite) and you can redeem British Airways Avios for award tickets on oneworld airlines like American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, Cathay Pacific, and more.

Award tickets on short-haul American Airlines are actually a major sweet spot of the British Airways Avios program with flights like New York to Miami in coach going for just 9,000 Avios and $5,60 in tax.

More importantly, you’ll receive 10% off all British Airways flights that originate in the United States. (Must book through a special website provided with your new card.)

And then, after your first year, you can earn a Travel Together Ticket (a.k.a. Companion Ticket), good for bringing a companion for just the taxes and fees when you redeem a reward flight for yourself, when you spend $30,000 in a calendar year. Don’t have a companion to bring? You can use it for half off the points of an Avios award flight instead.

Finally, you’ll also receive up to a $600 statement credit on bookings for Reward Flights as described above in Unique Card benefits.

If you fly British Airways frequently, this airline credit card is truly compelling.

Keep in mind, from a pure points earning perspective, that the Chase Sapphire Reserve also earns 3x Chase Ultimate Rewards credit card points on these airlines and on all airlines, hotels and other travel and can even be transferred to Avios if needed – as well as a range of other travel partners, like World of Hyatt which offers excellent and outsized value.

So if you are getting the card for the points alone, you may want to rethink it. If you are getting it for the benefits, your head is in the right place.

Keep in mind that British Airways Avios expire after 36 months of inactivity, though that won’t be a problem if you are spending on this credit card!

If you don’t primarily fly BA, you might want to look at other airline credit cards or bank cards with transferable points.

Note: Per Chase’s 5/24 Rule, you will only be approved for a Chase card like the British Airways Visa card if you have applied for fewer than 5 personal credit cards within the last 24 months from any issuer. (Business cards do not count against the total, except for Capital One Spark Cash Select and Spark Miles plus Discover, but are subject to the policy).

The Citi Double Cash® Card isn’t a card loaded with features and benefits.

But it has one killer feature that makes the card a must-have for nearly everyone and that’s the simple fact that it earns 2% cash back on all of your everyday purchases. Technically, you earn 1% when you spend and 1% when you pay, but semantics aside, you’re earning 2% cash back on absolutely all eligible purchases.

And before we forget, it also comes with a pretty amazing intro offer for balance transfers, as outlined in the Key Facts at the top of the page.

You don’t have to think about bonus categories with this credit card. The answer to “what will I earn here” is always 2%.

Just one caveat: the Double Cash does not come with many expected benefits, like extended warranty or purchase protection. For those reasons, you may want to use another card for high value merchandise purchases.

That said, why is it a must have credit card for nearly everyone? Three reasons:

1) There is no consumer credit card issued by a major bank that earns a higher % of cash back with no annual fee. None.

2) You can use this as your one credit card if you are completely averse to using multiple credit cards (although you’ll need to be aware of the foreign transaction fees charged if you travel internationally). But even better is to use this as your “default” card. What I mean by that is you may have a card that earns 4X on dining and groceries and another that earns 3% on drugstores, but that’s it. What about an insurance payment? What about daycare?

On most other credit cards, if you aren’t spending in a bonus category, you only earn 1X or 1% back. For example, the Citi Premier Card pays 3X in certain categories (Air/Hotel, Gas, Restaurants and Supermarkets) and 1X in everything else. So you can “Double Up” by having both cards.

The Citi Double Cash card earns 2X Thank You® points on everything. If your purchase is in a Citi Premier card bonus category, go ahead and make the purchase with your Citi Premier card. If it’s in any other category, make the purchase with your Double Cash card. That way, you’ll get one percent when you make the purchase and another percent when you pay it. With a Double Cash card in your pocket, you can always take it out when you have no bonus category available, ensuring that you never, ever earn less than 2% back on any purchases.

3) While you’ll earn cash back rewards with this card, it earns it as ThankYou® points. If you only have the Double Cash alone, that keeps things simple. It’s cash! You can cash out as a statement credit, via direct deposit to your bank account, or by check.

Pair with a Citi Premier® card – a great credit card strategy

In that case, once again, you simply pair this card with a Citi Premier credit card. That would allow you to pool all of your ThankYou® points together and, because of the Premier, you’ll unlock access to all of the transfer options listed below, the best kind of credit card rewards:

What are some of the ways you can use Citi ThankYou® points for outsized value with a Citi Premier?

We outline all of that on the Citi Premier card page, since that is the card that unlocks these features. Please take a look at the Citi Premier review for everything you need to know about using Citi ThankYou® points.

The Citi Trifecta: Add the Citi Premier and then a Citi Rewards+ Card for a 10% Points Rebate

You can make your Citi Premier and Citi Double Cash rewards combo even more rewarding if you add in a no-annual fee Citi Rewards+ card.

Each calendar year, Citi will rebate back 10% of the first 100,000 ThankYou® Points that you spend, so you can get back up to 10,000 points per year Best of all, it isn’t tied in any way to your spending on the card. Just having it in your profile and linked to the same ThankYou account will ensure that you get the rebate.

Citi Application Rules

Citi won’t approve more than 2 cards in a 60-day period, although we recommend 65 days, just to be safe. This means that if you decide to apply for the Double Cash and combo with a Citi Premier and Citi Rewards+ card, you’ll have to pick one to wait and apply for on Day 66. We’d recommend getting the Rewards+ last, since the benefits are when you redeem.

Bottom Line

The Citi Double Cash is quite simply a card that should be in 99% of wallets. The 2% cash back on everything (1% when you buy and 1% when you pay your bill), with no annual fee, is too good to pass up, even if you are using it in conjunction with other credit cards to maximize your bonus categories – as you should be!