New list is up: Check out the latest list:Everyone wants the best credit card ever available in India, but what’s best for me may not be best for you. This is because where we spend, how much we spend and how much joining fee we’re willing to pay varies between you and me. However, this article covers anything and everything that you would ever need to make the most out of your credit cards.
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Be it a beginner to the credit card or the celebrity who spends few lakhs to crores every year, i’ve covered them all 🙂. Best Credit Cards in India with Full Reviews for 2017 – Rewards Points, Cashback & Travel BenefitsIf you’re very new to credit cards or if you’re wondering what are the basic benefits of holding a credit card, you must first check out. Others, lets begin with the list.
India’s Best Credit Cards in 2017 – The Most Famous All RoundersIf you’ve a very high income or looking for a super premium credit card, you can find them at the end of the article. Now lets first look at the ones that are more popular, easy to get and common among the credit card holders in India. SBI Card Prime.
Yes Bank Preferred Credit Card. SBI Elite Credit Card. HDFC Regalia. HDFC Diners Premium. SBI Simply Click Credit Card.
Amex Gold Charge Card. Indusind Iconia Credit Card. Standard Chartered Manhattan. ICICI Bank Coral Credit Card. Citibank Cashback Credit Cardand now lets see why each of them are in the list.
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#1 SBI Card PrimeSBICard recently launched a new credit card in 2017 which is my favorite pick of the year. If you’re looking for a single card that serves all purpose, its SBI Prime Credit card.
Its a power packed credit card with a lot of features stuffed inside. From milestone benefit to lounge access, SBI Card prime has everything you need under single roof and that too with a renewal fee waiver of 3L spend.
Reward Rate: 3%-5%. Joining Fee: Rs.2,999+Tax (You get equivalent Welcome Gift). Full Review:.Best for: Dining, Groceries & Departmental stores Spends, International/Domestic Lounge Access,#2 Yes Bank Preferred Credit CardThis is more of a replacement for HDFC Regalia (as its devalued now) and is relatively easy to get approved.
If you prefer to redeem your points primarily for Flight tickets/recharges, or even amazon vouchers this card is best fit. Yesbank entered Credit cards space in 2016 and they’re growing super fast.
Their recent promotional offers are good enough to consider holding one of their credit cards. YES First Preferred Credit Card by YesBank. Reward Rate: 2%. Joining Fee: Usually Free. Full Review:Best for: All type of spends, International/Domestic Lounge Access #3 SBI Elite Credit CardIf you’re looking for a best credit card with the ability to redeem reward points for cashback, this card will fit in perfectly. Also you get 2 bookmyshow tickets every month (not buy1 get 1) which is one of best kind of Bookmyshow offer you could get. It suits best for high spenders and your annual fee gets waived off on 10L spend.
SBI Elite Credit Card. Reward Rate: 2%.
Joining Fee: Rs.4,999+ST. Full Review:.Best for: Dining, Groceries & Departmental stores Spends, Free Movie tickets every month, International/Domestic Lounge AccessYes, it comes with a high joining fee, though you can get a waiver on a 10L spend per year.
Even if you don’t spend that much, you get the value back through bookmyshow vouchers. #4 HDFC Regalia Credit Card:It’s HDFC’s flagship credit card and had its name and fame for many years, but now after a, it has lost its position big time.
Its a lifestyle card, you get decent reward rate, free domestic and international lounge access, low foreign currency markup fees on international transactions, 5X rewards with selected merchants and access to host of other offers with HDFC. My HDFC Business Regalia Credit CardI’ve been using it for more than 2 years, accumulated a lot of reward points and used them to book FREE flight tickets for my recent. If you find it tough to get approved, apply for and then upgrade it to the Original Regalia after 6 months. Reward Rate: 1.3%.
Joining Fee: Usually Free. Alert: HDFC devalues all their cards very often. Full Review:Best for: All spends, International/Domestic Lounge Access (Priority Pass can be shared with Add-on Cards) #5 HDFC Diners Premium Credit CardIf you’re more of a traveler and online shopper, HDFC Diners Premium Credit card will help you save quite a lot with its 10X Reward Points and complimentary lounge access in India. The only downside of this credit card is that its not a Visa or Mastercard but Diners Club itself and the is not 100%. Hence you always need one backup card to be on safer side. Amex Gold Charge Card. Reward Rate: 2%.
Joining/Renewal Fee: Rs.1000+ST/Rs.4,500+ST. Full Review:.Best for: All spends, Travel & lifestyle offers, world-class customer supportNote that its a charge card and hence you can’t buy things on EMI, for which you might consider the. Do you know, with Amex Gold charge card, you can start with 1 Lakh internal credit limit and go as high as 8 Lakhs in just 6 months. Before you apply for one, you must check out. #8 Indusind Iconia Credit Card (Amex)The ability to earn reward points on fuel & utility spends and redeem them for cashback makes this card a unique one among the most popular Credit cards in India.
Best when spends are made on weekends. Go for it if you’ve a lot of Utility spends, if not skip it as it does have a joining fee that you can’t escape from. Standard Chartered Manhattan Credit Card Review. Reward Rate: Upto 5% (though lots of limits applicable).
Joining Fee: Rs.499+tax (Waived if you Spend Rs. 30,000 in a year ). Full Review:.#10 ICICI Coral Credit CardIn earlier days its famous for the Bookmyshow Buy 1 Get 1 offer, however these days its very tough to get it due to the limited availability. Availing Buy1Get1 with this card is like booking a Tatkal ticket 😀 Apart from that, its very useful for Lounge access.
Make sure to grab the Mastercard variant for lounge access. Citibank Cashback Credit CardGet flat 0.5% cashback irrespective of where you spend, infact it gives you 5% on some categories. So you don’t need to deal with reward points and all that stuff. Good for beginners and as like Amex cards, Citi also runs travel offers quite often for which this card will be very useful. Reward Rate: 0.5%. Joining Fee: Free. Full Review:Alright, these are the cards most of the Indians are having in their wallet.
Its upto you to choose which one you need based on what benefits you’re looking for. Ideally, you can have 2-3 credit cards for someone who has yearly spend of 3L and for anything more than that, i invite you to the super premium credit card segment. Super Premium Credit Cards:Got a high income or have credit card spends more than 3 Lakhs in a year? You’re supposed to have one or more of these super premium credit cards in your wallet. ↓. DevCongrats on a great blog that is going places.I have 2 questions:-What is the difference in getting the regular Amex and the Yes Bank affiliated Amex cards?Which card do you think is best for utilities and/or fuel?Also, not sure what I should do with my normal Amex cards – I switched my Jet card to the Plat Travel and they reduced my limit from 5Lakhs to 70k!
I tried speaking to them but oddly for Amex someone was very rude and told me to cancel my card. Which card do you think I should move to?
I already have the Diners Black. ↓. Vinod KannanNow HDFC is very clear about the Eligibility Criteria for all their Credit Cards. HDFC has updated the minimum eligibility criteria for all their cards in their website. For Dinersclub Black it is 21 Lakhs, Regalia 12 Lakhs, Dinersclub Premium 7.2 Lakhs, Regalia First 7.2 lakhsThey have also updated the Rewards Catalogue and the heart break is, Regalia Credit card has been placed at a Lower Level than Dinersclub Premium.
Regalia is in Category E, whereas Dinersclub Premium has been placed above it in Category F.What it means that, Inorder to redeem your points for a 32Gb Iphone 7, you need 2,00,000 points in case of Regalia, and only 1,75,000 points incase of Dinersclub Premium. ↓. VishalHow i am looking to apply for a Credit card, after reading your article i am planning to apply for Amex Gold but annual fees are very high?
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I have few questions for amex gold charge card1. Is there any monthly/ annually spend required so that customer care support can waive off annual fees?2. I currently hold league kotak card? Is that worth having?3, what is your strategy to use this Gold charge card? How to make most use of it4. I hold addon card of Regalia and i have my own Citi rewards card?
Is it worth keeping citi rewards card? ↓. Vishi SegalI am also a little puzzled on this, I am provided 2 options to upgrade from Diners rewards:1. Diners Premium2.
HDFC Regalia(both LTF)I am planning on going with Diners Premium, because:1. Lounge access = 6 (domestic, international combined and shared with the add on cards), which can be availed on add on cards as well and not limited to 2 per quarter for domestic.2. Movie Buy 1 get 1, still there on few theaters, I hope, they will bring back PVR to their list.3. 10X category, which results to around 13.3% rewards. Spend of Rs 600, give rewards equivalent to Rs. Same reward rate, after devaluation of both Diners and Regalia = 1.3% (except for 10X on diners)PS: for other benefits I also hold Axis Select Credit Card (LifeTimeFree) like:1. Priority Pass – 4 complimentary international lounge access2.
Domestic Lounge Access – 2 per quarter3. Visa offer Buy 1 Get 1 on Bookmyshow4. Reward rate on all Retail = 2.5%5. Reward Rate on all other spends = 1.3%. ↓. AtulHi Siddarth,For about 5 years+ I was using the ICICI Signature card.
About a year ago ICICI have offered me a Sapphiro with the same limit of 3.9 lakhs.My yearly spending is more than 5.0 lakhs & i travel atleast twice abroad.To use the international lounge access I have been given a Priority Pass Card but on which I get charged!Could you suggest me:a) any other ICICI or a SBI Credit Card with similar perksb) How to best utilize the 26000+ reward points accumulated on my card.Thanks. ↓.
AbdulWhat charges are showing up exactly? Can you please list few of them?I’ve around 10 credit cards and none has any ‘extra’ service charges showing up.Also, if your CA said that double charges will be attracted on credit cards, its time to change your CA. Its merely a hoax, nothing else. Only only change post GST is the amount of tax that you pay on services/fees/interest.For example, if you do not pay card dues on time, you’re charged interest + GST on that interest. Also, if your card has any annual fees, you have to pay GST on that annual fees.
This GST is 18% for all financial services. Earlier, we used to pay 15% VAT+service tax.
So 3% increase only on the interest or fees component. Nothing else. ↓.
Raj SarmaHi Sid,I am surprised that you have not considered the AMEX Platinum Travel Card. That card beats every other card hands down.Over a year on around 5 lakhs of spends I got more than 33K worth of vouchers (if it is used for Indigo, you get at the rate of 0.8p per 1 reward point).You also get money back on fuel spends (3% back) which is unbelievable. Add to that the Taj voucher for 10K.Note: This are my thoughts and I do not work with Amex nor have any benefits from anyone using/not using this card. Himanshu JainHi Siddharth,Thank you for sharing so much of information on your blog. It is helpful. I have two queries.
Can you help me with them?1) I am looking for a credit card with free lounge access for the addon card. It will be fine if there is limited lounge access as I am looking to use them on our upcoming family trip to Hyderabad from Mumbai. I am having ICICI Instant Platinum Credit Card and recently got a AMEX MMRC under the LTF offer.2) YesBank is offering me both Yes First Preferred Credit Card and Yes First Business Card. Which do you think is better? ↓. RKHi Siddharth,I recently went through your blog and love it.
Your articles are detailed and helpful.My annual spend is around 4L and through your blog advice I have got Yes First preferred and Amex rewards card both life time free in the last 2 months.Yes is now used for most spends and Amex only for availing monthly rewards.I have also two old cards –Standard Chartered super value titanium card – continued to be used for petrol offer – Paid card but I get waiver every yearHDFC moneyback card – Life time free but post devaluation stopped using it.Please advise regarding my last two cards. I would prefer carrying 2-3 cards at the max. ↓.
HPHi guys! Need a few inputs from big time online shoppers in the bank card strategy. I want to cover almost all the leading banks either through a card or through a savings bank relationship so that I am able to reap in the offers which are often restricted to specific banks.What I would like to know is:1) would you know which banks mostly put out credit card only offers. For example I often see HDFC Bank restricting the promotional schemes to their CC customers.
Any other bank following this practice?2) I would like to avoid having credit cards with all the major ( the top 5 private banks, citi, HSBC, SCB and SBI) banks as this would kill my CIBIL. Hence a judicious mix of savings relationship and card seem plausible. Hence what do you think will be that judicious mix which banks to hold a savings account with and which banks are good for only a credit card. I have a Citi and Hdfc savings relationship and hold HSBC, Amex, Icici cards.Looks forward to your inputs.
↓. Saurabh SenHi Sid,I will be a first-time user of credit card.
After going through your blog, I used like to go for either SBI Simply Click or SC Platinum Rewards Card. However, I have a few queries:1. How to save on annual fees? Unless I am not using my card very frequently, how logically is it go for a card with annual fees?2.
If I pay the credit within dates, then do i need to pay any additional interest or only the net transaction?3. Any precautions for first-time users? What can be done if the bank falsely charges for something?
I saw many such instances in television. ↓. KARTHEEK REDDY MHi Siddharth,Thanks for all the information.I would spend most of the next year abroad. Most of my expenses (personal travel,food) are corporate reimbursed leaving expenses like Spouse/family travel, shopping, retail purchases in US. Is there any article of yours which talks about best credit cards for 100% international spend.I prefer low forex conversion and the only card i have for now is SBI Elite. I wonder if there are better cards than JP Diners club, which i am inclined to own.
↓. RiteshI never imagined that there is so much play with CC’s and thanks to Siddharth for publishing this brilliant info.I am one of those with a Regalia card and satiated with it, till I came across your website.I have a yearly spend of 1315 lakhs mostly on Policy premiums,Electricity & Telephone bills, International and Domestic Online shopping and Fuel. What should I consider?
I would prefer staying with 1-2 cards rather than 5-6.And where does one get to see the number of cards issued in one’s name. I would like to cancel my unused cards.