Update: Today s your final day to finish your $1,500 in quarterly grocery spending (or buy gift cards from grocery stores) on your Freedom cards!
Chase Freedom Flex and Freedom are excellent no annual fee cards thanks to their quarterly 5% categories. While the rewards are marketed as 5% cash back, you’ll actually get 5 Ultimate Rewards points per dollar spent which can be worth much more than 5% cash.
If you max out the $1,500 in bonus spending per quarter you will earn at least 30,000 Ultimate Rewards points over the course of a year (7,500 points per quarter at 5 points per dollar spent). My wife and I now have 7 Freedom cards, which makes it all the more lucrative!
You can register now for 2022 Q2 spending which will be valid 4/1-6/30 at:
- Select streaming services, including HBO Max, Paramount+, Peacock, Showtime, Disney+, Netflix, Hulu, Sling, Vudu, Fubo TV, Apple Music, SiriusXM, Pandora, Spotify, YouTube TV, and ESPN+.
- Amazon.com, including Amazon account reloads and gift cards sold by Amazon for hundreds of other stores.
You still can finish Q1 spending through 3/31 at:
- Grocery stores. This includes large grocery chains and small local grocery stores, including Bingo Wholesale. These stores sell gift cards to lock in future savings, and gift cards to other stores as well. You can lookup how a store is categorized here.
- eBay.
You can check your current 5% earnings here by clicking on “Your Dashboard.”
You can currently earn a $200 signup bonus in the form of 20,000 Ultimate Rewards points for spending $500 on the Freedom Flex Mastercard. Plus you’ll earn 3 points per dollar on drugstore and dining purchases and 5 points per dollar on all Travel purchased through the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal. Read more about the Freedom Flex card here.
While Chase Freedom Flex is a great card for the bonus categories, it’s not a great card for everyday spending. However the Chase Freedom Unlimited card also has no annual fee and earns 3 points per dollar on up to $20,000 of spending during your first 12 months. Plus it’s excellent for everyday spending thanks to 1.5 points per dollar that can be earned everywhere with no limit, though it doesn’t have rotating 5x categories. Read more about the Freedom Unlimited card here.
The no annual fee business version of Freedom Unlimited is the Chase Ink Unlimited Card, which offers $750 in the form of 75,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points after spending $7,500 within 3 months plus 1.5 points per dollar spent. Read more about the Ink Unlimited card here.
Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, and Ink Unlimited alone can’t transfer points into much more lucrative airline or hotel miles, but if you or your spouse has an Ink Preferred, Sapphire Reserve, or Sapphire Preferred, then you can transfer points from Freedom to one of those cards and from there to your favorite travel currency. Those cards also allow you to redeem your points for paid travel or other select consumer categories and business categories at a value of 1.25 or 1.5 cents per point. The Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, or Ink Unlimited card can also keep your points alive for free if you do close one of those premium cards.
The value of the points will be based on where you use them, but if you use those points for a trip worth where they are worth 2 cents each then you’ll have effectively earned 10% back on those “5 point categories.” The sky is the limit of the value of airline miles as they aren’t tied to the cost of a ticket. That’s good for people in the know and bad for those who are not. 1 mile can be worth 0.25 cents or it can be worth 25 cents, it all just depends on how you use them!
Where will you make your Q1 and Q2 purchases?
Pyb? Category for next month, for any cards?
If I spend in the grocery today and it dosen’t post till tomorrow is that counted as this quarter?
Yes. Spend date.
Wiil I get the 5% using the card the last day of the month, even though the purchase is pending?
The link to checking the category of a store leads to a stale page. 🙁
I tried also – that should be deleted.
how is the amazon offer any better than amazon prime?
5 UR points are worth much more than 5% back.
Is it the same 4 rotating categories every year? Or do they surprise you each quarter?
Surprise
Sorry, Dan, Amazon and select streaming services aren’t awesome categories. I stock up on Amazon gift cards at a better discount than 5x UR, and I don’t use streaming services.
Where?
Offers at various retailers from Amex, Chase, and Wells Fargo give 10% to 22.5%. Also category spend with Discover gives 10% the first year.
I swiped 5k on two of my favorite groceries for a total of 10k so like that I take advantage of the 5% back in the next few months while having credit in the grocery and 0 % apr (since I recently opened it) just wanted to give others the idea that you can swipe and keep the credit in the grocery
How do I know which offer I’m applying for?
You write “However the Chase Freedom Unlimited card also has no annual fee and earns 3 points per dollar on up to $20,000 of spending during your first 12 months.”
It seems from what I read and the offers I got that it’s 5% back on gas the first year.
Am I mistaken?
That’s a different offer. Just depends if you want 3x everywhere or 5x on gas.