Coinbase card review
Fees:
Rewards:
Network:
Funding methods:
Fees
The Coinbase card doesn’t charge transaction fees but you need to pay a relatively high 2.49% conversion fee when you make purchases with any crypto apart from USDC and you may also be charged additional fees by an ATM operator. The card has zero annual or maintenance fees but there’s a $4.95 issuance fee to obtain the physical card. ATM withdrawals are free for up to $200 and thereafter you need to pay a 1% domestic withdrawals fee or 2% for international withdrawals.
| Type of fee | Amount |
|---|---|
| Annual | No fee |
| Topup | No fee |
| Transaction | No fee |
| ATM withdrawal | There may be an additional ATM fee that’s dependent on your ATM operator. |
| Currency exchange (non CAD) | 2.49% conversion fee |
| Account closure | No fee |
| Reissue card | $4.95 |
Similarly, the Crypto.com VISA card has no transaction, annual or maintenance fees and you can earn up to 5% back on spending in the form of CRO rewards. Unlike the Coinbase card, Crypto.com doesn’t charge a card issuance fee and fee-free ATM withdrawals are capped at $15,000 monthly for the premium card.
Limits
The Coinbase card has an ATM withdrawal limit of $1,000 a day and you can cash out your funds up to six times a day. You’re allowed a maximum balance of $10,000 and the Terms and Conditions of the card mandate that you can only load at a frequency of up to two times a day, four times a week and 10 times a month. The maximum daily purchase limit is $2,500 a day which is quite low but you can contact customer service to change your Coinbase card purchase limit and there’s a verification process you must undertake in order to be approved for this increase.
| Type of limit | Details |
|---|---|
| Free ATM withdrawal | No limit |
| ATM withdrawal limit | $1,000 per day |
| ATM withdrawal frequency | No more than six times per day. |
| Max balance | $10,000 |
| POS purchase | $2,500 spending per day |
| Load frequency | Two times a day, four times a week and 10 times a month. |
With the Crypto.com card, the ATM withdrawal limit depends on your tier so the premium tier is capped at $2,500 daily, $15,000 monthly, with no yearly limits, while the second and third-tiers can withdraw the same as the premium tier. In a similar fashion, the lowest tier allows you to withdraw $1,500 a day, $15,000 monthly, with no yearly limits. In addition, you can withdraw at an ATM up to three times a day, 30 times a month, with no yearly limits. Also, you can load your Crypto.com card up to 12 times daily, 140 times monthly with no yearly frequency limits and you can even spend up to $35,000 a day on goods and services if you’re in the premium tier.
Merchant and POS network
The Coinbase card uses the VISA network which is available in Canada and at 46 million merchants worldwide. For instance, you can use the card at leading Canadian stores like Sobeys, Loblaws or Tim Hortons.
Rewards
The Coinbase card offers up to 4% crypto rewards on purchases which means you can save money on every transaction made using the card and there are nine available cryptos which earn a specific percentage back. For example, if you spend Bitcoin, you can receive 1% back in Bitcoin and the more transactions made with the card, the more crypto rewards are earned. Upon purchase, your crypto rewards become available in your Coinbase account within 24 hours.
The advantage is that you're able to earn rewards on anything from morning coffee to cinema ticket purchases and then you can withdraw your crypto rewards in FIAT. Hypothetically speaking, if your household has average expenses amounting to $32,000 annually, earning a 2% reward on every purchase would save you around $641 a year.
| Cryptocurrencies | Rewards on purchases |
|---|---|
| USD Coin | 1% |
| Dai | 1% |
| Dogecoin | 1% |
| Bitcoin | 1% |
| Ethereum | 1% |
| Amp | 2% |
| Stellar Lumens | 4% |
| The Graph | 4% |
Staking
Coinbase card users can stake their cryptos and earn rewards as this is available for nine eligible cryptos. For instance, you can earn annual percentage yields (APYs) of up to 3.89% on your Ethereum, 2.4% on Solana or 5.75% on Algorand.
Is Coinbase card safe?
Coinbase has been in operation since 2012, amassing over 108 million users across the world and has developed a good standing with community members due to the comprehensive security measures it has in place. For example, balances of up to $250,000 are secured by FDIC insurance and the Coinbase Vault that can prevent stored crypto from being withdrawn in order to mitigate the risk of money laundering or financial crime. There are annual third-party audits for its web network and end-to-end encryption that keeps your data safe, while the company itself adheres to OFAC standards and received a coveted Bitlicense from the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS).
| Trustpilot | 1 star |
| Investopedia | 4.8 star |
| Forbes | 4.5 star |
| Nerdwallet | 5 star |
| Business Insider | 4.4 star |
A very low percentage of users (8%) rate Coinbase with five stars on Trustpilot, which is a low indicator of safety and the company has faced controversy for a series of past hacks that led to numerous customers losing up to hundreds of thousands of dollars. The most common issues raised are related to account, withdrawal and customer service concerns. However, Coinbase has received high ratings from various sites like Nerdwallet and Investopedia, while many people praise them for the Coinbase Advanced Trade service and a great mobile app with multiple features.
How to get a Coinbase card?
Registration
You need to sign up for a Coinbase account in order to apply for the card and this can be done by:
- Visiting the website or mobile app and inputting your full name and email address so you can create a password and start the process.
- After verifying your email address, you need to select if you want to receive marketing emails about products and services.
- You then have to enter your phone number to receive an SMS verification text message.
- After verifying your phone number, you have to complete KYC verification.
- Upon successful registration and passing verification, visit your dashboard and click on the ‘Pay’ option.
- After clicking ‘Pay’, a section for the Coinbase card appears and you can select ‘Get started’.
- You then need to confirm the name you want to appear on the card and which address you want it to get mailed to.
- A legal disclosure then appears on the screen, known as the MetaBank Cardholder Agreement and you must read and click ‘Agree’ in order to receive the card.
KYC
Multi-step KYC verification is mandatory for all Coinbase card users in Canada. The company asks you for proof of identity, which can be a drivers license, government-issued ID or passport, as well as proof of address, which can be a utility bill, letter from your local municipality, house rental agreement, tax letter, credit card statement or bank account statement. You must provide a clear and visible picture of the front and back side of your documents and you need to submit a selfie.
Delivery
You can receive your physical card in up to 10 working days but it’s not possible to get a virtual card for online use.
Loading or topup Coinbase card
The card is funded by the cash or crypto balance in your Coinbase account and the accepted payment methods to fund your Coinbase account include VISA, MasterCard, wire transfer, bank transfer, PayPal, Apple Pay and Google Pay.
CashtoCode eVoucher
You can’t fund your card with a CashtoCode eVoucher as this isn’t offered at Coinbase.
Customer Support
Despite being a globally well-known and prominent crypto exchange, there are limited customer service options at Coinbase, with only a Help Center displaying FAQs, email address and no live chat function or phone line.
| Live chat | No live chat function available. |
| Phone support | No customer phone line available. |
| support@coinbase.com | |
| FAQs | Available |
Unlike most other large crypto exchanges, Coinbase doesn’t use a ticketing system where users can fill in an online form with a subject, description and optional attachment in order to contact the company. For users who are dealing with emergency account issues, there’s no way to speak with customer service on the phone. However, this is compensated for by the customer service email address.
Coinbase card is recommended to users who are looking to earn crypto rewards
The Coinbase card is recommended to users who are seeking crypto rewards of up to 4% which they can conveniently withdraw at ATMs in FIAT. Usually, users have to send crypto directly to a wallet for processing and transactions could be affected by the specific blockchain network but Coinbase automatically converts your crypto to Canadian dollars at ATMs so you can withdraw your rewards instantaneously in cash. However, there’s a low maximum daily purchase limit which puts a cap on crypto rewards, no tiered categories for spending and a relatively high conversion fee.
But if you don’t mind this, the Coinbase card can still be a great option if you don’t want to pay transaction, annual or maintenance fees that are normally associated with cards of this nature. Coinbase could improve its card by increasing the maximum daily purchase limit in line with market standards, introducing tiered categories for spending and reducing the conversion fee.
Alternatives of Coinbase
- No transaction, annual, maintenance, issuance or ATM fees
- Earn up to 5% in crypto rewards on purchases
- Unlimited airport lounge access at over 500 airports
- Reimbursement for Expedia, Airbnb, Spotify, Amazon Prime and Netflix
- High daily purchase limits
- Use the card with any merchant that accepts VISA
- Extremely high CRO staking requirements for most tiers
- A relatively high 2% foreign currency administration fee
- High card reissuance fee of $70
- 14 working days to receive your card
- Low 0.9% transaction fee
- No annual, maintenance or issuance fees
- Easily convert crypto into FIAT for spending or at ATMs
- 50 merchants participate in the rewards program
- No credit check to obtain the card
- Track your spending via the modern Binance mobile app
- A low daily ATM withdrawal limit
- 45 days to receive your card
- Crypto rewards are only available in BNB
- Earn up to 8% rewards in WXT on every purchase
- Company’s FCA e-money license
- No maximum balance limit
- No annual, transaction or issuance fees
- Four working days to receive your card
- Easily convert crypto or stablecoins into FIAT for spending or at ATMs
- Monthly $1.50 card maintenance fee
- Crypto rewards are only available in WXT
- Relatively low daily ATM withdrawal limit
Unlike the Coinbase card, you are required to stake funds for a certain amount of time with the Crypto.com card and the percentage you earn back depends on the tier of the card you hold. For instance, Crypto.com’s top-tier card comes with a $400,000 staking requirement and earns 5% in CRO rewards for purchases, as well as monthly reimbursement on subscription services like Spotify, Amazon Prime and Netflix. There’s also a high maximum daily purchase limit of $35,000 and no issuance fees.
The Binance card has a high $12,500 maximum daily purchase limit and tiered categories for spending which are divided into seven levels. There’s also no issuance, ATM or annual fees but you need to pay a 0.9% transaction fee and if you lose your card, there’s a high charge of $35 for reissuance.
The Wirex card has a low maximum daily purchase limit of $2,000 for accounts with incomplete KYC verification, but if you complete KYC, you can spend up to $2,500 a day. There’s no issuance fee for the card but unlike the Crypto.com or Binance cards, the company doesn’t offer a tiered spending structure so you can’t earn more rewards for higher purchases.
FAQs
Yes, because Coinbase has been in operation since 2012, amassing over 108 million users across the world and has comprehensive platform and network security measures in place.
You need to create a pin for your Coinbase card first by clicking ‘Manage card’ on your dashboard and then you can conveniently spend using Google Pay or Apple Pay.
You can manage your card and track spending via the Coinbase website or mobile app.
You can withdraw up to $1,000 a day.
You need to report this immediately to the Coinbase customer service team at support@coinbase.com and they can issue you with a new card.
When you swipe your card at a gas station, some fuel companies place an automatic hold on your card for up to $100 and can decline the transaction if your account doesn’t have at least a $100 balance. Coinbase recommends that you take your card inside and prepay for your gas manually through a cashier.
Yes, Coinbase uses procedural safeguards to keep your data safe including password Bcrypt algorithms and DKIM cryptography for email domains.
Specification: Coinbase card review
| Bezahlmethoden | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
||||||
| Specification | ||||||
|
||||||
