12 Best cash back credit cards for February 2025

Cash back cards are among the most flexible and rewarding cards you can get. They’re a great fit if you want to access valuable, simplistic rewards. Although some cash back can be more complicated than others, they’re a great way to maximize your credit card rewards.

To make an informed decision about which cash back card fits your wallet best, you’ll need to consider each type of cash back card. Here are your options:

Our team of credit card experts is no stranger to the top cash back cards, and many of Bankrate’s writers and editors have strategies of their own to maximize credit card rewards. We look at and research credit cards every day, so we know which options are best for us. Although what works for our experts may not necessarily be a great fit for you, here are a few different, well-crafted cash back strategies to learn from:

"I’ve been a credit card nerd for five years now — but it doesn’t mean I like an overly complicated credit card strategy. On the contrary, the less work I do with my cards, the better. “Get the most value with the least effort” is my motto here.

I have a couple of other cash back cards I barely use but keep open because they’re my oldest cards. Overall, I find that a fat stack of credit cards doesn’t necessarily mean more rewards. If anything, it’s harder to spread your spending effectively. So I’m happy with the four cards I do use and all the value I get out of them."

— Ana Staples, Lead Writer

Here’s what Ana’s spending looks like:

• Dining and groceries: The Capital One Savor Cash Rewards Credit Card offers generous cash back rates at restaurants and grocery stores, especially considering it doesn’t charge an annual fee (See Rates & Fees). I spend around $6,000 per year with the Savor and earn $180 in annual cash back. I convert these earnings into Capital One Miles (18,000 miles) to spend on airfare.
• Amazon purchases: The Affinity Cash Rewards Visa Signature is a no-annual-fee card that offers 5 percent cash back rate (on up to $1,000 in purchases per month) at Amazon — where I shop for essentials. It also rewards purchases at bookstores, where I usually spend more than I intend to. On average, I spend around $3,000 annually with my Affinity card and earn $150 in cash back. I send this money to the savings account that holds my emergency fund.

"I’ve been writing about cash back and credit card rewards for several years now, so I understand the benefit of carrying multiple cards and using them strategically to maximize my earnings. But I also know that sometimes juggling so many cards to earn a little more cash back can be more trouble than it’s worth.

When I first got into rewards strategy, I went a little overboard, carrying a card for every spending category I could think of, constantly switching based on where I was shopping or which bonus category was available in a given quarter. I even had a spreadsheet I used to track my purchases and cash back earnings. It eventually became a headache, though. Now I take a more streamlined approach, focusing on a few key spending categories as I try to strike a balance between high earnings and low maintenance. Is my stack perfect? Definitely not. But for now, five cards is plenty to juggle."

— Nouri Zarrugh, Senior Editor

Here’s how Nouri focuses his spending:

• Groceries: The Citi Custom Cash® Card. This card automatically rewards your top spending category each billing cycle, and I only use it for groceries, making that my top category by default.
• Gas and online shopping: The Blue Cash Everyday® Card from American Express. Since I use the Custom Cash for groceries, it made sense for me to use the no-annual-fee Blue Cash Everyday to get a solid rewards rate on gas. As an added bonus, this card comes with an online shopping category — another key category for me, so this card is quite versatile.
• Dining: The Capital One Savor Cash Rewards Credit Card. This card offers one of the best rates you can get at restaurants without paying an annual fee (See Rates & Fees).
• Everything else: The Citi Double Cash. I use this card for all purchases outside of groceries, gas, dining, travel and online shopping. A flat rate of up to 2 percent back (1 percent when you buy, 1 percent when you pay off purchases) is hard to beat.

When I opened my Bank of America Customized Cash Rewards credit card, I never dreamed of someday becoming a credit cards content editor or managing over a dozen credit cards between my husband and me. These days, earning travel rewards for family trips forms the foundation of my credit card rewards strategy, but my Customized Cash Rewards card has continued to earn a spot in my credit card rotation. It’s my oldest card, so I keep it open to extend the length of my credit history and benefit my credit score, and it’s hard to beat its boosted cash back for online purchases.

I strive to use the card that earns the most rewards for each purchase. Plus, I’m a Preferred Rewards member with Bank of America, so my rewards rate is even higher than the card’s standard rate. I’m careful only to use the card for online purchases, and given how much you can buy online these days, I rarely have trouble hitting the card’s $2,500 spending cap.

When I max out the Bank of America spending cap each quarter, it adds up to $93.75 in cash back, which I'm perfectly happy with.

I usually let that cash back accumulate and then redeem it after a trip to offset expenses — food, an experience or a rental car — that my travel rewards didn’t cover. I love the feeling when that $200 or $300 hits my checking account and I know I didn’t do anything special to earn it. So you could say that the Bank of America Customized Cash Rewards card does have a place in my travel rewards strategy, even if not directly.

— Brooklyn Lowery, Senior Editor

How we assess the best cash back credit cards

When evaluating the best cash back cards, we consider a mix of factors, including how cards score in our proprietary card rating system and whether cards offer features that fit the priorities of a diverse group of cardholders, from earning rewards in popular categories to scoring a large sign-up bonus or high-value perks. Whenever possible, we also feature cards that are available at various credit levels and price points. 

We analyzed over 150 of the most popular cards and scored each based on its rewards rate, estimated annual earnings, welcome bonus value, APR, fees, perks and more to determine whether it belonged in this month’s roundup of the best cash back cards.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the key factors in our cash back card scoring methodology and details we considered when putting together our list of the best cash back cards.  

Have more questions for our credit cards editors? Feel free to send us an email, find us on Facebook, or Tweet us @Bankrate.

*For Capital One products listed on this page, some of the benefits may be provided by Visa® or Mastercard® and may vary by product. See the respective Guide to Benefits for details, as terms and exclusions apply.

*The information about the U.S. Bank Cash+® Visa Signature® Card, U.S. Bank Altitude® Go Card and the Citi Custom Cash® Card has been collected independently by Bankrate.com. The card details have not been reviewed or approved by the card issuer.