What is a crypto card
A crypto card is a regular Visa or Mastercard that spends your cryptocurrency. The shop sees an ordinary card payment in its own currency; the card converts your crypto behind the scenes. This page explains how that works, what it costs and what you need — in plain words.
How it works
You hold crypto — usually stablecoins like USDT or USDC — on an exchange or in a wallet. When you pay, the card's issuer converts just enough of it into the shop's currency and settles the payment over the normal Visa or Mastercard network. To the shop, and to Apple Pay or Google Pay, it is indistinguishable from a bank card.
What you need
Crypto somewhere. Most cards spend an exchange balance or a wallet balance. Some also load from a bank account or card — useful if you are starting from zero crypto.
An identity check. Almost every card asks for KYC (know-your-customer) at signup: a passport or ID, sometimes proof of address. Cards that skip it exist and are marked "No KYC" here — they tend to carry other limits and risks, so read their pages carefully.
To live where the card ships. Issuers publish country lists. We show a card as confirmed for your country only when its issuer says so — pick your country in the list and the ranking adjusts.
What it actually costs
Four fees decide what a card costs you — and the advertised one is rarely the one that matters:
A "free" card with a 2% FX markup costs more than a $10 card with 0.5% FX once you spend a few hundred dollars abroad. That is why every card here shows one number — the estimated cost or earning over a year at your monthly spend — with the arithmetic printed on its page.
About cashback
Cards advertise their loudest number: "up to 8%". The rate every holder actually gets — the base rate — is usually far lower, and the boosted tiers require deposits, staking or subscriptions. We rank cards by the base rate only.
Where to start
Pick your country and monthly spend — the list re-ranks by what each card would cost you over a year. If you have a job in mind, sort by it: travel, subscriptions, everyday spending. Every number links to the issuer document it was read from — the method is described in one page here.