Best Business Credit Cards

Some people just want to earn cash back without bothering with bonus reward categories and complicated redemption options. If that sounds like you, you could do a lot worse than the Capital One® Spark® Cash for Business (Review).

Capital One reports business card activity to three business credit bureaus, along with the consumer bureaus:

• Dun and Bradstreet
• Experian Business
• Small Business Financial Exchange
• Consumer credit bureaus: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion

Some credit card issuers will only report positive business card activity to one business credit bureau, so this feature stands out. If you want to improve your business credit at more bureaus, this card would be a good way to do that.

• 2% cash back for every purchase you make
• $500 bonus cash back for spending $5,000 in the first 3 months after account opening
  • Return on spend: 10%
• $1,500 bonus cash back for spending $50,000 in the first 6 months after account opening
  • Return on spend: 3%

Unlike other cards, which reward you more for certain types of purchases, the Spark Cash offers a flat rate for everything you buy. This can be good for businesses that spend a lot on a variety of purchases, rather than particular spending categories. And there’s no limit to the cash back you can earn, unlike many other rewards cards.

This card isn’t as potentially valuable as other business cards, but its rewards program makes it very flexible. This means that it’s a great option to pair with other rewards cards that do have bonus categories, like any of the others on our list.

You can use that other card for its bonus categories, earning cash back or points at a high rate. Then use the Spark Cash for every other expense, where you would typically only earn 1% back (or 1X point per dollar). If you hit the reward spending limit on that other card, you can switch to the Spark Cash for those purchases too. This will ensure that you always get at least 2% cash back, no matter what you buy.

• Luxury Hotel Collection: Get perks for eligible hotel stays, including a $25 food and beverage credit, room upgrades when available, complimentary in-room WiFi, and more.
• Visa Signature Concierge: Call any time for non-emergency assistance, like help making reservations or finding gifts.
• Shopping and Travel Protections: Including Extended Warranties, Price Protection, Travel Accident Insurance, Lost Luggage Reimbursement, and more.
• No foreign transaction fees
• Annual fee: $0 intro for first year; $95 after that

Available to companies (not sole proprietors) that make at least $50,000 in monthly sales and have been in business for at least a year, the Brex Ecommerce Card is designed for big spenders. It offers a credit limit up to $5 million. Your limit will be based on a number of factors, like equity in your company and projected sales.

This Brex Ecommerce allows you to choose from net 60-day terms (the more popular option) or net 30-day terms to pay off your expenses. While most cards require payment within about 30 days, the Ecommerce card can give you twice as long to come up with the funds and pay. This could prove most useful for companies with lots of marketing, logistics, and IT spend.

Like the other Brex cards, this is a charge card, meaning you must pay the full statement balance by the due date.

If you choose net 30 terms, you’ll earn 1X point per dollar for every purchase.

• 1X point per dollar on every purchase (net 30 term cardholders only)
• 30,000 bonus reward points after approval and waived card fees for life
  • Value: $300 (when redeemed for a statement credit)

• Perks: Thousands of dollars in statement credits, plus discounts and more, for services like Amazon Web Services, WeWork, Google Ads, SendGrid, and Twilio (explained here).
• Point transfer: At a 1:1 rate to select airline loyalty programs.
• Employee cards: First 5 cards for free; $5 fee per card after that
• Choose your payment term: Choose net 60 terms to pay off your card over a 60-day period, or opt for the shorter net 30 terms to earn rewards
• Credit limit: Up to $5 million, determined in part by your projected monthly sales using data provided through sales platform integration
• No foreign transaction fees
• Annual fee: $0
• Not available to sole proprietors

Sometimes you may not know what your business expenses will be from month to month. If that’s your situation, you may like a card with many different bonus categories, or categories that are flexible in some way.

The American Express® Business Gold Card (Review) is a rewarding card with bonus categories that will match the two types of spending your business has the most of each month (out of six possible categories).

This is a handy feature because you don’t have to bother changing the categories manually each month, like with some cards, and you don’t need to try to predict your upcoming business spending. You’ll just automatically get 4X points in the two categories you spent the most in, without any extra effort on your part.

But of course, the bonus categories should fit your business spending. So if this card doesn’t work for you, check out the runners up and their different categories.

American Express business cards report positive card activity to Dun & Bradstreet and Small Business Financial Exchange. If the card enters a negative status, the activity will be reported to the three main consumer credit bureaus, along with Dun & Bradstreet.

• 4X Membership Rewards points per dollar in the two categories you spend the most in each month, up to $150,000 per year (then 1X):
  • Airfare purchased directly from airlines
  • U.S. purchases for advertising in select media
  • U.S. computer hardware, software, and cloud computing purchases made directly from select providers
  • U.S. purchases for shipping
  • U.S. purchases at gas stations
  • U.S. purchases at restaurants
• 2X Membership Rewards points per dollar on eligible purchases from Amex Travel
• 1X Membership Rewards point per dollar on all other purchases
• 35,000 bonus points for spending $5,000 in the first 3 months
  • Value: $350–$700 (1–2 cents per point)
  • Return on spend: 7%–14%

Amex’s Membership Rewards points aren’t usually worth much with the normal redemption methods, but you can get a better value through point transfers to an airline or hotel loyalty program, like Delta SkyMiles, Hilton Honors, or Marriott Bonvoy.

If you get a transfer that provides 2 cents per point, you’ll be earning an 8% cash back equivalent in the 4X categories, which would add up to quite a lot if you max out the $150,000 annual limit — that would come to $12,000 in rewards value per year.

• 25% airline bonus: Get 25% of your points back when booking eligible airfare through American Express Travel using Membership Rewards Pay with Points.
• The Hotel Collection: A $100 hotel credit and room upgrades when available for every eligible two-night stay.
• Point transfer: To a selection of airline and hotel partners.
• Amex Offers: Access to discounts and extra points at a wide variety of merchants.
• Tier One Program: Some businesses will be eligible for the Tier One Program from American Express. This comes with benefits that are “designed to streamline and enhance the business’s experience with American Express.”
• No foreign transaction fees (Rates & Fees)
  
• Annual fee: $295
• Charge card: You must pay your balance in full each month.

Want to earn a lot of points fast? Signup bonuses are a great way to get there.

The Ink Business Preferred℠ Credit Card (Review) has an excellent offer of 80,000 Ultimate Rewards points for spending $5,000 on purchases in the first three months. That bonus could be worth $1,600 or more if you transfer the points to an airline or hotel loyalty program and redeem for a good rate, like 2 cents per point. That would be enough for quite a few flights or hotel stays.

If you’re worried about not hitting the signup bonus threshold, check out some creative ways to meet minimum spend requirements.

Chase will report positive business card activity to:

• Dun & Bradstreet
• Equifax Business
• Experian Business
• Small Business Financial Exchange

If your account goes 60 days past due and enters a negative status, the card activity will be reported to the three consumer credit bureaus.

• 5X Ultimate Rewards points per dollar on Lyft rides (through March 2020)
• 3X Ultimate Rewards points per dollar on the first $150,000 spent per year (then 1X) on:
  • Travel
  • Shipping
  • Internet, cable, and phone services
  • Advertising purchases made with social media sites and search engines
• 1X Ultimate Rewards point per dollar spent everywhere else
• 80,000 bonus points for spending $5,000 on purchases in the first 3 months
  • Value: $800–$1,600 (assuming 1–2 cents per point)
  • Return on spend: 16%–32%

As mentioned above, you can transfer your points to a variety of airline and hotel loyalty programs. This is the most valuable way to redeem UR points, so you should wait for good point transfer deals if possible.

At 2 cents per point, you’ll be earning a cash back equivalent of 6% in the 3X categories, which is pretty good for a card at this fee level. With the $150,000 annual limit and at 2 cents per point, you can get an overall rewards value of $9,000 per year in those categories. Not too shabby.

The other Chase Ink Business cards have very good offers as well (they’re runners up below), but those offers get even better if you can move the points you earn to a different Chase card that allows point transfers. If you got a bonus of 50,000 UR points with one of those other Ink cards, it would normally only be worth $500 at most — 1 cent per point. But if you move those points to another Chase card that allows point transfers, you could then transfer the points to a partner program to get a better value — at 2 cents per point, that same bonus would be worth $1,000.

The Chase cards that allow point transfers are:

• Ink Business Preferred℠ Credit Card (Review)
• Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card (Review)
• Chase Sapphire Reserve® (Review)

• 25% point bonus when redeeming for travel expenses through Chase Ultimate Rewards.
• Point Transfer: At a 1:1 rate to a variety of airline and hotel loyalty programs, including British Airways, United, Marriott, and Hyatt.
• Cell Phone Protection: Pay your monthly cell phone bill with the card to get coverage against theft and damage, up to $600 per claim with a $100 deductible.
• Shopping and Travel Protections: Including Purchase Protection, Extended Warranty Protection, Trip Cancellation/Trip Interruption Insurance, Auto Rental Collision Damage Waivers, and more.
• Annual fee: $95

There are several business cards without annual fees, but the Ink Business Cash℠ Credit Card (Review) is likely to be the most rewarding for the most small businesses.

Chase will report positive business card activity to:

• Dun & Bradstreet
• Equifax Business
• Experian Business
• Small Business Financial Exchange

If your account goes 60 days past due and enters a negative status, the card activity will be reported to the three consumer credit bureaus.

• 5% cash back on Lyft rides (through March 2020)
• 5% cash back on the first $25,000 spent each year (then 1%) for:
  • Office supply stores
  • Internet, cable, and phone services
• 2% cash back on the first $25,000 spent each year (then 1%) at:
  • Gas stations
  • Restaurants
• 1% cash back on all other purchases
• $500 cash bonus for spending $3,000 in the first 3 months after account opening

If your business spends a lot on office supplies and the other services listed, you’ll have few other options if you want to earn 5% cash back on them. That’s a pretty good deal but it’s limited to the first $25,000 you spend, and so is the 2% rate. So if you’ll spend much more than that every year you may want to consider getting multiple versions of this card, or adding in other cards to the mix.

Combining the Ink Business Cash with other cards wouldn’t be an overly-expensive strategy because it has no annual fee, so any rewards you earn are all profit as long as you don’t incur interest or fees. And you can avoid interest on purchases by simply paying your statement balance in full each month.

• Shopping and Travel Protections: Including Purchase Protection, Extended Warranty Protection, Travel and Emergency Assistance Services, and more.
• Purchase APR: 0% for 12 months, then 14.74% - 20.74% Variable
• Annual fee: $0

Unlike most business cards, the Brex Corporate Card (Review) doesn’t require a personal guarantee, and you won’t need an SSN to apply. You can apply using only your business EIN, and there’s no personal hard inquiry on your credit.

Brex charge cards are primarily designed for big, tech-forward corporations and other non-personal liability companies, with at least $100,000 in the bank and hefty projected sales. They’re not available to sole proprietors.

To earn rewards beyond the 1X rate with this card, you’ll need to make Brex the exclusive corporate card for your company. But every new cardholder starts with that status, and it shouldn’t be too hard to maintain.

Brex credit cards stand apart for their high credit limits (up to $5 million for some cards), along with handy features like merchant data cleanup to ensure that every transaction is paired with the correct merchant.

All Brex cards are charge cards, meaning you need to pay the full statement balance by the due date each billing cycle.

• 7X points per dollar on Rideshare services (including Uber, Lyft, taxi, etc.)
• 4X points per dollar on Brex Travel (flights, hotels, Airbnb)
• 3X points per dollar on Restaurants
• 2X points per dollar on Recurring software purchases
• 1X point per dollar on all other purchases
• 30,000 bonus reward points after approval and waived card fees for life
  • Value: $300 (when redeemed for a statement credit)

• Perks: Thousands of dollars in statement credits, plus discounts and more, for services like Amazon Web Services, WeWork, Google Ads, SendGrid, and Twilio (explained here)
• Point transfer: At a 1:1 rate to select airline loyalty programs
• Employee cards: First 5 cards for free; $5 fee per card after that
• No foreign transaction fees
• Annual fee: $0
• Not available to sole proprietors

If your credit is in the fair or average range, which is a FICO score of about 580–669, you may have a hard time being approved for the more rewarding business cards out there. But your credit isn’t bad enough to warrant a secured business card either, so you need a middle option.

The Capital One® Spark® Classic for Business (Review) fills that gap, one of the few unsecured business cards designed for average credit.

Capital One reports business card activity to three business credit bureaus, along with the consumer bureaus:

• Dun and Bradstreet
• Experian Business
• Small Business Financial Exchange
• Consumer credit bureaus: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion

Some credit card issuers will only report positive business card activity to one business credit bureau, so this feature stands out. If you want to improve your business credit at more bureaus, this card would be a good way to do that.

• 1% cash back on all purchases

It’s not a very strong rewards program, but this is the trade-off for not having credit in the “good” range. You can actually get a slightly better cash back rate than that on some secured cards. But you won’t need to pay a security deposit to fund the credit limit of the Spark Classic, and you’ll need to do that with secured cards.

Although you could get a better rate by going for a secured card you wouldn’t earn much more than 1% cash back, and you may need to pay an annual fee, so it might not be worth it.

• Shopping and Travel Protections: Including Purchase Security, Extended Warranties, Travel and Emergency Assistance Services, and more.
• No foreign transaction fees
• Annual fee: $0

Secured cards are designed for people with poor credit (a FICO score below 579) or no credit, providing a way to build a positive credit history. They require a refundable security deposit when you’re approved, which will be used to fund the credit limit.

There are only a few secured business credit cards, and the Wells Fargo® Business Secured Credit Card is probably the most useful.

Wells Fargo will report positive card activity to Small Business Financial Exchange.

If your account enters a negative status, card activity will be reported to the three main consumer bureaus.

Choose one rewards program:

1. Cash Back:
   • 1.5% cash back on all purchases
2. Rewards Points:
   • 1X point per dollar on all purchases
   • 1,000 bonus points when your company spends $1,000 or more in a given month
   • 10% point bonus when redeeming online

It’s not very rewarding, but this is typical for secured cards. Many don’t offer any rewards at all, so this is actually pretty good considering the competition, and the ability to choose the program that’s best for you is an interesting feature.

Use your expected business spending to figure out how much reward value you’d earn with each program, using a value of 1 cent per point. The answer will depend on how much you’ll spend, and your ability to redeem online (which should be easy to do).

Take note that this rewards program is the current offer from Wells Fargo, and it’s subject to change.

If approved for this card, you’ll need to deposit $500 to $25,000 to fund the credit line. Your credit limit will be equal to the amount you deposit.

After spending some time improving your credit, you’ll able to qualify for cards with better terms and rewards programs. Wells Fargo will periodically review your card account and your recent credit history, and, if you’ve been improving, you may be offered an upgrade to an unsecured card.

• Shopping Protections: Including Purchase Assurance and Zero Liability Protection.
• No foreign transaction fees
• Annual fee: $25 per card