THE 6 BEST CREDIT CARDS YOU NEED IN 2020

What's up guys, it's Graham here! So, as I'm sure many of you are aware, the one thing I love more than anything, even more so than finding really creative ways to ask you to smash the like button for the YouTube algorithm, would be credit cards.

That's right! These little pieces of plastic—or sometimes more commonly now, metal—hold a really special place in my heart. I spend way too much of my time looking up which ones have the best rewards, how to maximize the value of my points, and how to use these little things to increase my credit score, which then gives me a better interest rate anytime I go and buy real estate.

Today, all of that research and time spent analyzing credit cards really late at night is going to be put to good use because we're going to be covering the best credit cards in existence throughout six different categories. We're going to be going over the best credit card for cash back, the best credit card for dining, the best credit card for travel, the best credit card with a signup bonus, the best credit card for 0% interest, and then to top it all off, we'll end it with the best credit card overall.

And remember, the point of this is not to dig yourself in debt or go and buy that cool $75,000 robotic dog that will take you 20 years to pay off, even though that might be pretty tempting. Instead, this is really just about maximizing the best value for your spending—with money you would be spending anyway—in a situation where you could get free stuff, whereas otherwise you would not be getting free stuff.

So, sit back, relax! I've compiled all the research for you so you don't have to do a single thing besides watch the video and smash the like button for the YouTube algorithm, of course. I had to say it because a blue like button holds a very special place in my heart. So, with that said, thank you so much, and let's begin the video.

First, we're going to be starting off with an easy one, and that is the best credit card for people who want cash back. Now, I think this is the most important one for people to pay attention to who don't do a lot of traveling or do a whole bunch of random spending and just want to get everything at a slight discount because this one is going to give you the most money back at the end of every single month, and that would be through the Citi Double Cash Rewards credit card.

It's going to be giving you a limited 2% cash back on everything—1% when you make a charge to the account and another 1% when you pay off the balance. It's that easy! That's right, you can now get 2% off that Nicolas Cage pillowcase your girlfriend has been begging you to get for her birthday. You could also get 2% off every single time you buy a Picasso. You could even get 2% off the sponsor of this video, if I had a sponsor for this video.

Now, what makes this card so good is that the 2% cash back applies to anything without any limits, whereas instead, a lot of credit cards will give you slightly less or give you more cash back on certain categories within certain time frames and then put a limit on how much cash back you could get. For example, the Discover It cash back card can give you up to 5% cash back, but every three months, it's going to be a different category and up to $1,500.

But with this one, you never need to remember which categories are in the right season or which cards to pull out in which spots. So you never need to go and remember like, "Oh, it's Mondays, so if I spend money at Ruby Tuesdays, I'll get 5% off in the month of October." You never have to remember that! All by the way, with no annual fee.

And don't just take my word for it. We can go on their website and see what other people are saying about this card. It's pretty good! This user said, "Great card, it's great." This person said, "Really liked the card," or this one, "Awesome!" And H-Town said, "Nice card." Imagine if my reviews were like that, by the way—just no context whatsoever, just this awesome, nice card, end video!

But at least one of their reviews was a little bit critical of this card, and here's what they had to say about it: "Only reason for four stars, because everything has room for improvement."

But now, we're going to be moving on to the next category of this list, and that would be the best credit card for travel. So, even though a lot of people right now are not traveling, the one I'm about to mention still offers a ton of flexibility, and it's really easy to get your money's worth with this one. That would be the Chase Sapphire Reserve. To start, this one is going to be costing you $550 a year as an annual fee, which on the surface is a lot of money.

But this is one of the few cards where if you know how to use it correctly, you can actually make a lot of money from it. So, here's how you could do that: One, the signup bonus. You're going to be getting 50,000 points when you spend $4,000 on the card within the first three months, and those 50,000 points are worth $750 when you redeem it through travel or straight-up just cash back.

Now, before anyone inevitably comments and says something like, "But Graham, you have to spend $4,000 just to get $750 back!" That's a bad deal; you're wasting money! Well, that's not really how it works. If you are just going to naturally spend $4,000 over the next three months anyway, then you may as well put it on this card and get money back, whereas otherwise, you would be getting nothing.

And if you cannot organically spend $4,000 on the card within the first three months, then I don't recommend you get the card. It's best to hold off for now—problem solved!

Anyway, in addition to getting 50,000 points worth $750, you're going to be getting a $300 annual travel credit towards anything travel-related. That includes hotels, parking meters, Airbnb, Uber, airfare, timeshares—you name it! To me, this is really just like free money because all of us inevitably will probably be spending $300 a year in this category anyway.

Now, you're also going to be getting a $120 statement credit towards DoorDash deliveries and free access to Priority Pass for two years, which is worth another $120 a year. You're also going to be getting one year of complimentary Lyft Pink when you activate the service using your credit card, and that is worth $240.

You're also going to be getting free Priority Pass lounge access for yourself and up to two guests anytime you travel. You're also going to be getting complimentary Global Entry or TSA PreCheck, which works out to be about a $100 statement credit every four years. You're also going to be getting so many other perks and services that are just too much to mention here!

Oh, and also, a brand new feature that just went into effect on July 1st: The credit card is going to be giving you five times points back on Instacart, five times points back at gas stations, and ten times points back on streaming. This one is actually really good! I'll share with you how much it's worth.

Recently, the Chase Sapphire Reserve now has what's called a "Pay Yourself Back" feature, where you could redeem your points for a value back of 1.5 cents each. So, if you have 1,000 points, you could essentially redeem that back for a $15 statement credit. That means if you go to the gas station and you get five points for every one dollar you spend, that's essentially the same thing as you getting 7.5% back on money you spend at gas stations, which is a lot! Or, you could also get 15% off any streaming services, which is also a lot of money.

That makes this card really good, even if it does cost you $550 a year to open it! And right off the bat, if you add up the signup bonus, the travel credit, the DoorDash credit, the complimentary Lyft Pink, and the value of the Priority Pass lounge access, you're getting at least $1,630 worth of value for $550 spent. That leaves you with a profit of $1,080 in the first year just for opening up the card! That's what makes this card so good to get for anyone who loves spending money on travel, even if you're not traveling really beyond your own city.

Next, with all of that travel talk out of the way, let's move on to the next category here, and that would be the best credit card for dining out, and that would be the American Express Gold Card. It does have an annual fee of $250 a year, but it's got so many really good rewards that more than make up for that, especially if you do not do any traveling.

Like, to start, when you sign up for the card, you're going to be getting a signup bonus worth anywhere from 35,000 to 50,000 points, usually when you spend anywhere from $3,000 to $5,000 in the first three months on the card. Now, here's the thing with American Express: Usually, you have to go online and do a whole bunch of searching to try to find the best signup bonus offer out there. Then, you have to go on incognito mode to try to get the offer, and sometimes it's going to show up, and sometimes it's not.

Some links you'll find are going to be better than others, and some links will work for some people and not for others. It's kind of random when it comes to that! But just for the sake of this video, let's assume you get 35,000 points when you spend $4,000 on the card in the first three months. That's going to be worth anywhere from $350 to $750 back in value depending on how you redeem it, so really just right there it's more than paid for itself.

They're also going to be giving you a $120 dining credit, which works out to be $10 a month towards GrubHub, Seamless, The Cheesecake Factory, Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, Boxed, and participating Shake Shack locations. I'll be honest; I use this feature a lot, but every now and then, I have to remember to spend this money like, "Oops! It's almost the end of the month; forgot to spend the money at The Cheesecake Factory!" You gotta go do that really quick.

So, it's really not as good as the Chase Sapphire Reserve's overall travel credit that goes towards everything, but it's still good! We're also going to be getting four times points back on restaurants and supermarkets, which depending on how you redeem it could be the equivalent of almost getting 8% cash back, depending on how you use those points.

So, that makes this card really good anytime you go and buy groceries or go and spend money at restaurants. And of course, because this is an American Express card, they're also going to be giving you $100 statement credit towards the airline of your choosing.

There's also going to be plenty of other benefits with this as well, like a $100 hotel credit when you stay two nights that you could use towards dining, spa, and other resort activities. So, all in all, if you go and add up all the benefits of this card, including the signup bonus, at minimum, it's going to be worth $670 all the way up to $1,020, depending on how you redeem the points.

Personally, I never recommend using these points towards cash back or gift cards because they give you a really low value for it. But each point can be worth up to two cents in value if you redeem it for travel. Personally, I use Aeroplan; I transfer my points to that company, and then I could book United flights through that at a rate of 12,500 points for a one-way flight.

The advantage with American Express is that almost every partner takes them, so you could end up getting some really, really good deals if you just know how to look. Otherwise, I would say this is the best all-around card for dining, and then you save up your points and can transfer them anywhere else where you could get the best value.

But if all you're looking for right now is the best signup bonus possible because you want some of those sweet, sweet points, well, don't worry! I got you covered with the Chase Sapphire Preferred. No, this one is not the Reserve. This is the one just below that, the Preferred, and it has an annual fee of $95 a year. Now, this one is really good and wins the best signup bonus category because they will give you 60,000 points when you spend $4,000 on the card within the first three months.

And those points are worth $750 when you redeem them towards travel or cash back. Like I mentioned, Chase now has that pay yourself back feature, and with the Chase Sapphire Preferred, each one of your points is worth 1.25 cents back. You're also going to be getting two times points back on travel and dining, so essentially that's like you getting 2.5% back on those categories.

Now, this one, it's a really great signup bonus, and it's a good card to get, especially for beginners, but besides that, that's pretty much it. So, essentially, it's like you're spending $95 to be able to get back $750 in value. But don't just take my word for it; here's what other people have to say about it on their website: "Excellent! I am very happy! It is perfect! Very like it!" And then, of course, we got this one: "Can't say enough!" Obviously, you know there's something to it when there's so much to say about a credit card that you're able to sum it up in three words: Bravo!

Next, we're going to be moving on to a slightly different category, and that would be the best credit card for 0% interest, which during a time like this can be a really useful feature. See, here's the thing: ideally, in a perfect world, you would never carry a balance on a credit card ever. You'll always pay it off in full; you'll never pay any interest, and you're not going to be disrupting your credit utilization, which is the amount of credit you have available to you versus how much of it you actually use.

The lower that number, the higher your credit score is going to be. But let's be real—we don't live in a perfect world. People have financial issues; they don't have the savings to pay for it, and they need a really low-cost option to hold them through. That is where this card comes in! Normally, most credit cards again charge you some outrageous interest rate between 15% and 30%, which is just unacceptable.

But as an alternative to that, in a last-case resort, putting your expenses on a card like this temporarily until you could pay it down in full is a good way for you to get 0% interest and not be out of pocket even more money than you need to be. Now, I will say that this one was a really tough one for me to rank because there's a lot more to take into consideration besides who has 0% interest for the longest time period.

Because if that's all you care about, the U.S. Bank Visa Platinum will do that and give you 20 months of 0% interest with no annual fee. Besides that, there's really no other benefit or perks to the card. But hey, at least you get almost two years of 0% interest on a card with no annual fee, so that's pretty good.

Now, the Citi Double Cash Card is also going to be giving 18 months of 0% interest on balance transfers, so if you already have debt that you want to move over, that one could actually be a pretty good option. But if I'm going to be ranking the best overall 0% interest rate credit card, then I gotta give that to the Capital One Quicksilver Card. I like this one a lot because they don't charge you any annual fee. They're going to be giving you 0% interest for 15 months on both balance transfers and purchases.

They'll give you 1.5% cash back, and they will give you a $150 cash bonus when you spend $500 in the first three months. So, yeah, you're going to be getting five fewer months of 0% interest, but let's be real: 15 months of 0% interest is a long time! On top of that, you're going to be getting cash back, and on top of that, you'll get $150 when you spend $500 in the first three months.

So from my perspective, in most situations, this one would just be the clear winner. But sure, if we're just gonna be going with 0% interest for the longest, then the U.S. Bank credit card is going to be the winner on this one with 20 months. I'll have you decide which one you think is better for your situation.

And lastly, we have the final award designation for the best overall credit card that I've not yet mentioned here. This is the card that's not necessarily best in one specific category, but it's just really good at a whole bunch of things. It's like the jack-of-all-trades, and that would be the Chase Freedom Unlimited.

To start, there's no annual fee, so there you go! It's not going to cost you anything. You're also going to be getting 1.5% cash back unlimited on everything and five times points back on Lyft, which is awesome! You're also going to be getting $200 cash back when you spend $500 in the first three months on the card, which is even better than the Capital One Quicksilver Card! And it pays 0% interest for the first 15 months on all of your purchases.

So, what's not to like? Now, this one is very similar to the Capital One Quicksilver, except it does have a foreign transaction fee. If you go and use this card overseas, you're gonna be charged that, and it doesn't allow for 0% interest on balance transfers. But with Chase, you do get a slightly higher signup bonus, and there's a little bit more flexibility in terms of where you transfer your points to get a slightly higher valuation in the right deal.

So that's why I'm giving this one to the Chase Freedom Unlimited. It just barely beats out all of the other cards as one of the best ones to have in your wallet, and the $200 signup bonus is really nice for a card like this with no annual fee! Plus, reading these reviews on their websites are just too good not to include in the video, like this one just says, "Works good stuff," or "I don't know how to say it, but it very good!" Or this one says, "10 stars, love it!" But they only rated it 3 stars anyway.

If you have a chance, I'm going to be linking to these reviews down below in the description when you're ever bored. If you want to go and give them a read, they're really funny if your threshold for funny is really, really low like mine.

There we go! Those are my top six credit cards in each of their categories. I'm sure some of these are eventually going to be changing over time, which is why a video like this constantly needs to be updated. But as of right now, here you go! Those are my thoughts, and now could be the time to add on to your credit card collection and maximize the benefits of every dollar you spent! Get some of those sweet, sweet points and smash the like button for the YouTube algorithm!

So with that said, you guys, thank you so much for watching. I really appreciate it! Make sure to subscribe and hit the notification bell. Also, feel free to add me on Instagram! I post here pretty much daily, so if you want to be a part of it there, feel free to add me there as well on my second channel, The Graham Stephan Show. I post there every single day I'm not posting here, so if you want to watch a new video from me every single day, make sure to add yourself to that.

And lastly, speaking of all this free stock, if you could get, if you guys want two free stocks, use the link down below in the description! Webull is going to be giving you two free stocks when you deposit $100 on the platform, with one of those stocks potentially being worth all the way up to $1,400! So if you want those two free stocks, use the link down below in the description. Let me know which two free stocks you get! Thank you so much for watching, and until next time!