Capital One has been busy during the pandemic. The increasingly popular credit card brand responded to changing consumer trends by adding new partnerships from 5X points or 5% cash back at Uber Eats, to new ways to use points at Amazon; and now PayPal too. With fewer people traveling and more people putting money towards online shopping amusement and safe at home culinary delight, it makes sense.
If you’ve got a Capital One Venture, Quicksilver, Savor or Spark card, you’ll soon be able to use points to cover PayPal purchases right on the spot, without having to login to your Capital One account. Here’s everything you need to know about this new way to use points…
Capital One x PayPal
Sometimes when you’re in the process of making a purchase, you decide it’d be nice to use some points and pretend you didn’t actually make a purchase. Hey, no judgement. Capital One and PayPal now offer an extremely easy way to do that.
When you add a Capital One Venture, Savor, Quicksilver or Spark card to your PayPal wallet, you’ll now have the ability to link the PayPal and Capital One Rewards programs together. You’ll then be able to use Capital One Cash Back Points or Venture Miles to cover purchases. And yes, you can cover just some of a purchase, or all of a purchase.
The rates are virtually the same as the Capital One x Amazon offer, where you can link the programs and redeem points for Amazon purchases too. If your Capital One card earns cash back, $1 in cash back will cover $1 in PayPal purchases, same for Amazon.
If your Capital One card earns Miles, such as the Venture Card, which by the way has a huge, best ever 100,000 point welcome bonus worth $1000 right now, then the rate is 125 miles for $1 off. So yeah, 125,000 miles would cover $1000 in PayPal purchases, 50,000 would cover $400 in purchases, etc.
Should You Use Points This Way?
Capital One Venture cardholders will find greater value for their points by using them towards Travel purchases via Capital One Purchase Eraser, where 125,000 points are worth $1250, rather than $1000 via the PayPal redemption option. Transferring to an airline partner can be even more lucrative, if you’re in the know on how to maximize airline loyalty programs.
But with that said, it’s always nice to have options for your points, particularly for those who don’t see travel in their near future.
Points are best served in ways that make you happy, and using a few points to cover a PayPal purchase can be great, and when using a Capital One cash back card where $1 earned in cash back is a dollar no matter what, there’s no downside to using points for PayPal. The rate at which you’re able to redeem points remains the same.
