Capital One Venture card review: One of the best travel credit cards, with an excellent sign-up bonus and 2x miles on every purchase

Review: Is the Capital One Venture the best credit card for you?

The Capital One® Venture® Rewards Credit Card is a competitive travel rewards card at a moderate price point. While it does carry a Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card annual fee, it offers plenty of value and useful benefits, and it's currently offering a hefty welcome bonus: Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card

The Capital One® Venture® Rewards Credit Card earns 2 miles per dollar on all purchases with no spending caps. While you can do better in certain spending categories — such as dining and travel — with other cards, if you value simplicity, earning 2x miles on all your spending is a solid solution. 

There are some cards that might give you more value, like the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card— which also has a Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card annual fee — or The Platinum Card® from American Express, which comes with premium card benefits. But to get maximum return from those cards, you need to transfer your points to partners, which is a bit more involved.

With the Capital One® Venture® Rewards Credit Card, you can redeem miles at a fixed value of 1 cent apiece to "erase" travel purchases from your credit card statement, without having to worry about award charts or blackout dates. But if you want to squeeze the most value from your Venture miles, you have the option to transfer them to Capital One's airline and hotel partners for award flights and stays as well.

Comparison: Capital One Venture vs other Capital One credit cards

Comparison: Capital One Venture vs other travel credit cards

How to use miles from the Capital One Venture card

Redeeming miles from the Capital One® Venture® Rewards Credit Card is easy — much easier than some competing cards, in fact. Once you make an eligible travel purchase, you can redeem miles to wipe out the charge through a statement credit, which Capital One calls the "Purchase Eraser."

Just use your card to book new travel through any airline, hotel, train, cruise, or travel agency, then reimburse yourself with miles when the transaction posts. Alternatively, you can book new travel through the Capital One portal, which works a lot like most big travel-booking sites online.

You can currently transfer Capital One miles to over a dozen airline and hotel partners, and most are at a rate of 2 Capital One miles to 1.5 airline miles or hotel points, with a few exceptions as noted below:

• Aeromexico Club Premier
• Air Canada Aeroplan
• Air France-KLM Flying Blue
• Alitalia MilleMiglia
• ALL - Accor Live Limitless (2:1 ratio)
• Avianca LifeMiles
• Cathay Pacific Asia Miles
• Emirates Skywards (2:1 ratio)
• Etihad Guest
• EVA Infinity MileageLands
• Finnair Plus
• JetBlue TrueBlue
• Qantas Frequent Flyer
• Singapore KrisFlyer (2:1 ratio)
• Wyndham Rewards

This means Capital One "miles" can be used like flexible points such as American Express Membership Rewards and Chase Ultimate Rewards— and transferable points can often get you a higher value for your rewards.

You can also use miles for gift cards at the same rate of 1 cent per mile, but don't use your miles for cash-back redemptions. When you do, you only get half a cent per mile in value, which is just not worth it.

Capital One Venture benefits and features

The Capital One® Venture® Rewards Credit Card comes with a handful of good benefits, some of which are usually reserved for more premium travel rewards cards like Platinum Card® from American Express. These can help you squeeze even more value out of the Venture card beyond what you get in rewards.

Global Entry/TSA PreCheck application fee credit 

The card comes with up to a $100 credit toward the Global Entry or TSA PreCheck application fee. Global Entry, which fast-tracks your re-entry to the US when you travel abroad, includes TSA PreCheck, so it's the better choice.

Because Global Entry lasts five years, that's effectively a $20 per year value. If you already have a membership, you can use this benefit to pay for someone else's application fee, and you'll still be reimbursed.

Exclusive events

Capital One also offers cardholders access to some exclusive events, VIP packages, and presales for concerts, music festivals, sporting events, and other ticketed events.

Other perks

When you jet off across the world, or over any border, the card charges no foreign transaction fees. Those are often around 3% for lower-tier cards that don't include this benefit.

When you hit the road, this card covers you with decent travel insurance benefits. It includes rental car insurance, travel accident insurance, and a 24-hour emergency assistance number. The card does not offer purchase protection, but it does come with an automatic extended warranty for eligible purchases.

The benefits are not the very best you can find in the travel rewards card space, but at the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card annual fee price point they are pretty good and cover the most common needs for frequent travelers. If you want the most comprehensive travel coverage for that price, though, the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is worth a closer look. Unlike the Venture card, it offers trip cancellation and interruption insurance that can reimburse you if your travel plans are delayed due to a covered reason.

Capital One Venture card fees and costs

The main cost of the Capital One® Venture® Rewards Credit Card is the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card annual fee. Like other cards, if you don't pay the card off in full every month (you should), you'll pay interest, and there are fees for cash advances, balance transfers, and late payments.

However, the card doesn't charge foreign transaction fees, so it's a good choice for international purchases.

Eric Rosenberg is a finance, travel, and technology writer in Ventura, California. He has in-depth experience writing about banking, credit cards, investing, and other financial topics, and is an avid travel hacker.

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