Methodology — How CardStack values Canadian credit cards

Net value formula

Per card: rewards + credits − annual fee − fx cost. Rewards are the sum of rate × spend × ¢/pt per category.

Caps

When an earn rate has a cap (e.g. $25,000/year), spend above the cap drops to the base 1× rate. Cards with a single shared cap across multiple categories (e.g. TD First Class' $25k pool across groceries + dining + recurring) split the budget proportionally by your spend in those categories.

Foreign spend

Foreign spend is excluded from the per-category earn table; it's modelled separately as an FX cost (fx_fee × foreign_spend). Category winner for foreign spend uses base earn minus FX.

Point value presets

Point currencies are worth wildly different amounts depending on how you redeem. We ship three presets so you can pressure-test the ranking:

Or set custom values on the home page — your assumptions persist locally.