The Citi Premier® Card is a great way to earn transferable points in Citi’s ThankYou Rewards® program. While I rank Citi’s program behind similar offerings from Chase and American Express, this card’s earnings structure still makes it very attractive. It earns 3x points on many of the most common spending categories, like dining, groceries, gas and travel. It’s also a great card for people already earning points with Chase or Amex and want to diversify their points-earning strategy.
The card comes with a reasonable $95 annual fee. To help offset the fee, it includes an annual $100 hotel credit for hotel stays booked through ThankYou.com. While the card also has no foreign transaction fees, it’s missing many of the other travel benefits you might expect, like trip delay reimbursement, baggage insurance or auto rental insurance.
Who is this card for?
This is Citi’s mid-tier offering within it’s ThankYou Rewards family of cards. It fits squarely in between the no annual fee Citi Rewards+℠ Card and the $495 Citi Prestige® Card. It’s a good fit for those wanting to accumulate Citi ThankYou Rewards points, since the card earns 3x points on many of the most popular spending categories.
You can apply for the Citi Premier® Card here.
Card Features
Bonus Offer
You’ll earn 60,000 bonus points after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first three months. Plus, you can earn bonus points for every referral that applies using your unique link and is approved for the card (up to a maximum of 50,000 points per year).
Note: You won’t be able to earn the bonus if you’ve opened or closed any of the 5 Citi cards in the ThankYou Rewards family in the last 24 months (includes Citi Prestige®, Citi Premier®, Citi Rewards+℠, Citi Rewards+℠ Student and AT&T Access Card from Citi).
Annual Fee
The card comes with a $95 annual fee, which is not waived the first year.
Earning Rates
The Citi Premier® Card earns bonuses on some of the most popular categories.
- 3x points per $1 spent on air travel and hotels
- 3x points per $1 spent at restaurants, supermarkets and gas stations
- 1x points per $1 on all other spending
Compared to its biggest competitor, the Chase Sapphire Preferred®, this card earns more bonus points on dining and some travel categories. However, the card falls short in its narrow definition of travel. Only air travel and hotels earns bonus points, so spending on cruises, trains, tolls and parking will not earn bonus points.
Redeeming Points
The flexibility of Citi ThankYou® Rewards points is evident when it’s time to redeem for travel. You can book travel through the Citi Travel Center, which is an online travel agency booking site similar to Expedia or Orbitz.
The Citi Travel Center isn’t your only option, however. You can often get even greater value by transferring points to any of their 16 airline partners and really maximize your points!
For example, 15,000 Citi ThankYou Rewards points are enough for a round-trip coach award to Hawaii on Turkish Airlines.
You can transfer points to participating frequent travel programs at full 1:1 value – that means 1,000 Citi ThankYou Rewards® points equals 1,000 partner miles/points.
For more information on Citi’s flexible points program, check out The Complete Guide to Citi ThankYou® Rewards.
Card Benefits
$100 Hotel Credit
Each calendar year, you can get up to $100 off a single hotel stay of $500 or more, excluding taxes and fees, when booked through ThankYou.com or 1-800-THANKYOU.
Citi Merchant Offers
Citi Merchant Offers is a free cash-back program for targeted Citi credit cardholders. It saves you money on shopping, dining and more. You choose offers from brands you love and get cash back in the form of statement credits.
To redeem an offer, simply select the offer you want to add to your card by clicking the “See Details” link. Then, click “Add Offer” to enroll your selected Citi card in the offer.
Warning: Make sure to review the requirements and restrictions listed on each offer so you know what is needed to trigger the cash back.
Finally use your card to pay and within a few days, the cash back will be applied to your credit card as a statement credit.
No Foreign Transaction Fees
For those who travel internationally, this card does not charge foreign transaction fees.
Purchase Protection
This benefit covers your new purchases for 90 days against damage or theft up to $10,000 per incident and $50,000 per calendar year. As always, make sure you read the fine print for benefit terms and conditions. But you’ll sleep easy knowing your new, big purchases are covered.
Extended Warranty Protection
With this benefit, you can extend the time period of the manufacturer’s warranty by 24 months. This applies to eligible warranties of five years or less.
Who should look for another card?
The mid-tier credit card market is flush with great options. To help you decide which card may best fit your lifestyle, you need to compare the annual fees, annual credits, and the earnings rates of each card. It’s also worth exploring each card’s flexible points ecosystem since they’re not all the same.
A few cards to consider are the Chase Sapphire Preferred® and Capital One® Venture® Rewards cards. These cards have comparable annual fees of $95 and earn transferable points.
There are also a couple American Express cards to consider, although the annual fees on those are a bit higher.
The American Express® Gold Card is one of my favorites. It has an annual fee of $250, but it also has dining perks that offset most of that each year. This food-centric card has an amazing earnings rates of 4x points on dining and groceries.
The other Amex card worth considering is the American Express® Green Card. It carries a $150 annual fee, but has several travel credits which can offset that each year.
| Card Card | Welcome Offer | Annual Fee and Offsets | Earnings Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| American Express® Green Card | 40,000 bonus points after spending $2,000 on purchases in the first 6 months | $150 ($189 CLEAR credit and $100 LoungeBuddy credit) | 3x points on dining, travel and transit |
| American Express® Gold Card | 60,000 bonus points after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months | $250 ($240 annual dining credits) | 4x points on dining and groceries |
| Capital One® Venture® Rewards | 75,000 bonus points after spending $4,000 on purchases in the first 3 months | $95 ($100 Global Entry or TSA Pre✓® Credit once every 4 years) | 2x points on all purchases |
| Chase Sapphire Preferred® | 60,000 bonus points after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months | $95 ($50 hotel credit for stays purchased through the Chase Travel Portal) | 3x points on dining and online grocery and 2x points on travel |
| Citi Strata Premier℠ Card | 75,000 bonus points after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months | $95 ($100 hotel credit for stays purchased through Citi Travel) | 3x points on air travel, hotels, dining, grocery, gas and EV charging |
Bottom Line
Thanks to its long list of bonus categories, the Citi Premier Card is one of the best points-building cards in its price range. Plus with a 60,000 point sign-up bonus, you can amass points very quickly. It also earns flexible Citi ThankYou Rewards® points that can be transferred to 19 airline partners, for some really wonderful redemption options.
If you’re just starting out with transferable points credit cards, I’d first take a look at similar offerings from Chase and Amex. However, if you already hold cards in those programs and are looking to diversify, the Citi Premier Card is a great way to start earning ThankYou Rewards points.
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