- The advertised cashback rates are nearly all unreachable. The headline number usually needs thousands of pounds locked in the provider’s own .
- On £1,000 of spending a year, the best free card returns about £10. The card advertising 9% loses you £150.
- Three of the seven are not clearly FCA-authorised. That is the row we would read first.
Seven crypto cards are open to UK residents. They advertise cashback from 0% to 9%, and the spread between the advertised rate and the rate you would actually get is the widest we have seen in any product we cover.
Why this matters to you: a crypto card is a payment product, so the only questions that matter are what it costs and whether the money is safe. Both are buried. The cashback headline is a rate you cannot reach, the monthly fee is quoted separately from it, and whether an FCA-authorised firm is holding your balance is not mentioned on any of the marketing. This page puts those three things in one table.
Head to head
Cashback shown is the realistic rate for someone who has not locked up thousands in the provider’s . Net position assumes £1,000 of UK spending across a year.
| Card | Fee | Realistic cashback | Net on £1,000/yr | FCA status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MetaMask | Free | 1%, paid in mUSD | +£10 | Issued via Monavate, FCA EMI |
| Wirex | Free | 0.5% base | +£5 | Not confirmed on the register |
| Nexo | Free | 0.5%, credit mode only | +£5 | Not FCA authorised |
| Krak (Kraken) | Free | 0% until £50k held | £0 | Issued via Monavate, FCA EMI |
| Crypto.com free tier | Free | 0% | £0 | ForisGFS UK, FCA EMI |
| Gnosis Pay | About £26 once | 1%, paid in GNO | −£16 first year | Issued via Monavate, FCA EMI |
| Plutus Starter | £83.88/yr | 3%, capped | −£54 | Not confirmed, mid-migration |
| Plutus Premium | £239.88/yr | 9%, capped | −£150 | Not confirmed, mid-migration |
The differences that actually matter
The monthly fee usually beats the cashback. Plutus advertises up to 9%, the highest rate available anywhere. At £19.99 a month you would need to spend £2,665 a year through it before the rewards cover the subscription. Below that you are paying for the privilege of earning cashback. The cheaper Starter tier needs £2,796, because the fee falls but so does the rate.
That is not a criticism of Plutus specifically. It is arithmetic that applies to any subscription reward product, and it is why the free cards win at ordinary spending levels.
The headline rate is a staking rate. Wirex advertises up to 8%, and the base rate is 0.5%. Crypto.com’s 5% requires the Obsidian tier, which needs a very large CRO stake. Krak pays 2% only once you hold £50,000 or more with Kraken. Gnosis Pay’s 4% is tiered on how much GNO you hold. In each case the advertised number describes a customer with a five-figure position in the company’s own token, and the money locked up to reach it is money at risk of falling.
You are usually paid in a token, not in money. Cashback arrives as CRO, GNO, NEXO, PLU, WPAY or a . A reward worth £10 when issued is worth £10 only if the token holds its value and you can sell it without cost. It is also a disposal for UK tax when you do. A stablecoin reward, like MetaMask’s mUSD, avoids most of that, which is a quiet point in its favour.
Who is actually holding your money. Four of these are issued through Monavate or ForisGFS, both authorised by the FCA as electronic money institutions, which means your balance is safeguarded under UK rules. Nexo’s card is issued by DiPocket UAB and is not FCA-authorised. Wirex previously held its own licence and its current register status is unconfirmed. Plutus is mid-migration after ending its arrangement with Modulr. None of that means your money vanishes tomorrow, but it is the difference between a regulated safeguard and a contractual promise, and it is not on any of the marketing pages.
Foreign spending. Most charge nothing on FX, which is genuinely good and better than several high street banks. The exceptions are Plutus at 2.5%, Nexo at 0.2% to 2.5% depending on the day, and Crypto.com’s free tier at 0.2% to 2%. If you mostly spend abroad, that row matters more than cashback.
So which one?
For most people spending ordinary amounts, take a free card and expect very little back. MetaMask’s 1% in a is the best real return here and is our pick, with two caveats: it is virtual only in the UK, and new UK sign-ups are currently paused. Wirex at 0.5% is the practical alternative and works today.
Avoid the subscription tiers unless you have done the sum for your own spending. Below roughly £2,700 a year on the card, Plutus costs more than it returns, and the higher the advertised rate the more you pay for the chance to earn it.
If safety matters more than pennies, and it should, choose one issued through an FCA-authorised institution. That rules out Nexo for UK use on this basis alone, whatever its rate.
And the honest version of the whole category: at £1,000 of annual spending the difference between the best and worst free card is about £10 a year. A crypto card is worth having if you already hold crypto and want to spend it without selling first. It is not worth acquiring crypto in order to use one, and our guide to getting your money out of crypto covers the alternative.
Common questions
Does the shop know I paid with crypto?
No. Every card here runs on Visa or Mastercard, and the merchant is paid in pounds. The conversion happens behind the payment. No shop needs a wallet and none of this counts as a business accepting crypto.
Do I pay tax when I spend crypto on a card?
Usually yes. HMRC treats spending a cryptoasset as a disposal, so buying something with bitcoin can create a capital gain or loss. Stablecoins shrink the gain but do not remove the disposal. Cashback paid in a token is a separate event again when you sell it. Our UK crypto tax guide covers how it is calculated.
Is a crypto card cheaper than my bank card?
For UK spending, no. A debit card purchase is free to you already. The saving, if there is one, is on foreign spending where several of these charge 0% FX. The reason to hold one is convenience, not cost.
What happens if the provider fails?
Balances held with an FCA-authorised electronic money institution are safeguarded, which is not the same as FSCS protection but does mean the money is held separately from the firm’s own. Where the issuer is not FCA-authorised, you are relying on the arrangements of whichever regulator does cover them.
Fees, rates and availability checked 24 August 2026 against the providers’ published pages. This market changes fast and figures date quickly. General information, not financial advice.