Choice Rewards World Mastercard® review: A good low-interest rewards card

The Choice Rewards World Mastercard is good if you need a low ongoing APR to consolidate debt or occasionally carry a balance.  It also earns rewards in several bonus categories and offers various perks, including Mastercard benefits and special bonuses for cardholders who open a First Tech Rewards checking or savings account.

Rates and fees: Low ongoing APR and no extra fees

One of the biggest advantages of this card is the lack of fees and low ongoing APR. The card’s low-end APR of 13.5 percent makes it one of the best low-interest credit cards on the market, and the high-end APR of 18 percent also falls below the average credit card APR. This makes the card a great option if you need to carry a balance.

Like many of the best credit union cards, it also has no annual, cash advance, foreign transaction or balance transfer fee. The card is spectacularly generous in this regard, particularly the lack of balance transfer fee, which has become more difficult to find on credit cards. 

Perks: Excellent Mastercard World Elite benefits

This card offers the standard suite of Mastercard Benefits, including MasterRental Coverage, Master Global Service™ and Mastercard ID Theft Protection™. You’ll also receive the following Mastercard World Elite perks at participating merchants:

• Doordash: Enroll for a free 3-month DashPass membership and $5 off your first two orders each month. 
• ShopRunner: Enroll for free ShopRunner membership, which offers free 2-day shipping and returns to more than 100 merchants annually.
• HelloFresh: Earn 5 percent back on every HelloFresh order and an initial discount on your first few orders.
• Lyft: Earn a $5 credit for every three Lyft rides taken during a calendar month.

Cardholders can also take advantage of the following travel insurance benefits:

• Travel assistance insurance: This benefit can assist in locating certified medical providers, obtaining legal services and replacing stolen credit cards and passports.
• Trip cancellation and lost luggage insurance: You’ll be reimbursed for any charges incurred up to $1,500 if you need to cancel a trip booked using the card or if your luggage is misplaced or damaged. You can qualify for partial coverage if you didn’t pay for the trip using your First Tech card.
• Secondary car rental collision insurance: Use your card for car rentals for extra protection against collisions.

Cardholders can also access emergency cash advances, card replacement and roadside assistance. 

Portland Trail Blazers fans: Discounts on tickets and merchandise

First Tech is the official credit union of the Portland Trail Blazers basketball team, offering team-related perks, like a Blazers-themed card and discounted tickets and merchandise. This is a great incentive for fans to get outsized value from this card. And while this is more of a localized benefit, this is the kind of unique local value a credit union card can provide.  

Although the Choice Rewards World Mastercard is a good low-interest card and provides solid perks, many other cards are worth considering if you want to maximize your rewards.

Rewards: Earn more with other cards

The card offers 2X points in everyday categories like gas, groceries, telecommunication services and household goods, and 1X points on all other purchases. 

You’ll receive a slight boost to earnings if you open a First Tech Rewards Checking or Savings account, which will earn an additional 0.5 percent cash back (up to $15 a month) on credit card spending and a $10 monthly rebate on streaming subscriptions. While that can be helpful, you’ll still do much better elsewhere if rewards are your primary focus. If you value rewards more than a low APR, many of the best rewards credit cards will prove more valuable.

Welcome offer: High spending for not much in return

This card comes with a 20,000-point welcome bonus after you spend $3,000 in the first 60 days from account opening. This is worth $200, giving Choice Rewards points a value of roughly 1 cent per point.

The sign-up bonus is less valuable than many other rewards cards, which typically provide similar bonus value with smaller spending. For example, the Wells Fargo Active Cash® Card has the same bonus but only requires $500 of spending in the first three months of account opening. That bonus only requires you to spend over $167 over three months. The First Tech Choice Rewards card needs $1,500 in two months, which can prove difficult if you don’t normally spend that much in a month or have any large purchases planned.

Membership: First Tech credit union members only

You must be a First Tech Credit Union member to apply for this card. To qualify for membership, you must meet one of the following criteria:

• Work for First Tech partner companies, including Amazon, Microsoft, Intel and others
• Have a family or household member who is already a member
• Work for the State of Oregon
• Live or work in Lane County, Oregon
• Belong to the Financial Fitness Association or the Computer History Museum

If you don’t meet the criteria, the easiest option may be to join the Computer History Museum or the Financial Fitness Association. From there, you can schedule a virtual or in-person appointment to finalize your application.

Other rewards cards can’t match this card’s low interest rate or lack of fees, but many offer more competitive rewards rates for most categories and come with better sign-up bonuses or 0 percent intro APR periods.  Here’s a look at some alternatives. 

While this card isn’t available for everyone, it can be a helpful tool to manage debt while earning rewards. You might give the card a look if you fall into one of the following categories.

The Choice Rewards World Mastercard’s is a solid and low-cost rewards card thanks to it’s low APR and lack of additional fees, and is a good card to look into if you need to consolidate and manage debt at a lower interest rate. The rewards program isn’t the most competitive, but it does come with an array of useful everyday categories like gas, groceries, and household goods. But if you pay your balance in full and don’t need a low-interest credit card, better options are available. 

Our proprietary card rating system takes into account a mix of factors when scoring balance transfer and low-interest cards, including each card’s introductory APR, intro APR period length, ongoing APR, balance transfer fee, perks and more.

While balance transfer and low-interest cards share a similar ratings rubric, we weigh features differently based on how a card is categorized. We categorize cards that carry an especially long intro APR offer on balance transfers as dedicated balance transfer cards, while cards that offer an especially low ongoing APR are considered general low-interest cards. 

Based on its features, we assigned this card a primary category of low interest and tailored our ratings accordingly. 

We analyzed over 100 of the most popular balance transfer and low-interest cards and scored each based on how its key features stacked up against those of other cards in its category. 

Here’s a breakdown of what gave this card its score: