National Bank · Mastercard
$70 waived in the first year, with 2 points a dollar on groceries and restaurants up to $1,000 a month. A third of the welcome offer requires buying insurance.
Rates and features verified 2026-08-18Full terms and conditionsHow we research cards
What we like, and what we don’t
Worth having
- The $70 fee is waived in the first year
- 2 points a dollar on groceries and restaurants, and 1.5 on fuel, bills and travel
- $5,000,000 of emergency medical cover and $1,000 of mobile device insurance
- Medical cover runs to age 75, higher than the age 65 cut off on most cards
- A la carte points are worth a cent, so the rates translate cleanly
Watch out for
- 10,000 of the advertised 35,000 welcome points require enrolling in optional paid payment protection insurance
- The 2x grocery and restaurant rate covers only the first $1,000 of combined monthly spending
- The base rate is 1 point per $1.50, below one point a dollar
- Medical cover runs only 10 days a trip
- Additional cards cost $35 each
What this card earns
- Groceries
- 2x
- Gas
- 1.5x
- Dining and restaurants
- 2x
- Travel
- 1.5x
- Recurring bills and subscriptions
- 1.5x
- Everything else
- 0.67x
- Bonus rates apply up to
- $12,000 of annual spending after that, the base rate
- Bonus categories at once
- 2 you choose which
- What we value a point at
- 1¢
The earning fine print
2 points per $1 on groceries and restaurants on the FIRST $1,000 of combined monthly spend in those categories, then 1.5 points per $1; 1.5 points per $1 on gas and EV charging; 1.5 points per $1 on recurring bill payments; 1.5 points per $1 on a la carte Travel bookings; 1 point per $1.50 on everything else (restated as 0.67 for earn_base). Conservative reading: the grocery/restaurant cap is a SHARED $1,000 per calendar month, which is $12,000 a year. Recorded in earn_cap_annual as the annualised equivalent. The cap is a monthly cap and resets every statement month rather than annually.
The welcome offer
- Welcome bonus
- 10,000 points after you spend $2,500, within 3 months
- Second tier
- 15,000 points after you spend $10,000, within 12 months
- Also included
- The first-year annual fee is waived
- Offer ends
- 2026-11-04
What the offer actually requires
Up to 35,000 points in three parts: 10,000 for $2,500 of spend in the first 3 months; 15,000 for $10,000 of spend in the first 12 months; and a further 10,000 points that require enrolling in optional payment protection insurance and keeping it for 3 or more months. The $70 annual fee is waived in year one. Offer expires November 4, 2026. The insurance-enrolment tier is described here rather than encoded, because it is not a spend-based tier.
Fees and interest rates
- Annual fee
- $70 waived the first year
- Additional card
- $35
- Foreign transaction fee
- 2.5%
- Purchase APR
- 20.99%
- Cash advance APR
- 22.49%
- Balance transfer APR
- 22.49%
Who can get this card
- Minimum personal income
- $0
Insurance and benefits
- Travel medical
- $5,000,000 first 10 days of a trip, age 76 and under
- Trip cancellation
- $1,000
- Trip interruption
- $1,500
- Flight delay
- $500
- Mobile device
- $1,000
- Purchase protection
- Included
- Extended warranty
- Included
What the benefits really mean
Out-of-province emergency medical up to $5,000,000 per person, maximum 10 days, with NO coverage at all for cardholders aged 76 and over. Trip cancellation up to $1,000 per person. Trip interruption up to $1,500 per person. Flight delay up to $500 per person for delays of 4+ hours. Mobile device insurance up to $1,000 for a maximum of 2 years. Purchase protection for 180 days. Applicants must not currently hold, and must not have held in the past 12 months, a National Bank Mastercard credit card. 10,000 of the advertised 35,000 welcome points require enrolling in OPTIONAL PAID payment protection insurance and keeping it at least 3 months. A paid product dressed as a bonus tier. The 2x grocery/restaurant rate applies only to the first $1,000 of combined monthly spend, then falls to 1.5x. Base earn is 1 point per $1.50, below one point per dollar. Emergency medical covers only 10 days and is completely unavailable at age 76+. Anyone who has held any National Bank Mastercard in the past 12 months is ineligible. The $70 annual fee waiver is first year only.
Our verdict
The insurance is the best thing here. $5,000,000 of emergency medical that keeps working to age 75 is unusual: most cards stop at 65, and several of the premium cards in this comparison collapse to a few days at that age. For an older traveller this is a materially better card than its fee suggests.
The welcome offer is the worst thing here. National Bank advertises up to 35,000 points and 10,000 of those require you to enrol in a paid payment protection product and keep it for three months. Selling an insurance product as a bonus tier is a practice we would rather not see. Ignore that tier, treat the offer as 25,000 points, and the card still stands up on the insurance.
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Where this came from. National Bank Platinum Mastercard product page (fees, 20.99%/22.49% rates, no minimum income, earn rates and the $1,000 monthly cap, welcome tiers and November 4, 2026 expiry, insurance amounts and age limits, eligibility restriction) and National Bank's help-centre page stating the 2.5% foreign currency transaction fee.. We take every figure from the issuer’s own pages, never from another comparison site, and we leave a field blank rather than guess at it.