Every number on this site is copied from the company that issues the card, not from another comparison site and not from memory. This page says exactly where the figures come from, how the ratings are built, what we refuse to publish and how we get paid. If something here does not match what you find on an issuer page, we want to know.
The database currently holds 155 cards from 28 issuers, 98 personal and 57 business. The most recent verification pass was 18 August 2026.
Where the numbers come from
In this order, and we stop at the first source that answers the question:
- The issuer’s product page for the card, on the issuer’s own domain.
- The cardholder agreement, the disclosure statement or the rates and fees sheet, when the product page is vague or when marketing copy and contract disagree. Where a bank contradicts itself, the contract governs and we say on the card that the two do not match.
- Nothing else. We do not copy figures from other comparison sites, from forums, or from press coverage. If the issuer has not published it, it is not on this site.
Every card page carries the date its rates and features were last checked and a link straight to the issuer’s full terms, so you can check our work on the primary source in one click.
A blank is never a zero
This is the rule the whole database is built on. If an issuer does not publish a foreign transaction fee, that card does not get 0%. If it does not state a minimum income, that card does not get $0. The field stays empty, the card page says Not published by the issuer, and the card is excluded from any filter that would need the number to be true.
The difference matters more than it sounds. A card that says no minimum income required has made you a promise. A card that says nothing has not. Treating the second like the first is how comparison sites quietly mislead people, and it is usually an accident rather than a decision, which is why we enforce it in code at five separate layers rather than relying on care.
You can see the rule working. Of the 155 cards here, 56 show no foreign transaction fee, because their issuer does not publish one, and 96 state no minimum income at all. A further 7 state a minimum income of zero, and those are counted and sorted separately, because saying nothing and saying none is not the same claim.
How the ratings are built
Our rating is out of five and it is editorial. It is not an average of user reviews and it is not supplied by anyone. It weighs four things:
- What the card returns against what it costs, on realistic spending rather than on the best case the marketing describes.
- Whether the earn rate survives its caps. A headline 5% that stops after $500 of spend a month is a 5% on $6,000 a year and an ordinary rate after that, and we rate it as the second thing.
- What the benefits are actually worth. Lounge access that is a membership with zero free visits is not lounge access, and several cards on this site are marked down for exactly that.
- Who the card is for. A card can be excellent and still be wrong for most people, and the rating reflects the card on its own terms rather than a single ranking of everything.
Ratings are meant to spread. Cards we think people should skip are rated as such and the verdict says why, including cards from the largest issuers in the country.
How we value points
Where an issuer fixes the redemption rate, we use the issuer’s number. Where a card earns into a programme that prices dynamically, we use a house valuation, we label it as ours, and the comparison page has a switch that re-ranks every card at cash out value in one click. Four programmes carry no valuation at all, because no honest one exists. The full valuation table and the case against it is on its own page.
What we will not publish
Refusals are part of the method, and this is the shortest way to understand how the site is run:
- Approval rates and approval odds. No Canadian issuer publishes one. Our “easiest to qualify for” sort ranks on the barriers issuers actually state, minimum income, secured status and whether an existing account is required, and it says so above the list every time it is used.
- Estimated annual fees. Five cards were researched and left off the site entirely because their issuer publishes no annual fee. It is the most compared number on a card and we will not guess it.
- Interest rates derived from a formula. A dozen business cards are priced at prime plus a margin. We record the formula in our notes and leave the rate field empty, because converting it to today’s arithmetic publishes a number the issuer never published.
- Point values nobody publishes. Airline and hotel programmes that price dynamically get no valuation, and the cards that earn into them show as not rated on value rather than carrying an invented figure.
How often this is re-checked
Card terms change constantly and most changes are never announced. Every card carries a verification date. Beyond that we keep a schedule of dates we already know matter: welcome offers with an apply by date, benefit changes an issuer has published in advance, products with a closure date, and every card priced against prime whenever the Bank of Canada moves. Cards that are discontinued come off the site rather than sitting here collecting clicks.
How we make money, and what it does not buy
This site earns commission when a reader is approved for some of the cards listed. That is disclosed on every card page next to the button, not buried in a footer.
What commission does not do here: it does not change a rating, it does not change the order of a list, and it does not keep a card off the site. Cards with no affiliate relationship at all are listed on the same terms and rank on the same rules, and cards that do pay are criticised in their own verdicts where they deserve it. The value of that promise depends entirely on it being checkable, which is why the ranking rules are written down here rather than described as a proprietary score.
Corrections
If a figure on this site is wrong, it is worth telling us, and the fastest way to get it fixed is to point at the issuer page that disagrees. Corrections are made to the underlying data, which updates every page the figure appears on at once, and the verification date on the card moves with it.