As Canadians, we want to maximize our travel rewards from our credit card. We’ve had an Airmiles Mastercard with BMO for years, and it’s done well for us, but we wanted to see if there was a better travel rewards credit card for Canadians like us.

We’ve done hours of research, and come up with what we think are the best travel credit cards in Canada.

What we found while researching these cards is that there’s a good reason Canadians like us are confused about the best travel rewards programs and credit cards. It’s hard to determine from most credit card sites exactly how many points are required for a flight, tracking down the dollar value of each point is confusing, and it’s even harder to figure out how to compare the different travel rewards points programs.

No wonder most people throw up their hands in frustration, and why it took us a few years to finally sit down and slog through all the research required to write this post.

Just a note here. We’re only human, so while we try not to make mistakes, they do happen. In addition, credit card companies change their rewards programs or credit card information at any time. That means that before you get a card, confirm the details of the card and travel rewards for yourself!

Best Travel Credit Cards in Canada

Travel rewards in Canada come in three main reward flavors: Air Miles, Aeroplan, and private travel rewards schemes. You can also choose either Visa, Mastercard, or American Express.

Some of the bigger names in travel rewards cards come from BMO Rewards, TD® Aeroplan, Amex Membership Rewards, and Scotia Rewards.

We’re most interested in the travel rewards offered by a card, so these ratings reflect the amount of travel we can get for each card, based on a $3,000 monthly spend. We’ve excluded any cards that charge over $150/year for an annual fee, since we feel that high fees stop most Canadians from signing up for a card.

Most of the cards offer other perks like travel insurance for Canadians, airport lounge access, purchase protection, and so on. We’ve made note of the major perks for each card, in case one of those perks is important to you.

Sick of paying foreign transaction fees on your credit card purchases? Check out our picks for the best no foreign transaction fee credit cards in Canada.

Scotiabank Gold American Express® Card

The Scotiabank Gold American Express® Card

Annual fee: $120

Rewards Program: Scotia Rewards

There’s a tiered reward system with this card. You’ll get 5 rewards points for every $1 spent on eligible grocery stores, restaurants, fast food, and drinking establishments and eligible entertainment purchases. It pays 3 rewards points for every $1 spent on eligible gas and daily transit, and 1 reward points for everything else.

Current bonus: Up to 30,000 bonus Scotia Rewards points (conditions apply)

Spend $3,000 = 6,600 Scotia Rewards points (based on $800 groceries, restaurants, fast food and drug stores, $200 on gas, and $2,000 other purchases)

Minimum personal income required: $12,000

Perks include medical travel insurance, trip cancellation and interruption and rental car collision insurance. There’s also extended warranty protection and purchase protection, no foreign transaction fees, and Front Of the Line® access.

How the Scotia Rewards program works

You can book travel on your own (paying in advance with your Scotia Rewards Credit Card) and then apply your points to travel and get a refund on your statement, or book directly with the Scotia Rewards travel service using your points (meaning you don’t need to prepay and get reimbursed).

Scotia Rewards points are worth $0.01 each, or 100 points/1 dollar. You need to redeem them in increments of 5,000 ($50). Points can cover taxes and fees.

One thing to note, and that we don’t really like, is that partial point redemptions are not permitted if you book your own travel and then apply points to travel. So, if you spend $51 on flight, you’ll need to redeem 10,000 points ($100) worth of points.

TD® Aeroplan® Visa Infinite* Card

The TD® Aeroplan® Visa Infinite* Card is our pick for the best Aeroplan credit card.

Annual Fee: $120

Rewards program: Aeroplan

Minimum personal income required: $60,000 individual or $100,000 household.

Spend $3000 in a month = 3,500 Aeroplan miles (based on $1,000 gas, groceries and drug stores and $2,000 other purchases).

Welcome bonus (till December 31, 2019): 40,000 Aeroplan Miles (conditions apply).

You can earn earn 1.5 Aeroplan miles on every $1 spent on eligible gas, grocery, drugstore and aircanada.com purchases. Earn 1 Aeroplan mile for every $1 spent on other purchases.

There’s travel medical insurance included, with trip cancellation and trip interruption, baggage and flight delay, and auto rental collision. The primary cardholder gets one free checked bag on Air Canada, and one annual Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge access.

The Aeroplan rewards program is changing in 2020

Because there was a lot of uncertainty back in early 2019 about the future of Aeroplan, we’d initially struck Aeroplan related credit cards off our list.

However, since Air Canada acquired Aeroplan, cards that collect Aeroplan points are back on our list. However, Air Canada is changing Aeroplan, and creating a new loyalty program that will launch in 2020.

Air Canada says that existing Aeroplan Miles will be honored on a one-to-one basis in the new loyalty program when it launches in 2020.

We do know that credit card loyalty program and network agreements have been finalized with TD, CIBC and Visa Canada for future participation in Air Canada’s loyalty program, with an agreement in principle for American Express.

However, we don’t know what other changes are coming. Will Air Canada devalue the Aeroplan program, for example by requiring more Aeroplan points for flights and rewards? If you choose an Aeroplan card, keep in mind that changes to Aeroplan are upcoming. They could be for the better, or for the worse; we just don’t know at this point.

There is some encouraging early news, as there are reports that most economy rewards redemption rewards won’t change.

BMO® AIR MILES®† World Elite Mastercard®

Our current travel rewards card is the BMO® AIR MILES®† Mastercard, and I’m middling happy with it. We’re looking at a slight upgrade to the BMO® AIR MILES®† World Elite Mastercard to see if there’s something better out there for us.

Annual fee: $120

Rewards program: Air Miles

Get 1 Air Mile for every $10 in credit card purchases.

Current bonus: 3,000 Air miles and first year’s fee waived (conditions apply)

$3000 for a month = 300 Air miles

Minimum personal income required: $60,000 individual or $100,000 household

Perks include travel and medical insurance with 15 days emergency medical insurance, purchase protection and extended warranty protection, two annual airport lounge passes with Mastercard Airport Experiences provided by LoungeKey. There’s also a 15% discount on all flights in North America booked with AIR MILES.

Our current card, the BMO® AIR MILES®† World Mastercard is similar, with a lower annual fee of $99. We currently get 1 Air Mile for every $15 in credit card purchases. There’s no welcome bonus on this card right now, and a $3000 monthly spend = 2400 Air Miles/year.

RBC Avion Visa Infinite

Annual Fee: $120, additional card: $50

Rewards program: RBC Rewards

Minimum personal income required: $60,000 or household income of 100,000

Spend $3000 in a month = 3,000 RBC Rewards Points

Welcome bonus: 15,000 welcome points

You earn 1 RBC Rewards point for every $1 spent, plus an extra 25% on eligible travel related purchases. There are no blackouts or seat restrictions, but you need to use a minimum of 10,000 points at a time.

For roundtrip flights, you use the travel redemption schedule to determine how many points you’ll need to cash in. For example, a short haul flight is 15,000 points (with a maximum ticket price of $350). The 15,000 points can’t include taxes, surcharges, or fees, but you can pay the fees at a rate of 100 points per $1 spent.

If you redeem flights, hotel, or other travel needs not on the redemption schedule, the cost is 100 points per $1 spent.

If you buy gas at Petro-Canada, the card offers an instant 3c/L fuel savings, plus 20$ more Petro-Points. Other perks include travel medical insurance, trip cancellation and interruption insurance, and purchase protection.

CIBC Aventura® Gold Visa* Card

This one just barely made the list for us personally, but we’ve included it as an option since a lot of people have this card and love it.

We didn’t love that exact rewards needed were hidden behind a login that you need the card to access, making it hard for people researching the card (like us) to make comparisons.

Annual Fee: $120, additional card: $50

Rewards program: CIBC Aventura Rewards

Minimum personal income required: 15,000 household

Spend $3000 in a month = 3,400 CIBC Aventura Points ($800 on groceries and gas, and $2,200 on other purchases)

Welcome bonus**: 20,000 Aventura Points, $120 travel credit, access to 1,200+ airport lounges, and a NEXUS application fee rebate (conditions apply) **ends October 31, 2019.

Here’s how you earn points: You’ll get 1.5 points for every $1 spent at gas stations, grocery stores and drugstores, 2 points for every $1 spent on travel purchased through the CIBC Rewards Centre, and 1 point for every $1 spent on all other purchases.

The Aventura Points let you book in one of five flight zones with fixed points requirements, but they also only cover a maximum dollar value for each flight zone. If your flight is over that amount, you’ll need to use extra rewards to pay for it at a rate of 100 points per $1. You can use Aventura points to pay for fuel surcharges and flight taxes. A minimum redemption of 3,000 points ($30) is required. Points don’t expire.

What I don’t love is that you must book travel with the online CIBC Aventura® Rewards Centre or call the CIBC Rewards Centre. From what I can see, you cannot book travel on your own, and then apply for a rebate on your purchase.

There are a few perks with this card, including Priority Pass membership with four complimentary airport lounge visits a year, and one $50 NEXUS application fee rebate every 4 years. There’s also emergency medical travel insurance, flight delay and baggage insurance, auto rental collision and loss damage insurance, and purchase security and extended protection insurance. There’s no trip cancellation or trip interruption insurance on the CIBC Aventura® Gold Visa* Card card.

CIBC Aventura® Gold Visa* Card vs the CIBC Aventura® Visa* Infinite* Card

The cards are similar, but we included the CIBC Aventura® Gold Visa* Card here, because it has a much lower income requirement ($15,000 vs $60,000 for the CIBC Aventura Visa Infinite). There may be other differences, but we noticed that there’s no trip cancellation or trip interruption insurance on the CIBC Aventura® Gold Visa* Card card, but that the CIBC Aventura® Visa* Infinite* Card does have trip cancellation and trip interruption.

Looking for the best no fee travel rewards credit card for Canadians?

We like the no fee BMO® AIR MILES®† Mastercard®. It gives 1 Air Mile per $20 spent.

There’s no welcome bonus here, and not a lot of perks, but if you’re looking for a bare bones card with no fee, it’s worth a look.

If you spend $3000/month for a year, that equals 2160 Air Miles at the end of the year.

Do you have any picks for the best travel rewards credit cards for Canadians? Let us know below!

We use our credit cards for almost everything when we travel. Carrying cash puts us at risk for theft, and traveler’s checks are pretty much a thing of the past. So what does a non cash carrying traveler to do? Well, that leaves us using a Canadian credit card while we travel.

Now that’s all fine and good, but here’s a harsh travel fact that a shocking number of Canadians don’t know:

Most Canadian credit cards charge a foreign transaction fee of around 2.5% to 3% every time you pay in a foreign currency (including in USD)!

No foreign transaction fee credit cards in Canada 2022

We’ve done the leg work and sorted through a long list of Canadian credit cards, and found a few great choices that don’t charge a foreign transaction fee.

What is a foreign transaction fee?

A foreign transaction fee is an additional fee of 2.5% that you’re charged when making a purchase in a foreign currency.

This foreign transaction fee is 2.5% to 3% on top of any exchange rate! So, if you buy something for $1,000 USD out of Canada, a fee of 2.5% (or $25) is added to your purchase on top of the daily VISA or Mastercard exchange rate. The tricky thing is that this foreign transaction fee isn’t listed separately on your credit card statement – it’s just hidden in the purchase amount on your credit card statement.

Most Canadian travelers likely don’t even know that they’re being charged a foreign transaction fee. Sure, your credit card’s fine print may mention the fee, but honestly, who reads that?

Canadian No Foreign Transaction Fee Credit Cards Comparison Table

Card	Annual Fee	Rewards/Perks/Notes	Interest Rate	Learn More
Scotiabank Gold American Express® Card	120	Scotia Rewards points signup bonus of 25,000 bonus Scotia Rewards points free airport lounge visits	19.99% purchases 22.99% cash advances
Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite	139.00	Scotia Rewards points signup bonus of 25,000 bonus Scotia Rewards points six free airport lounge visits	19.99% purchases, 22.99% cash advances
CIBC Air Canada® AC conversion Visa Prepaid Card	n/a	n/a Prepaid card.	n/a
Scotiabank® U.S. Dollar VISA Card	35	must be paid off in USD only	19.99% purchases, 22.99% cash advances
Home Trust Preferred Visa	0	Reports that Home Trust's email and phone service could use improvement	19.99% purchases, 19.99%cash advances
HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard	149	31-day insurance coverage, $100 annual travel enhancement credit, 3% in travel rewards on all eligible travel purchases, 1.5 % in travel rewards on other eligible purchases	17.9%

Who can save by getting a credit card with no foreign transaction fee?

Canadian travelers like us can definitely save on foreign transaction fees, but Canadians who shop in US dollars at sites like Amazon.com, snowbirds who spend a good part of the year down south in the USA or Mexico, and even businesses that buy from U.S. vendors can also be hit hard by these fees. In these cases, a credit card with no foreign transaction fee could save them a bundle.

Travelers

If you travel anywhere outside of Canada and pay using your credit card in a foreign currency, you’re likely paying the 2.5% foreign transaction fee for the privilege of using your credit card.

This can really add up, when you figure in food, accommodation, ticket prices and transportation.

Tip! Thinking of just using your debit card at an ATM out of country to escape the foreign transaction fees charged by credit cards? Unfortunately, that’s not a lot better. Debit transaction and out-of-country debit card ATM cash withdrawals often charge an extra foreign currency exchange of around 2.5% as well, plus an often stiff fee per ATM withdrawal. (Of course, using a debit card is still better than using a credit card to get cash at an ATM overseas, which will get you dinged steep cash advance interest fees, plus an ATM transaction fee of $3 or more).

Shoppers

Whether you cross the border into the USA to shop, or you buy online from the comfort of your home in USD (or another foreign currency), you’re still charged the extra 2.5 % if you pay with your Canadian credit card.

Here’s the thing: You don’t need to be outside of Canada to be charged the extra 2.5%. The foreign transaction fee is also charged when you pay in USD or other foreign currency using your credit card from within Canada.

Here’s what’s worse. If you make a purchase in a foreign currency, and then return it, you’ll be charged the 2.5% foreign currency fee on both the return and purchase. That means the item you just returned cost you 5% on top of the exchange rate differences. Ouch.

Business that buy from U.S. vendors

If you’re a business that buys from vendors in the USA in USD on your credit card, you’re probably paying that pesky foreign transaction fee, and costing your business $$$ in the process.

Snowbirds who winter in the south

Because snowbirds often spend months out of Canada in the winter, it’s easy to spend upwards of $20,000 in credit card charges, especially if you’re paying for all accommodation, food, travel and activities on your card.

With a 2.5% foreign transaction fee, you’re unnecessarily paying $500 in foreign exchange fees (on $20,000 in purchases) to the credit card company. I don’t know about you, but I can easily think of plenty of other ways to spend that $500.00.

No foreign transaction fee credit cards in Canada 2022

When our trusty no foreign transaction fee Chase Amazon Visa card was discontinued last year, we were in the market for a new card.

After searching for hours, we could only find five current Canadian credit cards with no foreign transaction fees.

Wanting to save some money? Here are the only Canadian credit cards that we could find that don’t charge a foreign transaction fee at this time.

Scotiabank Gold American Express® Card

There are no foreign transaction fees on the Scotiabank Gold American Express® Card, whether you’re shopping online or traveling in or out of Canada.

The Scotiabank Gold American Express® Card made our list of one of the best travel credit cards in Canada for its travel rewards program.

There’s an annual fee of $120 per year for the card.

What’s nice about this card is that to qualify there’s a fairly low minimum personal income required of $12,000.

Right now, there’s a bonus offer for the card of up to 30,000 bonus Scotia Rewards points (conditions apply, and the offer may be time limited)

There’s a tiered reward system with this card. You’ll get 5 rewards points for every $1 spent on eligible grocery stores, restaurants, fast food, and drinking establishments and eligible entertainment purchases. It pays 3 rewards points for every $1 spent on eligible gas and daily transit, and 1 reward points for everything else.

Perks include medical travel insurance, trip cancellation and interruption and rental car collision insurance. There’s also extended warranty protection and purchase protection, no foreign transaction fees, and Front Of the Line® access.

Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite

There’s no FX markup on the Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite Card, whether you make foreign currency purchases online or outside of Canada.

The annual fee is $139.00, but you also get some interesting perks.

If you travel a lot, there’s also comprehensive travel protection included, which includes emergency travel medical insurance for multiple trips (25 days coverage if you’re under 65, and up to 10 days if you’re over 65). There’s also trip cancellation and interruption insurance, flight delay insurance, coverage for delayed and lost baggage, and travel accident insurance. Perks also includes rental car collision loss/damage insurance.

It also comes with a free Priority Pass airport lounge membership, plus six free visits per year from your date of enrollment.

This card comes with complimentary Avis® Preferred Plus membership, plus Visa Infinite Benefits, which include Visa Infinite Concierge and the Luxury Hotel Collection.

You can earn Scotia Rewards points with purchases. Earn 2 Scotia Rewards points on every $1 you spend on eligible grocery stores, dining, entertainment purchases, and daily transit purchases (including buses, subways, taxis and more). Earn 1 Scotia Rewards point on every $1 you spend on all other eligible purchases.

Right now, there’s a signup bonus of 40,000 bonus Scotia Rewards points in your first year (that’s up to $400 towards travel!).

As a new Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite credit cardholder, you can earn a one-time 30,000 Scotia Reward point bonus with your first $1,000 in everyday eligible purchases if made within the first 3 months.

You’re also eligible to earn an annual 10,000 Scotia Rewards point bonus when you spend at least $40,000 in everyday eligible purchases annually.

100 Scotia Rewards points = $1 in redeemable travel, so that’s $400 equivalent in redeemable travel.

There’s 19.99% interest on purchases, and 22.99% interest on cash advances.

CIBC Air Canada® AC conversion Visa Prepaid Card

We’re going to start with the CIBC Air Canada® AC Conversion Card.

The first thing to know is that this is a prepaid card, so you add funds up front.

What’s interesting is that this is a multi-currency card. That means you can hold several currencies at once on this prepaid foreign currency card, so you can pay in the local currency, and you don’t pay the 2.5% to 3% foreign currency conversion fee.

You manage the card, including adding funds, and checking your balance, with an app that’s available on Google Play and iTunes.

There’s no 2.5% to 3% foreign transaction fee on the 10 supported currencies below (if a currency isn’t on this list of 10 currencies, you pay a 2.5% foreign transaction fee).

1. Canadian Dollars – CAD
2. United States Dollars – USD
3. Euros – EUR
4. Great British Pounds (UK) – GBP
5. Mexican Peso – MXN
6. Hong Kong Dollars – HKD
7. Australian Dollars – AUD
8. Japanese Yen –  JPY
9. Turkish Lira – TRY
10. Swiss Franc (Switzerland) – CHF

How it works:

1. Order the card online.
2. When you get the card, convert your Canadian dollars to one (or more) of the 10 supported currencies. You can see the exchange rate before you do the conversion.
3. The card is shipped to you, and you activate it.
4. Use the card like a regular prepaid credit card when you travel. There’s no fee to use the card the first time, or to activate the card.

You can add more money to the card anytime via the app as you travel, in Canadian dollars, as long as you have an internet connection for the app. Reloading is free.

The minimum amount you can load is $100 CAD equivalent at a time. The maximum balance is $20,000 CAD equivalent.

Funds on this multi-currency credit card never expire.

Can I withdraw from an ATM? 

Yes. There’s one free international withdrawal monthly

For foreign withdrawals, there’s no fee for the first ATM withdrawal outside Canada, but there is a fee for subsequent withdrawals after that.

ATM withdrawals within Canada at CIBC ATMs are free.

Where can I use the card? Is it like a regular Visa?

You can use the card anywhere you would use a non-prepaid Visa, including 36 million Visa retailers worldwide, or at any ATM where Visa is accepted.

Advantages

• No credit score check
• No worries about overspending
• No 2.5% foreign transaction fee on the 10 supported currencies
• You can lock in a good exchange rate when you load the card. This is great if you think rates are going to change.
• There’s no annual fee, and it’s free to get.

Disadvantages

• Since this is a prepaid card, you can’t charge a balance like on a regular card.

Home Trust Preferred Visa

The Home Trust Preferred Visa has a 0% foreign currency conversion fee, meaning that there’s no foreign currency fee on either purchases or cash advances.

The annual interest rate for both purchases and cash advances for the Home Trust Preferred Visa is 19.99%.

There’s no annual fee.

There is a 1% ATM charge of 1.50% (with a minimum fee of $4.50 and a maximum fee of $45.00) if the ATM is located in the United States, and a 1.50% ATM charge (with a minimum fee of $5.50 and maximum fee of $15.00) if the ATM is located outside Canada and the United States. If you’re in Canada, the ATM charge is 1.00% of amount withdrawn (with a minimum fee of $2.50 and a maximum fee of $10.00).

This card does have a $10 inactive account fee if the credit balance hasn’t changed in 360 consecutive days.

Unfortunately, we’ve read reports that Home Trust’s email and phone service could use some improvement, and that there are significant delays with applications.

Scotiabank ® U.S. Dollar VISA* Card

If you’re paid in USD, and you make only USD credit card purchases, the Scotiabank ® U.S. Dollar VISA* card may work for you.

There’s no U.S dollar foreign currency conversion fee on this card. However, transactions in any currency other than USD are charged a 2.5% foreign currency transaction fee.

However, and this is probably a deal breaker for most people, you need to make payments in U.S. dollars. That means that if you don’t already have US dollars to pay with, you’ll need to convert your Canadian dollars to U.S. dollars at the bank – where they’ll charge you their foreign exchange surcharge, usually between 1 and 3%. So you won’t get charged a foreign transaction fee when using the card for USD, but you’ll get charged an equivalent fee when converting Canadian dollars to US dollars.

The only way to avoid this is to get paid in US dollars and use that USD to pay off your credit card.

The annual fee is $35.00.

Interest is charged at 19.99% on purchases, and 22.99% on cash advances.

Find out more here.

HSBC Premier World Elite® Mastercard®

The HSBC Premier World Elite® Mastercard® has no foreign transaction fees.

There’s an annual fee of $149, and the interest rate is 17.9%.

In the past, they’ve waived the annual fee for the first year, and also offered a 30,000 points bonus.

There are a few perks included with this card, including 31-day insurance coverage, a $100 annual travel enhancement credit, 3% in travel rewards on all eligible travel purchases, and 1.5 % in travel rewards on all other eligible purchases.

Find out more here.

Brim Financial Credit Cards

You may see the new Brim Financial Credit cards on a few lists of Canadian credit cards that don’t have foreign transaction fees.

We’ve decided not to include them on this list, because of less than favorable reports from Yahoo Finance and from Redditors here.

Discontinued cards or cards that now charge a foreign transaction fee

In our research for this article, we came across at least four cards that had no foreign transaction fee in the past, but that are now charging a fee, or that are now discontinued.

Unfortunately, a lot of other, less up-to-date, lists still mention a couple of these cards as having a 0% fee, but that’s changed. Two of these cards have been discontinued (the Chase Visas), and the other two now charge a foreign exchange fee (the Rogers Mastercards).

Chase Amazon Visa and Chase Marriott Visa

We really loved our Chase Amazon Visa, but sadly they discontinued the Chase Amazon.ca Visa and Chase Marriott Visa in early 2018.

There’s no word if these cards will be replaced.

Rogers Platinum Mastercard

The Rogers Platinum MasterCard used to have no foreign currency conversion, but that changed as of March 2018, and it now charges a 2.5% foreign transaction fee.

Instead, the card offers 3% cash back rewards on all purchases made in a foreign currency.

You can redeem the awards using the Mastercard® Pay with Rewards app on your smartphone. However, the cashback rewards can only be redeemed towards “anything Rogers”, including your Rogers or Fido bill, Toronto Blue Jays tickets, Chatr mobile, or shopping online on Rogers owned Today’s Shopping Choice website.

There’s no annual fee (from March 13, 2018 onward, however there used to be an annual fee of $29, but this was dropped).

Interest on purchases is 19.99%, and interest on cash advances is 21.50%.

There’s no account maintenance fee.

Rogers World Elite Mastercard

The Rogers World Elite Mastercard used to have a 0% foreign transaction fee. Now the fee’s 2.5%.

That said, you’ll get 4% cash back rewards on all eligible purchases made in a foreign currency, 2% unlimited cash back rewards on Rogers products and services charged to your card, and 1.75% cash back rewards on all other eligible purchases.

You can redeem the awards using the Mastercard® Pay with Rewards app on your smartphone. However, the cashback rewards can only be redeemed towards “anything Rogers”, including your Rogers or Fido bill, Toronto Blue Jays tickets, Chatr mobile, or shopping online on Rogers-owned Today’s Shopping Choice website.

Interest on purchases is 19.99%, and interest on cash advances is 21.50%.

There’s no annual fee.

Canadian American Express Card with no foreign transaction fees

We haven’t been able to find an American Express credit card in Canada that waives foreign exchange fees.

From what we can tell, you’ll be paying the approx. additional 2.5% fee if you use a Canadian Amex cards for foreign currencies.

While you’re here, check out our thoughts on the best travel insurance for Canadians, and tips on how to get travel insurance if you’re already abroad.

Have you found a different Canadian credit card with no foreign transaction fees?

Have you tried one of these no foreign transaction fee credit cards for Canadians?

People travel for a lot of different reasons.

One could say almost as many reasons as there are stars in the sky. Whether it’s a vacation to get away and relax, to visit family, to volunteer, to sample foreign cuisine and culture or to have an adventure and experience the world.

You see, travel is an intensely personal thing and honestly, I think that how you travel and why you go isn’t as important as the fact that you’re willing to just put yourself out there.

Whether you’re snapping photos at the Grand Canyon with the family or on a week-long trek in the jungles of  Borneo, I’m just glad you’re out experiencing the world.

We’ve been traveling a long time together (since 2002), and in that time we’ve traveled for almost every reason possible.

Our very first trip together was a week-long vacation from a job I didn’t particularly love and to escape a cold, Canadian winter. Hello all inclusive umbrella drinks by the pool and quick dips in the ocean!

Sooner than we anticipated, our first year long extended trip together was a journey of discovery. We set out together to explore the world, and set foot in Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, Cambodia, Australia and New Zealand.

A dozen years ago, we traveled to the South Island of New Zealand and decided to get married while we were there.

A few years later, the kiddos came along and our travels became about them as much as us.

You see, travel has been a way to introduce our kids to a bigger world. We want them to know firsthand that people are essentially the same, no matter where they live, what god they pray to, the color of their skin, and what language they speak.

These days, it seems we travel a lot to visit our family in Canada. That means a lot of time in the car. It’s a 26 hour, 2,450 km drive from visiting my brother on Vancouver Island to Winnipeg, where Charles’ family lives.

That makes for a lot of long road trips.

We also travel for experiences that will stretch us as people, and help us grow. Sometimes, we challenge our fears, and get pushed outside of our comfort zones.

Today, I was chatting with the kids about traveling to help volunteer with sea turtle conservation. Their eyes lit up more at that idea than at any birthday present I’ve ever seen them open.

So it’s interesting to see how other people approach travel.

As a matter of fact, Marriott Rewards Credit Card just conducted a US nationwide survey to take a peek at the global travel mindset of traveler’s age 18-67 who stay in a hotel at least five nights per year for business, pleasure or both.

I expected to see a few differences in why people travel based on age, but I was really struck with how different the approach to travel was between millennials (aged 18-34) and older travelers.

Plus, I’m a numbers geek, so it was really interesting to see the differences broken down.

84% of millennials say they would travel abroad to participate in volunteer activities, while only 68 % of Gen Xers (age 35-49) and 51% of Boomers (age 50-67) say the same.

That’s a huge difference.

On top of that, 78% of millennials are far more interested in thrilling vacations than lazy trips (32%). 67% of millennials are interested in water sports (compared to 55% of Gen Xers and 46% of boomers). 63% of millennials are interested in interacting with wild animals through activities like safaris or swimming with sharks.

It’s an interesting shift, especially the 84 % of millennials who would travel to volunteer. I love that.

No matter what, in the end, it’s about respecting our differences.

We all travel for different reasons. And our reasons for travel change, depending on our circumstances.

Those millennials who travel today to experience adventure and culture may someday travel on a family vacation or just to enjoy a week of relaxing on a beach.

It’s all good. No matter your reason, just get out there and see our gorgeous world!

The Marriott Rewards Credit Card from Chase lets travelers earn accelerated Marriott Rewards points on all purchases to help you get the most out of your travel.

So if you like earning points to put towards your next trip, visit Marriott Rewards Credit Card to learn more.