Last year, we saw a 5x grocery store spending bonus offer on both of the no-annual fee cards that earn Ultimate Rewards and once again this year that same offer is back, with both the Chase Freedom Flex and Chase Freedom Unlimited now featuring welcome offers good for 20,000 points with $500 in purchases plus 5x on grocery for the first 12 months on up to $12,000 in purchases. That’s a solid deal that gets a bit better this quarter: since grocery is a 5x quarterly category on the Freedom Flex card, you can actually earn 9x this quarter on the first $1500 in purchases. While that’s less exciting than some of the recent multipliers we’ve seen from Amex, it is nonetheless a great deal for the Chase ecosystem.
The Offers & Key Card Details
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Quick Thoughts
When this deal ran last year, I said that one of these offers would be worth a 5/24 slot. In 2021, I’m less certain of that, but I think they would be a potentially great deal for someone looking for a simple no-fee card with strong return in year one. Keep in mind that you do need to be under 5/24 to be approved.
| Chase's 5/24 Rule: With most Chase credit cards, Chase will not approve your application if you have opened 5 or more cards with any bank in the past 24 months. To determine your 5/24 status, see: 3 Easy Ways to Count Your 5/24 Status. The easiest option is to track all of your cards for free with Travel Freely. |
Remember that Chase markets the Freedom and Freedom Unlimited cards as cash back cards and thus the bonuses are framed in terms of cash back — $200 cash back after spending $500 in the first 3 months and 5% back on groceries — but those amounts are given in the form of Chase Ultimate Rewards points that can be redeemed for cash. If you have a Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase Sapphire Reserve, or Chase Ink Business Preferred in your household, you can move points earned on the Freedom Unlimited to one of those cards and then transfer on to travel partners if you prefer to use the points with airline or hotel partners. Hyatt fans can no doubt see huge value in being able to rack up easy points via this card and then transfer them to Hyatt.
The way Amex has thrown around huge multipliers on the Platinum cards, 5x for a year seems less exciting than it once did, but given the lost cost of admission here this could be a great way to get into the Chase ecosystem. And it’s a solid return on grocery spend, particularly if you are able to pair one of these cards with a Chase Sapphire Preferred or Chase Sapphire Reserve for the Chase Pay Yourself back feature.
Again, keep in mind that the extra 4x at grocery stores with this first-year offer will stack in quarters where grocery is a rotating 5x category on the Freedom Flex. This quarter is a grocery quarter, so you would earn 9x on the first $1500 in grocery purchases between today and the end of September. Spending $1500 at the grocery store in that timeframe would yield 33,500 total points: 20K from the initial welcome bonus and 13.5K from 9x on that spend. Considering that’s just $500 per month in grocery spend, that’s an excellent return.
Overall, I find these offers less exciting given the big offers we’ve seen on other cards recently, but now could be an excellent time for a student or rewards card newcomer to step into a Freedom or Freedom Unlimited given the great first-year bonus.
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Any idea if there’s a way to track your grocery spend in the 1st year? Thanks!
I think the 5x grocery offer SUB may be ending soon. I was looking for it on the Chase website today, but no longer see it. It was there a few days ago. Referral links still showing it for now.
Nick, do you know if the “5x Ultimate Rewards points (worth 5% cash back) on grocery purchases for 1st year” is only available as part of the SUB? I just product changed my Sapphire Preferred (AF coming up in 1 week, already got my SUB last year) to the Freedom Flex, but the rep said he’s not seeing the 5x on grocery showing up. Maybe it’s only available to new applicants of the card, and not if you product change? He wasn’t sure, but made it seem like that is the case.
yes, its part of the SUB so not available to product changers
Nick, I currently have two basic no-fee Freedom cards. Would it be possible and make sense to turn one of these into either a Freedom Flex or Freedom Unlimited card or maintain them as they are? If so, which is the better option?
Yes, it probably would.
If you change to the Freedom Flex, you pick up 3x dining, 3x drugstores, and 5x travel booked through Chase on top of the rotating categories.
If you chase to the Freedom Unlimited, you pick up 3x dining, 3x drugstores, 5x travel booked through Chase and 1.5x everywhere else. No rotating categories on this card, but it’s a very good “everywhere else” card if you’re in the Chase ecosystem and value Ultimate Rewards points (if you’re going to redeem points at a value of $0.01 per point, you’d be better off with a 2% card for everyday spend, but if you’re going to use these in conjunction with a Chase Freedom Unlimited at 1.5cpp or transfer to partners, the Freedom Unlimited could be better).
Really depends on what fits your needs. Keep in mind that if you product change, you won’t get the first year bonus. You could alternatively apply for either of them if you’re under 5/24. Then you’d get the 20K bonus + 5x groceries for a year on up to $12K. I’d first apply for the Sapphire Preferred if eligible, but that gives you a fuller picture I hope.
Wait. Isn’t 5x + 5x = 10x???
Wouldn’t the Chase Freedom Flex earn 10x points this quarter with this welcome offer?
Nope. Both bonuses are marketed as 5x, but remember that the card earns 1x on all purchases, so the quarterly categories and first year spending deal are each really +4x. You earn 1 base point + 4x on quarterly categories for a total of 5x or you earn 1 base point + 4x on the first year grocery, so when you’re in the first year and grocery is the quarterly category, you get 1 base point + 4x quarterly + 4x grocery = 9x.
That’s not just a theory — one of the quarters last year was grocery while this same offer was going on. I got 9x as expected and included screen shots in last year’s post (which I linked somewhere within this post).
That makes sense now. Thanks for the clarification.
These cards are a clear win compared to “other big offers we’ve seen on other cards recently.” Those other big offers all include a big annual fee. These do not.
I disagree with you. The Sapphire Preferred comes with a 100K offer. Use 9500 points to pay yourself back for the annual fee and you’ve got 91,500 points left — worth $915 at the $0.01 cashout rate or $1,143.75 toward travel booked through Chase. That’s 22.8-28.6% back on that initial $4K spend. After year 1, downgrade to a no-fee card.
By contrast, the Freedom Unlimited already offers 1.5x everywhere, so the 5x is really +3.5x on $12K spend for a “bonus” of 42,000 points plus the 20K after the first $500 spend. So you’re talking about 62,000 points on $12,000 spend — a return of 5.1%.
Note that in both cases above, I excluded the ordinary earnings on the required spend (i.e. what you would earn on the $4K spend or $12K spend) and just examined the bonus amounts. The bonus on a card like the Sapphire Preferred is a huge comparative win.
The Amex Platinum card is an even bigger difference. You’re right that it has a huge $695 annual fee, but if you maxed out the Resy offer in year 1 you’d be looking at 500,000 Membership Rewards points (set aside for a moment the huge spend involved). Even at the rumored devalued Schwab redemption rate of 1.1c per point, those points could be turned into money via Schwab for $5,500 back. Pay yourself back the $695 annual fee and even if you don’t use a single credit or benefit on the Platinum card, you’re ahead thousands.
Obviously that Platinum card offer isn’t for everyone and I get that the Freedom cards are marketing to an entirely different crowd who probably isn’t spending $25K in the next 6 months, but I disagree that the Freedom cards are a clear win *over* those cards. The annual fee on those cards is easily mitigated with the bonus points.
Fair points, but I’m considering only the return on spending, not the value of included bonuses. Appreciate the math, though.
Obviously there’s a plethora of great bonuses out there, if one is only after that initial injection of cash or value, and doesn’t consider how they’re going to somehow make use of the “pre-paid credits” such as AmEx doles out.
Hi Nick, great article, as usual. I have the regular Freedom card with the quarterly rotating categories. Do you think they might apply the year bonus to this card, as well?