Top business debit cards compared

About Top business debit cards compared

Business spending runs on the card in the wallet and the exchange rate attached to it, so this ranking of 198 business debit cards weighs three things at once: what the account costs to keep open, what a payment abroad costs to convert, and how quickly you can reach someone when a payment is blocked or a supplier asks for something unusual. Every card listed is aimed at companies rather than individuals, and each is judged on the same published pricing, so a plan that charges nothing to hold is not automatically the cheapest one to use. The main trade-off runs between the cost of holding an account and the cost of moving money across currencies. Plans with a monthly charge often add virtual cards, while plans that charge nothing often leave cash withdrawals and extra cards to you. Support routes matter too, because a stalled supplier payment is an operations problem before it is a banking one. Read every fee against the account type it applies to, since a plan fee and a card fee are not the same thing.

How we picked

Scores come from three weighted parts. Trust carries the most weight at 40%, which reflects how long the provider has traded, which legal entity holds the account and what kind of company stands behind it. Cost accounts for 35% and reads the monthly plan fee, the exchange rate markup and any cash withdrawal allowance. The offer weight of 25% covers the extras a company actually uses, such as multi-currency handling, virtual cards and travel features. Figures are taken from each provider's own pricing pages, card pages, legal pages and the European payment institution register where the entity is listed there, then cross-checked against the ranges and medians held across the wider site. Partner entries are listed first in the order the score produced, and everything else follows underneath them. Where two cards look similar, the lower cost and the wider set of support routes settle the order. Nothing here rests on a personal account, and no card is described beyond what its provider publishes.

Our top picks

1. 3. Qonto

   Qonto is in this ranking for the plan that suits a company spending across borders. It charges €9 a month, where Monzo Flex charges £0 and Paysera further down charges €1, and in return you get multi-currency accounts across from 30 currencies, virtual cards and travel features on a Mastercard debit card. Support runs on chat, phone and email, one of the widest services in this ranking, and the account is held by QONTO in France since 2017. The two lines to price in are the FX fee of 2% and the cash allowance of €0.

   • Monthly fee: €9
   • Currency conversion fee: 2%
   • Free ATM withdrawals: €0

   Pros

   • Card insurance for travel, business purchases and fraud comes with the card.
   • Multi-currency, virtual cards and travel use all sit inside the offer, so foreign buying needs no separate product (multi currency, virtual card and travel).

   Cons

   • The account charges a monthly fee of €9, while Wise charges £0 for the same job of holding money.
   • Card conversion costs 2%, and the ranking on that measure is 160 of 259.
   • Free ATM withdrawals come to €0, so cash at home or abroad is a charge rather than an included allowance.
   • The rewards type is none and the audience is business, so nothing comes back on card spend and there is no personal account.

What to look for

Monthly account cost

A plan that charges €0 a month at the median sits alongside the free ones, so the plan fee rarely decides this on its own. Check the top of the range too, where fees run as high as €99 in this category. A paid plan can still win if it bundles virtual cards and multi-currency handling.

Exchange rate markup

The median foreign exchange fee here is 1%, the upper quartile is 2.38% and the top of the range is 6%. For a business paying overseas suppliers every week, this line usually outweighs the plan fee.

Cash withdrawal allowance

The median cash withdrawal allowance in this ranking is €0, the upper quartile is €200 and the largest allowance reaches €438.48. A team that takes cash for expenses should read this line before the plan fee.

Virtual cards for staff and subscriptions

Virtual cards show up in 51.2% of the entries scored on features, which makes them common in this category. They let you cap one subscription or hand a contractor a card that can be cancelled on its own, without touching the main account.

Debit, prepaid or virtual

Debit cards make up 73.2% of the cards here, prepaid cards 20.3% and virtual-only cards 6.5%. A prepaid card is a loaded balance rather than a current account, so it suits spend control more than salaries or direct debits.

Support routes

A help centre appears on 79.9% of the cards scored on support, and phone support on 61.5%. For a company card, a reachable person on a blocked payment is worth more than a perk.

Frequently asked questions

Top business debit cards compared by country

• Australia
• Brazil
• Canada
• China
• France
• Germany
• India
• Ireland
• Italy
• Japan
• Netherlands
• Singapore
• South Africa
• United Kingdom
• United States

The data behind this ranking

All data and the CSV