Can I Use a Credit Card for That? Should I?
Many or all of the products featured here are from our partners who compensate us. This may influence which products we write about and where and how the product appears on a page. However, this does not influence our evaluations. Our opinions are our own. Here is a list of our partners and here's how we make money.
NerdWallet has long recommended putting most purchases on credit cards. Used wisely, credit cards can offer lucrative rewards, allow you to finance a purchase without interest and provide valuable consumer protections. If you spend within your means and you pay your balance in full every month, using credit cards for purchases is usually better than paying with cash, debit or check.
But there's a big difference between using credit cards to buy specific items like a restaurant meal, clothing or a new refrigerator and using them as an open-ended funding source for things like starting a business, paying rent or financing medical care. When you're thinking about using a credit card for something that you could just as easily pay for with cash, the considerations are different from when you're thinking about putting an expense on a card because you otherwise couldn't afford it.
At NerdWallet, we've heard many, many questions that start with "Can I use a credit card to ...?" or "I know I can, but should I use a credit card to ...?" No single answer will apply to every person in every situation, but we've written about dozens of scenarios in which people may be looking to a credit card as a viable option or as a last resort.
Jump ahead to:
Housing
Transportation
Health care
Kids and education
Finances
Entrepreneurship
Other
