Capital One VentureOne Balance Transfer: Cut Debt, Earn Miles

Strong balance transfer offer

You can find balance transfer promotions on a variety of cash-back credit cards, but they're much less common on travel cards. Further, promotional APR periods on cash-back cards tend to top out at 12-15 months. The Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit Card - Balance Transfer, by comparison, has this offer for new cardholders: 0% intro APR on Purchases for 6 months and 0% intro APR on Balance Transfers for 18 months, and then the ongoing APR of 18.74%-28.74% Variable APR.

This card charges an introductory balance transfer fee of just 3%. That's on the low end of the usual range; many competing cards charge 5%. And the 3% fee is good for 18 months — just as long as the intro APR period for transfers. There are other cards with introductory transfer fees, but those intro fees tend to expire after a month or two.

Light on other fees

If you’re not a frequent flyer and you pay with credit only occasionally, the $0 annual fee is a strong selling point. You'll earn rewards while paying nothing to carry the card, assuming you pay your balance in full each month to avoid interest. The Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit Card - Balance Transfer also travels well internationally; it charges no foreign transaction fees, and it's a Mastercard (and therefore widely accepted).

Simple rewards + bonus offer

Capital One's flagship Venture credit card popularized the flat-rate travel rewards model, where all purchases earn the same rate. The $0-annual-fee VentureOne cards offer that same simplicity. You earn 1.25 miles per dollar spent on purchases. (Hotels, vacation rentals and rental cars booked through Capital One's travel portal earn 5 miles per dollar.)

There's also a bonus offer for new cardholders: Earn a bonus of 20,000 miles once you spend $500 on purchases within 3 months from account opening, equal to $200 in travel. That's relatively easy to snag — but keep in mind that this is a balance transfer card. If your goal is to pay down debt, the last thing you want to be doing is piling up more of it.

Redemption flexibility

The redemption process on the Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit Card - Balance Transfer is as flexible as it gets for travel cards. You can use your miles for travel in three ways:

• Use miles to book travel through Capital One's travel platform.

• Use your card to pay for travel, and then redeem miles for statement credit against the expense.

• Transfer miles to leading travel loyalty programs.

Short intro APR period for purchases

Although the intro APR period for balance transfers on this card runs for 18 months, it's considerably shorter for purchases, at just 6 months. This could cause complications for your grace period down the line if you put purchases on the card while carrying a transferred balance. When the intro periods are mismatched like this, it's best to hold off on putting purchases on a card with transferred debt until that debt is paid off.

Relatively low rewards rate

This card's base rewards rate of 1.25 miles per dollar spent — equivalent to 1.25% back — is underwhelming when you consider that you can find no-annual-fee rewards cards that give the equivalent of 1.5% back or more. Compare it with these options:

• The Wells Fargo Autograph® Card has a $0 annual fee and earns 3 points per dollar on restaurants, travel and transit, gas and EV stations, popular streaming services, and select phone plans. All other eligible purchases earn 1 point. Points are worth 1 cent each.

• The $0-annual-fee Bank of America® Travel Rewards credit card earns 1.5 points per dollar on spending, with points worth 1 cent apiece when redeemed toward travel.

• The Discover it® Miles also has a $0 annual fee and earns 1.5 miles per dollar spent on everything. Miles are worth 1 cent apiece whether redeemed for travel or cash back.

Not ideal for bigger spenders

If you plan to put more than $12,750 a year on your card — about $1,060 a month — you'd get more value from the regular Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card, even taking into account that card's annual fee of $95 (see rates and fees). That's because it gives you 2 miles per dollar spent on the purchases that earn only 1.25 with the VentureOne variants. Plus, this card has a much bigger welcome bonus: LIMITED-TIME OFFER: Enjoy $300 to use on hotel and vacation rental bookings through Capital One Travel in your first cardholder year, plus earn 75,000 bonus miles once you spend $4,000 on purchases within the first 3 months from account opening – that’s more than $1,000 in travel value. You'll also get an application fee credit for Global Entry or TSA PreCheck, among other benefits.

A cash-back card gives more flexibility

When it comes to travel credit cards, redemption is understandably geared toward travel. If you want to use your rewards for anything else, you typically get less value. Such is the case with Capital One's travel cards, where NerdWallet values miles at 1 cent apiece when you redeem them for travel, but about half that when you use them to get cash back. Consider the Citi Double Cash® Card instead. It pays you 2% cash back on every purchase: 1% when you buy something and 1% when you pay it off. The annual fee is $0 — and it, too, comes with an 18-month intro APR period for balance transfers.

Visit NerdWallet's best credit cards roundup for more potential alternatives.

For Capital One products listed on this page, some of the benefits may be provided by Visa® or Mastercard® and may vary by product. See the respective Guide to Benefits for details, as terms and exclusions apply.