How ranking works

Kinds of offer

Card offer · Amex Offers, Chase Offers, Citi Merchant Offers, Capital One Offers

You generally need the applicable card and must activate the offer before purchasing. Targeted: it may not be in your account.

Cashback portal · Capital One Shopping, Rakuten

You generally need to start your shopping session through that service. Public rate, any card.

Wallet offer · PayPal Offers

Saved in the wallet and applied when you check out with it. Targeted.

Your offer · Synced from your account by the extension

Known to be in your account. Keeps the mechanics of its program.

Each row says which kind it is, what you have to do (activate first, start from the portal, pay with the wallet), whether it may be targeted, and where it applies when the terms say.

Where offers come from

Portal rates are refreshed from the programs only through authorized means; card and wallet offers are per-account, so they come from members who install the Chrome extension and choose to share the offers already loaded in their accounts. Right now the index holds 5,650 offers across 3,999 stores; offers checked 2 days ago.

The extension reads offers that are already displayed to you. It never collects card numbers or bank passwords. Extension privacy

How an offer is valued

Offers are written as free text, so each title is parsed into a reward, a minimum spend, and a cap. What is not stated is never invented; anything we cannot read confidently stays unranked.

Percentage offers

rate × spend, then capped at any stated maximum. “10% back, up to $15” pays $10 on a $100 purchase and $15 on a $400 purchase.

Fixed-amount offers

the stated amount, never more than the purchase. “Spend $100, get $20 back” pays $20 at $100 and $0 at $50.

Minimum spend

below the threshold the estimate is $0, and the row says what would qualify.

Tiered offers

“5% on the first $500” is capped at the tier, so the estimate stops at $25 no matter how much you spend.

Points, miles and “up to” rates

shown with their own wording and never converted to dollars. A points value depends on how you redeem, and an “up to” rate depends on what you buy, so neither can honestly be called best.

Why the purchase amount matters

The order is always tied to an amount, because the winner changes with it. At $100 a flat “$20 back” is worth more than “15% back”; at $200 the percentage wins. The amount we rank at is the store’s own: the largest minimum its offers require, never below $100, so every threshold offer qualifies. It decides which offer comes out ahead, not what you should spend. Ties prefer the percentage offer, then the lower minimum spend. Nothing is recommended unless it produces a positive dollar estimate at that amount.

The recommendation also has to be an offer you can count on: a public rate anyone can use, or an offer synced from your own account. A card offer that may only be in some accounts is never the answer on its own, however large; it keeps its place in the list by value, says “Check your account”, and appears in the potential stack when it combines with the portal rate.

Is this a good rate? (rate history)

Cashback rates move, so a number on its own does not tell you whether to shop now. Every day our refresh records the rate each program shows for each store — one observation per offer per day, so a rate that held for 80 days counts 80 times and a one-day spike counts once. Days we did not check are left blank, never guessed; days the offer was not on the program at all are recorded as unavailable, never as 0%. Rakuten and Capital One Shopping at the same store are separate histories, and a fixed “15%” is never mixed with an “up to 15%”.

Typical range

the middle half of tracked days (25th to 75th percentile), using rates that actually occurred.

Excellent rate

at least 85% of tracked days were lower, today is at or above the typical band, and the lift over the median is material (at least one point and 25% of the median). A steady 5% that ticks up to 5.5% is not excellent.

Above usual / Typical / Below usual

above the typical band, inside it, or below it. A rate that has never changed is simply typical.

Not enough history

under 7 tracked days we show only that we are building history; under 14 we show the observed range without a rating; the 90-day range is labelled by how many days it is based on.

The rating describes the past 90 days only. It does not predict what a program will do next, and we never say “wait”.

Potential stacks

A card offer and a cashback portal use independent mechanisms, so when one store has one of each with a real dollar estimate the results show a potential stack: both estimates added together, and the steps to use both (activate the card offer, start from the portal, pay with the eligible card). Two card offers, or two portals, are alternatives. Wallet offers are never shown in a stack. It is potential, not guaranteed: check both offers’ terms before you buy.

Freshness and retirement

Every row shows when its source last confirmed it — the hours since the last check inside the first day, then the day, then the date itself once it is over a week old — and Details shows the exact dates. Offers with an expiry drop out after it passes. Offers without one are retired only after their source has stopped returning them for several days; one missed check changes nothing, and a refresh that returns far fewer offers than usual is treated as a possible failure, not as the truth.

How we make money

Some portal links and card application links pay us a commission at no cost to you; application links are marked as advertiser links. Most links, including every card-linked issuer offer, pay nothing. The site also sells a paid developer API tier. Ranking never reads any of this: the order is computed from the reward and your spend amount, and there is no paid placement.

Questions

What is GetCurrentOffer?

GetCurrentOffer is a free search tool for one question: what is the best way to save at the store you are about to buy from. Search a store and it shows every card offer and cashback rate it knows about for that store, ranked by the dollars you would actually get back, with what you have to do to get each one.

What is the difference between a card offer and a cashback portal?

A card offer (Amex Offers, Chase Offers, Citi Merchant Offers, Capital One Offers) is attached by your card issuer to a specific card; you usually have to activate it before you pay and then pay with that card, and issuers show different offers to different accounts. A cashback portal (Rakuten, Capital One Shopping) pays anyone who starts the purchase from its site; the rate is public and any card works. Capital One Offers and Capital One Shopping are two different products and are labeled separately.

What is a personal offer?

An offer synced from your own account through the optional Chrome extension. It is shown as "Your offer" because we know it is in your account, and it keeps the mechanics of its program (an Amex offer still has to be activated).

Which programs are covered?

Amex Offers, Chase Offers, Citi Merchant Offers, Capital One Offers, Capital One Shopping, PayPal Offers and Rakuten. Community members can also share offers they see in their own accounts.

How are offers ranked?

By estimated dollars back at a purchase amount, not by the biggest percentage. The amount is the store's own: the largest minimum spend among the offers shown, floored at $100, so every threshold offer qualifies. Each offer is then shown as it is written rather than as a dollar figure. The recommendation at the top is the most valuable offer anyone can use — a public rate, or an offer synced from your own account; a card offer that may only be in some accounts stays in the list with "Check your account" and in the potential stack. Offers we cannot value in dollars — points, "up to" rates, and text we could not parse — are listed after the ones we can, never flagged as best.

What does "Excellent rate" or "Typical rate" mean?

It compares today's rate with what the same program offered at the same store on the days we checked over the past 90 days. We record one observation per offer per day, so a rate that lasted 80 days counts 80 times and a one-day spike counts once. "Typical" is the middle half of those days (25th to 75th percentile). "Excellent" means at least 85% of tracked days were lower and the rate is materially above the median; "Above usual" and "Below usual" mean outside the typical band. Under 7 tracked days we show nothing but the count; under 14 we show the observed range without a rating. It describes the past only; it is never a prediction.

How is the estimated value calculated?

A percentage offer pays rate x spend, capped at any stated maximum reward. A fixed offer pays its amount, and never more than the purchase itself. If your spend is below a stated minimum, the estimate is $0 and the row says what it would take to qualify. Tiered offers ("5% on the first $500") are capped at the tier ceiling. Points and miles are never converted to dollars, and an "up to" rate is never assumed to be its maximum.

What does "potential stack" mean?

A card offer is applied by your issuer after you pay; a portal rate is paid by the portal for starting the purchase there. Those two mechanisms are independent, so when a store has one of each with a real dollar estimate we show them together with the steps to use both. It is potential, not guaranteed: each program sets its own exclusions. Two card offers, or two portals, are alternatives, and wallet offers are never shown as part of a stack because paying through a wallet often breaks the tracking the other program relies on.

How fresh is the information?

Every offer shows when it was last verified, and Details shows the exact dates it was first seen and last verified. Offers with an expiry date drop out after it passes. Offers without one are retired when their source stops returning them; a single missed check never removes anything, and a refresh that returns far fewer offers than usual is treated as a possible failure rather than as the truth.

What is a targeted offer?

Card issuers and wallets do not show the same offers to everyone. A public listing here means the offer exists, not that it is in your account, which is why those rows say "Check your account". Confirm it in your app before you buy.

Does GetCurrentOffer earn affiliate commissions?

Some outbound links pay a commission, and card application links are marked as advertiser links. Most links, including every card-linked issuer offer, pay nothing.

Do commissions affect ranking?

No. Ranking is computed from the offer’s reward and your spend amount. Nothing in the ranking code reads a commission rate, and there is no paid placement.

Do I need an account to search?

No. Search, comparison and outbound links are free and work signed out. An account only adds saved offers, expiry reminders, and the offers synced from your own cards.

An offer looks wrong. How do I report it?

Send it to feedback@getcurrentoffers.com or use the contact form. Include the store and what you saw in your own account, and we will correct or remove the listing.