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Capital One Spark Miles Review

overall rating
4.0

Solid initial bonus, simple rewards program, but otherwise average

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Capital One Spark Miles offers two miles per dollar on all purchases. The bonus of 50,000 miles is worth $500 in travel and it requires spending $4,500 within the first three months of opening the account. The card has no annual fee for the first year, but it's $95 after that.

Capital One Spark Miles for Business

Overall Rating
4.0
Capital One Spark Miles for Business
On Capital One's Secured Site.
Current Offer

Earn 50,000 miles when you spend $4,500 in the first 3 months of account opening.

Recommended Credit
Score Our recommended ranges are based off of the FICO® Score 8 credit-scoring model. Credit score is one of the many factors lenders review in considering your application.
350 579
580 669
670 739
740 799
800 850
Good - Excellent
Regular APR (%) 25.74% variable
Annual Fee $0 for the first year, then $95
Rewards Earning Rate Unlimited 2X miles per dollar on every purchase, every day.
Balance Transfer Fee There is no standard balance transfer fee for this card.
Cash Advance APR (%) 31.74%
Cash Advance Fee Either $10 or 3% of the amount of each cash advance, whichever is greater.
how this card stacks up
When compared among all business cards in our database:
Rewards
Benefits
Low Fees
Security/Customer Experience
Low Interest
worst best

Capital One Spark Miles is not one of our top-rated travel credit cards. You can review our list of the best travel credit cards for what we think are better options.

Full Review of Capital One Spark Miles

Pros & Cons

Pros
  • Solid bonus, but with high required spending

  • Simple rewards program

  • Flexible travel redemption options

Cons
  • Your personal credit history could be affected

  • Not as flexible as cash back

Pros Explained

  • Solid bonus but with high required spending: This card offers a bonus of 50,000 miles that's worth up to $500 in travel purchases if you spend $4,500 in the first three months after opening the account. This bonus is on the high side for a business credit card, but the spending requirement is high as well. Most cards require spending no more than $3,000 in the first three months.
  • Simple rewards program: The card offers a flat two miles per dollar on all your purchases. There’s no cap on rewards. You don’t have to keep track of different rewards rates for different spending categories. The card charges a $95 annual fee after the first year but you only have to spend $4,750 annually at the two-mile-per-dollar rate to break even. That’s assuming that you don’t carry a balance on the card and have to pay interest charges.
  • Flexible travel redemption options: Capital One Spark Miles offers some of the most flexible travel rewards around. You’ll have three options when you're ready to redeem: for travel directly through Capital One, by getting a statement credit against previous travel purchases, or by transferring your miles to one of the bank’s airline partners.

Cons Explained

  • Your personal credit history could be affected: Like most major business credit card issuers, Capital One reports account activity on its cards to the commercial credit bureaus. This allows you to establish a business credit history. But unlike most major business card issuers, Capital One also reports your account information to the consumer credit bureaus. This could damage both your business and personal credit histories if you rack up a large balance on your card or miss a payment. Discover is the only other major business credit card issuer that does this.
  • Cash back is much less rewarding: You'll get a lot of flexibility with Capital One miles if you use your rewards to book travel. But the redemption rate for this card is unusually meager if you want to redeem your miles for cash. They’re worth only half as much as the redemptions for travel: 50,000 miles would be worth only $250 in cash back. Consider Capital One Spark Cash if you want a card that offers maximum rewards flexibility with cash back.

Who This Card Is Best For

Capital One Spark Miles is a solid option for small business owners who are comfortable using their card rewards for travel purchases and who plan to use the card regularly. You'll have to charge roughly $396 per month in two-miles-per-dollar purchases over the year to justify the card's annual fee.

The card is particularly well suited to businesses who charge enough to reach the fairly steep minimum spending requirements for the card's bonus. You'd have to charge at least $1,500 to the card for each of your first three months of account membership to earn the 50,000-mile bonus.

Capital One Spark Miles is best for business owners who plan to keep the card's balance fairly low relative to its credit limit and who make on-time payments. Your business’s activity with the card will be reported to both the commercial and consumer credit bureaus.

Capital One Spark Miles Bonus

New cardholders will earn 50,000 miles if they spend $4,500 in the first three months. 

The period during which you have to meet the minimum spending requirement begins when your account is opened, not when you receive the card in the mail.

Rewards Earning Details

The card offers a flat two miles per dollar on every other purchase you make, and this is a very good base rewards rate. But the card charges a $95 annual fee the first year so you may be able to get more value out of a card that doesn’t charge an annual fee if your business doesn’t spend a lot even if the rewards rate is lower.

Rewards Redemption Details

Capital One Spark Miles is primarily a travel credit card. It offers two redemption options for travel:

  • Purchase Eraser: You’ll use your card to book travel through any eligible travel agent, website, or resource with this option. You’ll then have 90 days to use your miles to “erase” the purchase after the transaction posts. You'll receive a statement credit for the value of the miles used for the expenditure. 
  • Book travel: You can use your miles to book travel directly through your rewards account with Capital One.

Both these redemption options give you a value of one cent per mile, which is standard for many travel credit cards. You can also redeem your miles for cash back or gift cards but you’ll generally receive less value per mile with these redemption options.

Transferring Miles

Capital One also allows you to transfer your miles to one of the bank’s airline partners. They include:

  • Aeromexico Club Premier
  • Air France KLM Flying Blue
  • Air Canada Aeroplan
  • Asia Miles
  • Avianca LifeMiles
  • British Airways
  • Emirates Skywards
  • Etihad Guest
  • EVA Air Infinity MileageLands
  • Finnair Plus
  • Qantas Frequent Flyer
  • Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
  • TAP Air Portugal Miles
  • Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles

You can transfer your miles at a rate of one Capital One Mile to one mile with the partner airline with most of these partners. EVA Air Infinity is the exception. For every 1,000 miles transferred to EVA, you will receive 750 miles with the Taiwanese airline.

We found a business class flight on Emirates from Los Angeles to Phuket, Thailand, for 250,000 miles plus $1,738 in taxes and fees. The cash price was $7,224. You'd have to move 250,000 Capital One miles to Emirates if you were to transfer your miles, and if you use the card to pay the taxes and fees, you could then use 173,800 Capital One miles to get a statement credit for the purchase if you use the card to pay the taxes and fees. That’s a total of 423,800 miles.

How to Maximize Your Rewards

Plan to use this card for all of your purchases to ensure you get miles back on every transaction, just as you would with any rewards credit card.

It's possible to squeeze more value out of your miles by flying with one of Capital One’s airline partners. This increased value typically requires international business class or first class tickets, but it could be worth stockpiling your rewards to fulfill them if you prefer this type of travel.

It might be best to redeem directly with Capital One through the travel partner or as a travel statement credit if you don’t plan to travel internationally or if you don’t want to spend the time researching redemptions with travel partners.

Capital One Spark Miles Outstanding Benefits

The card's only outstanding benefit is its application fee credit for TSA PreCheck or Global Entry. This perk is worth up to $100 every four years. You’ll get expedited security screening at participating U.S. airports if you're approved for one of the programs or the opportunity to bypass U.S. Customs and Border Protection inspections lines when returning to the U.S. or both.

Standard Benefits

  • Extended warranty protection
  • Free employee cards and customized spending limits
  • Year-end summaries
  • Purchase records in multiple formats

Cardholder Experience

Capital One was ranked fifth out of 11 in the J.D. Power 2022 U.S. Credit Card Customer Satisfaction Study.

Capital One's customer service team is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, which is standard among credit card issuers. You can manage your account online or with the bank’s mobile app, which was ranked first out of nine by J.D. Power in its 2022 U.S. Credit Card Mobile App Satisfaction Study.

Security Features

Capital One allows you to lock and unlock your card as well as employee cards from its mobile app. This feature can come in handy if you want to control errant card usage among your employees or if one of you loses a card. Beyond that, Capital One’s security features are standard for the industry.

Final Verdict

Capital One Spark Miles offers a solid two miles per dollar spent on all purchases. This card could be lucrative for the right business even with its fairly high spending requirement when it's combined with a decent bonus.

But it hardly stands out from the pack. The Blue Business Plus card from American Express offers two points per dollar on the first $50,000 spent each year and it has no annual fee. The Chase Ink Business Preferred also has a $95 fee. It earns three points per dollar spent on select travel categories and offers a bonus that’s worth $1,000 when it's used for travel, twice the value of the bonus for Capital One Spark Miles.

It's also important to consider this card's possible implications for your personal credit score. One of the card's drawbacks is that Capital One reports account activity on business cards to consumer credit bureaus. You might want to opt for a card from another issuer that doesn’t report its activity to consumer credit bureaus if you prefer to keep a maximum separation between your personal and business affairs.

FAQs

How much are Capital One Spark miles worth?

Travel redemptions are worth one cent per mile, but you'll receive less value per mile if you opt for cash back instead. Cash-back miles are only worth half as much as the redemptions for travel. You'll receive two miles per dollar on all purchases.

Is Capital One Spark Miles for Business card hard to get approved for?

Capital One advertises the card as for those with "excellent" credit scores. It defines excellent credit as never having declared bankruptcy or defaulted on a loan; never been more than 60 days late on a credit card, loan, or medical bill in the past year; and possessing a loan or credit card with a credit limit of $5,000 or more for at least three years.

What airlines can you use Capital One Spark miles on?

Your best bet might be transferring your miles to Capital One's airline partners. There are 15 of them. They include Air France, Air Canada, British Airways, Singapore Airlines, and Qantas, along with other well-known airlines. Your miles will likely be worth more if you take this option, but some restrictions can apply. You might have to fly first class or international business class. You can also claim a travel statement credit for use with other airlines.

How often does Capital One Spark increase my credit limit?

Credit One indicates that you must maintain your new account in good standing for "several" months to be eligible for an increased credit line. You're free to request a credit limit increase at any time, but this doesn't necessarily mean that your request will be approved, particularly if you haven't had your card for very long.

What is the highest credit limit for the Capital One Spark Miles for Business card?

The Capital One Spark Miles for Business Card has a minimum credit line of $5,000. The maximum limit is based on a review of your credit profile and your ability to pay.

Next Steps
For Capital One Spark Miles for Business
on Capital One's Secured Site.
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CURRENT CARD
Capital One Spark Miles for Business
overall rating
4.0
Recommended Credit
Score Our recommended ranges are based off of the FICO® Score 8 credit-scoring model. Credit score is one of the many factors lenders review in considering your application.
350 579
580 669
670 739
740 799
800 850
Good - Excellent
Regular APR (%) 25.74% variable
Annual Fee $0 for the first year, then $95
Rewards Earning Rate Unlimited 2X miles per dollar on every purchase, every day.
Investopedia Credit Card Rating Methodology
Investopedia is committed to delivering the best credit card recommendations in the industry. We’ll tell you when a card is good, we’ll tell you when a card is bad, and we’ll only call a card the best if we would recommend it to our friends or family members.
Overall Star Rating Explained
To rate credit cards we objectively assess, score and weight nearly 100 individual card features which roll up into five major feature sets: fees, interest, rewards, benefits and security/customer service. Here’s how we weighted those feature sets for the overall star rating of a card:
We have applied our proprietary rating methodology to every generally-accepted credit card in the U.S. domestic market to allow consumers to make fully informed choices. It’s important to note that for our overall score that we make a number of assumptions about how you would be using your credit card:
  1. While we make no assumption as to whether balances are carried on a given card we do assign varying weights to all credit cards’ introductory APR (if present) in addition to the regular, long term purchase and balance transfer interest rates.
  2. We utilize BLS (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics) income and average category spending data to calculate annual earnings rates for rewards cards that offer cash back, points or miles rewards at a set rate on all spending or in consideration of bonus rewards for certain spending categories, like gasoline, groceries, restaurants or travel.
  3. We determine the maximum points value of rewards cards by dividing the points, cash back or miles required to exchange for the retail price of the most valuable redemption option (for example, in the case of a card that offers a domestic roundtrip airline ticket as a redemption option vs. another redemption option of lesser value that requires the same amount of points or miles to acquire, we would base the rewards value on the airline ticket).
  • Cards that are selected best overall in their respective categories generally feature most if not all of the following attributes:
  • Low or Reasonable Fees Credit card fees come in many forms but the primary ones involve those for annual card membership and balance transfer. There are a myriad of reward and non-reward card options that charge no annual fee but for the many that do assess an annual fee the cost is often justified by their lucrative ongoing rewards and initial signup bonuses. Balance transfer fees are occasionally waived during introductory periods with certain cards, a factor which is heavily and positively weighted in our scoring model for cards offering this benefit. When charged, balance transfer fees range between 3% - 5%, which we grade accordingly. Other standard fees can generally be avoided, such as those for paying late or taking cash advances but we rate those relative to other cards in the market for reference, though with less weight assigned
  • Competitive Interest Many cards offer 0% introductory APR on purchases and balance transfers for varying lengths and then revert to a permanent or regular APR (based on a variable rate tied to the prime rate) that applies to any balances not paid in full. We rate both introductory APR percentage and length (in months) along with the midpoint of the variable regular APR interest rate range.
  • Valuable Rewards Credit card reward programs can be based on cash back, points or travel rewards (which can be generic or travel partner-specific, as with airline and hotel co-brand card programs). For cards that offer rewards we determine the value per dollar spent along with average redemption values and assign more favorable ratings to cards that offer superior consumer value. We also assign value to sign-up bonus offers and their initial spending requirements, when present.
  • Excellent Benefits Credit card benefits cover a range of offerings like concierge service, TSA Pre-check, auto rental coverage, travel accident insurance, lost luggage assistance and free credit scores. We rate cards on the number and level of over a dozen standard and upscale benefits and provide extra weighting emphasis for those travel-related perks that apply to premium travel cards when present.
  • Solid Security/Customer Service Security and customer service features like lost or stolen card replacement, being able to lock one’s card from an issuer app and 24 hour customer support are becoming more standard across the card market and we provide a significant amount of weighting to features in this area.
  • You can also read the full version of our methodology for a more in-depth look at how we assess cards and award them the best in various categories.