Finder’s Credit Card Awards methodology
The data and analysis Finder’s experts used to determine the best credit cards for each category of the 2024 Finder Credit Card Awards.
What are the Finder Credit Card Awards?
Finder's Credit Card Awards recognises market-leading credit cards, with a ratings methodology that compares both value and features for 270 cards in our database.
Why you can trust our research
270
cards assessed
100+
hours of research
17
number of data points
Selection criteria
The products were included in the categories if they were currently available for new applications and met the following criteria:
- Balance Transfer Credit Card: Has a valid balance transfer revert rate.
- Travel Credit Card: Has a valid purchase rate.
- Frequent Flyer Credit Card – Qantas: Has a valid purchase rate and accrues points on the Qantas Frequent Flyer program.
- Frequent Flyer Credit Card – Velocity: Has a valid purchase rate and accrues points on the Velocity Frequent Flyer program.
- Low Rate Credit Card: Has a purchase rate between 0% and 15%.
- No Annual Fee Credit Card: Has a valid purchase rate greater than 0% and $0 annual fee.
- Rewards Credit Card: Has a valid purchase rate and a valid rewards program.
- No Annual Fee Rewards Credit Card: Has a valid rewards purchase rate, $0 annual fee and valid rewards program.
- Business Rewards Credit Card: Is a valid business card, has a valid rewards purchase rate and a valid rewards program.
- Business Frequent Flyer Credit Card: Is a valid business card, has a valid purchase rate and accrues points through Qantas Frequent Flyer, Qantas Business Rewards or Velocity Frequent Flyer.
- Low Interest Business Credit Card: Is a valid business card and has a purchase rate between 0% and 15%.
- Business Charge Card: Has no purchase interest rate and the account type is defined as "business".
Scoring
Metrics are scored using either binary scores when dealing with categorical data points or dynamic scoring when dealing with numeric data. Finder's dynamic scoring means a product's metric is scored in comparison to the data points of all the other competitor products.
| Metrics | Scoring |
|---|---|
| Balance transfer period | Dynamic scoring |
| Balance transfer period | Dynamic scoring |
| Balance transfer fee | Dynamic scoring |
| Balance transfer rate | Dynamic scoring |
| Annual fee | Dynamic scoring |
| Annual fee (first year) | Dynamic scoring |
| Purchase rate | Dynamic scoring |
| Interest-free period | Dynamic scoring |
| Overseas currency conversion rate | Dynamic scoring |
| Overseas ATM withdrawal fee | Dynamic scoring |
| Reward points cap | Dynamic scoring |
| Reward points value | Dynamic scoring |
| Rewards program | Binary scoring |
| Reward points sign-up | Dynamic scoring |
| Lounge pass | Binary scoring |
| Travel insurance | Binary scoring |
| Balance transfer revert rate | Dynamic scoring |
| Reward point cost for $100 | Dynamic scoring |
Weights
Final award score
The final award score is calculated by first calculating a score for each of the previous 12 months. This evaluates each product against the competing products in those particular months. This score is calculated by multiplying the score for each metric by the weight percentage and summing the weighted scores:
The final award score is calculated by taking a weighted average of the monthly scores with more recent months being weighted progressively heavier. This final award score is then ranked to determine the overall winners for each category.
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