Finding the best cashback card used to feel like a bit of a maze. NatWest Rewards costs £24 a year, Santander All in One costs £36, and Amex somehow manages to have a different fee and reward structure for almost every card. And that’s before you even get into the endless points game. So unless you’re the sort of person who enjoys running the numbers, it’s usually a lot of hassle for not much reward.
Those cards still exist, but a new breed has arrived: higher rewards, no FX fees, and completely free to use.
I can’t help thinking it all started in 2021 when Chase entered the market. That 1% cashback on everything was almost unheard of at the time. Fast-forward to now and here’s where we are:
- Lloyds Ultra: 1% on everything for a year
- Virgin Money: 1% on everything for 3 months
- Chase: 2% on dining, groceries, and travel spend
- Santander: 3% on dining and travel spend for a year
Chase is the only ongoing offer here, although they do tweak the terms from time to time. It’s also the only one in debit card form; the rest are credit cards.
The best simple cashback Setup in the UK right now
So if you’re looking for the simplest cashback setup in the UK, it’s actually pretty straightforward:
- Santander Rewards: restaurants, cafés, takeaways, travel (3%)
- Chase credit: groceries (2%)
- Lloyds Ultra: everything else (1%)
If you’re anything like me, that means most of your spending lands in the 2–3% range. And that can add up to a tidy little sum.
Let’s do some maths
Say you spend £800 a month:
- £200 on groceries
- £250 on eating out, cafés and takeaways
- £150 on transport
- £200 on everything else
That might look something like this:
- £400 on Santander Rewards at 3% = £12
- £200 on Chase at 2% = £4
- £200 on Lloyds Ultra at 1% = £2
Total per month: £18
Annually, that’s £216.
The downside is that both Lloyds and Santander only run their top rate offers for 12 months before dropping to 0.25%.
At that point, your setup would look more like this:
- £600 on Chase at 2% = £12
- £200 on Lloyds/Santander/Barclaycard at 0.25% = 50p
Total per month: £12.50
Annually, that’s still a respectable £150, mostly thanks to Chase.
And honestly, since Chase is basically doing most of the work, you could make a good case for just putting everything on Chase. Having a second card still makes sense, but probably not for chasing a few extra pennies.
Final thought
Working out cashback can feel a bit like choosing between ten different SIM-only deals. Tiny differences in minutes, prices, roaming rules, contract lengths — you can spend the entire day comparing them and still doubt yourself.
That’s where cashback used to be, but not anymore.
This setup keeps things simple: Santander for food and travel, Chase for groceries, and Lloyds for everything else. At the moment, it’s hard to beat for overall cashback rate in the UK.
