Capital One Shopping Portal: What It Is and How to Use It to Earn Rewards

Online shopping portal allows you to earn reward points, airline miles, or cash back when you shop at select retailers. By logging into your favorite portal, clicking on a store, and making purchases as usual, you can earn these rewards in addition to the rewards you receive from your credit card.

Capital One Shopping is one of those portals that helps you find deals and save money, even if you don’t have a Capital One Credit Card. It offers targeted offers other than the Capital One Offers in your account and will automatically add coupons to your cart.

In this guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know about using Capital One Shopping to save money on your purchases.

Related: A Beginner’s Guide to Airline Shopping Portals: How to Earn Rewards Points and Miles

What is Capital One Shopping?

Capital One Shopping is an online shopping portal that can help you save money while you shop. It’s free and open to everyone, even if you don’t have a Capital One credit card or bank account. However, features may be limited if you’re outside the U.S.

Unlike other shopping portals that give you points, miles, or cash back, Capital One Shopping helps you earn credits that can be redeemed for gift cards. While it’s not the same as getting cash, many vendors can redeem your gift cards, including Walmart and eBay.

Capital One Shopping also offers a browser extension that you can easily download after logging in. Once installed, the extension will prompt you to activate any available Capital One Shopping offers when you search online.

To use, visit the retailer you want. You will be prompted to activate the available offers in the upper right corner of the screen. This extension is a convenient solution that simplifies the process of finding rewards and avoids manual searching.

Related: Best credit cards for everyday spending

How to Use Capital One Shopping

To use Capital One Shopping, start by visiting capitaloneshopping.com and create an account. You can set up your own login information or choose to log in through Capital One (if you’re already a Capital One customer).

Additionally, you can use referrals to start earning. Capital One Shopping is known for offering referral bonuses when you join using a friend or family member’s referral link. For example, if you create an account using your referral link and download the browser extension, then spend $10 in the first 30 days, you and your referral will both earn a one-time bonus of $40.

Once you have an account, you can find what you’re looking for using the search bar at the top of the page. From each merchant’s page, click “Visit Website” in the top left box. You can also click “Activate” or “Get Coupon” on one of the offers below. You’ll be redirected to the merchant’s website to complete your purchase.

Like other shopping portals, you must click through the portal to receive rewards (unless you have a browser extension that prompts you to activate rewards when you open a qualifying merchant’s website). You should avoid navigating to other websites or shopping portals during this process and using coupon codes that are not listed on Capital One Shopping, as this may cause your purchase to not be properly tracked by Capital One Shopping.

If you’re not sure exactly what you’re looking for, you can browse the options by clicking on the “Brands” or “Products” tabs at the top, or select the “Events” tab to search for current deals. Capital One Shopping currently offers a wide variety of merchants, from pet supplies and electronics to hotels and concert tickets.

When you search by product, Capital One Shopping will show you different retailers that sell your product, including product availability, estimated delivery time, potential rewards, and final out-of-pocket cost after rewards. For example, when I search Apple AirPods Pro HeadphonesI was able to save over $70 buying them from Amazon instead of eBay.

Capital One Shopping has a similar price comparison tool for booking hotels. Start by searching for your destination and dates, then click on the hotel you’re interested in and scroll down to see available deals.

As you can see, booking with some online travel companies can help you save money on hotel stays. But keep in mind that you usually won’t get benefits of elite status or earn points or elite qualifying nights unless you book directly with the hotel. If you find a lower rate at a Marriott, Hyatt, Hilton, or IHG property than the rate available when booking directly, you can submit Best price guarantee/best match guaranteeand if approved, a lower tax rate would apply.

Related: 9 things to consider when choosing to book through a portal vs. book directly

How to Redeem Capital One Shopping Rewards

As mentioned, Capital One Shopping rewards in the form of credits that can be redeemed for gift cards at select retailers. This is different from programs like Rakuten, Dosh And Top Cashbackallows you to earn cash rewards (usually delivered via PayPal, check, auto-pay service, or Venmo transfer).

When you’re ready to redeem your Capital One Shopping Rewards, you can order your gift card by selecting “Redeem Now” under the “My Rewards & Savings” tab.

From there, you can see your redemption options. There are currently over 50 retailers to choose from.

Related: Use a shopping portal aggregator to maximize your online shopping

Which credit card should you use when shopping at Capital One?

You can use Capital One Shopping without using a Capital One card. However, many Capital One cards can be great options for these types of purchases, including:

For more suggestions, check out our list. best card for online shopping.

Related: Capital One Miles: How to Earn, Redeem, and Transfer Rewards

The last line

The Capital One Shopping portal can help you save money, even if you don’t have a Capital One credit card. While it doesn’t offer cash back, it does reward you with gift cards to a variety of stores, and it sets itself apart from many other shopping portals with its valuable price comparison feature and the ability to search for and apply coupon codes to your purchases. Plus, the Capital One Shopping browser extension makes it easy to activate available offers and earn rewards while shopping online.

Overall, using Capital One Shopping is a simple and effective way to maximize your savings on your purchases — so Sign up today.