Best Current First Year Fee Waived Cards (updated January 26, 2017)

First year fee waived promotions are extremely valuable. One of the biggest deterrence of signing up for a credit card is a hefty annual fee. By waiving the first year annual fee, customers can get a free trial before deciding whether they want to keep it going.

This can also be a pain for financial institutions who want to clamp down on churners. But if enough people retain the credit cards beyond the first year, a few churners here and may be worth the first year fee offer.

Today, I will list the top first year fee offers, which I will rank by annual fees.

Permanent Offers

These are credit cards that do not have an expiry date on their first year fee waived offer. Unfortunately, it also means that they can end the offer at any time without notice.

Rogers Bank Platinum MasterCard

• $29 annual fee (waived the first year or waived so long as you have pre-authorized Rogers payments set up)

Chase Marriott Rewards Premier Visa

• $120 annual fee (waived the first year)

American Express Gold Rewards Card

• $150 annual fee (waived the first year)

Current promotional offers

These offers change all the time, but there are some cards that are relatively consistent at offering first year fee waived promotions.

CIBC Aventura Visa Card

•  $39 annual fee (first year fee waived if you apply before February 28, 2017)

CIBC Dividend Visa Infinite Card

• $99 annual fee (first year fee waived if you apply before February 28, 2017)

Scotiabank Gold American Express Card

• $99 annual fee (first year fee waived if you apply before January 31, 2017)

Scotia Momentum Visa Infinite Card

• $99 annual fee (first year fee waived if you apply before January 31, 2017)

CIBC Aventura Gold Visa Card

• $120 annual fee (if you apply by February 28, 2017)

CIBC Aventura Visa Infinite Card

• $120 annual fee (if you apply by February 28, 2017)

TD Aeroplan Visa Infinite Card

• $120 annual fee (if you apply by March 5, 2017)

Past Offers that may come back

There are some credit cards that offer first year fee waive promotions for only a short period of time in a year that you have to catch.

MBNA Rewards World Elite MasterCard

Past Offers that may Never come back

There are some first year fee waived promotions on card that used to have it and I suspect may never come back.

American Express Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card

• $120 annual fee

American Express AeroplanPlus Gold Card

• $120 annual fee

American Express Air Miles Platinum Credit Card

• $120 annual fee

RBC Visa Infinite Avion

• $120 annual fee

Cards that I would love to see  the first year fee waived

I don’t even know where to begin. There are so many to choose from. But I will focus on some realistic and reasonable ones that work for both sides.

This problem would be solved if we saw more system wide retention bonus offers instead.

WestJet RBC World Elite MasterCard

• $99 annual fee

RBC Cathay Pacific Visa Platinum

• $120 annual fee

RBC British Airways Visa Infinite

• $165 annual fee

Other Notes

That being said, there may be situations where you can get a first year fee waived offer if you have a certain banking package with a bank. But that will be a case by case basis and not system wide.