What is the BEST Mid=tier travel Credit Card? Sapphire Preferred Vs Strata Premier

In this video, we are comparing two of the hottest $95 travel credit cards on the market right now, the Chase Sapphire Preferred or CSP and the Citi Strata Premier, which also shortens to CSP. Did they do that on purpose? And this comparison has become a lot more interesting over the past few months because Chase has completely refreshed the Sapphire Preferred with new bonus categories, a higher hotel credit and a new welcome bonus. While Citi has continued to position the Strata Premier as one of the best earning cards for everyday spending. So question is, if you're looking for your next travel card, which one actually gives you more value in 2026? We'll compare the current welcome bonuses, annual fees, hotel credits, earning rates, travel perks and recent changes. And by the end of this video, I'll tell you which one I would apply for today. Hey, credit warriors. Welcome to the show. My name is Ben Hedges, aka The Credit Shifu. And on this channel, I cover U.S. credit cards, personal finance and luxury travel. If you like the sound of that, please subscribe. And this video is brought to you by Silo, the brokerage where you earn credit card style points on your investments and can get your Amex Platinum and Amex Gold card for free. But more on that later. Let's start with the welcome bonuses. For most people, that is where the biggest value comes from. Right now, the Chase Sapphire Preferred is offering one of its strongest public offers that we've seen in quite some time. A hundred thousand ultimate reward points after meeting the minimum spend requirement. If you transfer those points to partners like Hyatt, United or Air Canada and redeem them strategically, it's not difficult to get well over $1,500 or even $2,000 in travel value. The City Strata Premier, meanwhile, is currently offering 60,000 city thank you points after meeting its spend requirement. That's still a solid bonus, especially considering the card only has a $95 annual fee. But on paper, it simply can't compete with a six-figure Sapphire Preferred bonus. Although you can get an extra $100 in cashback at the moment if you go to Rakuten first and click through from their site to the City Strata Premier. If you are new to Rakuten, I'll put my link down in the description below. I think you can get $50 extra cashback when you sign up and make your first purchase. Now, of course, welcome offers come and go, so I wouldn't choose a card based solely on today's promotion. But if you're planning to apply while this Chase offer is available, it definitely tips the scales in Chase's favor. So let's give Chase one point, City is at zero so far. Moving on to annual fees, this is one area where the two cards are perfectly matched. Both charge a $95 per year annual fee, so neither has any pricing advantage. And since these fees are relatively low, I'll give each one a point. So Chase is two and City is at one. The question now becomes which card gives you more value for that $95 annual fee? Let's start with hotel credits. For a few years now, not that long actually, one of the Sapphire Preferred's most popular perks has been its annual hotel credit, and Chase recently made that even better. Previously, cardholders received a $50 annual hotel credit when booking through Chase Travel. Following the refresh, that has doubled to $100 every card member year, making it much easier to offset the annual fee if you book at least one hotel per year through Chase's travel portal. City also offers a hotel benefit, but it works quite differently. Instead of an annual statement credit, the Strata Premier gives you $100 off a single hotel stay of $500 or more before taxes and fees when booked through City Travel. So which benefit is better? Well, if you regularly book weekend trips or one night stays, I actually think Chase has the better setup. A $100 credit that can be used on a relatively inexpensive hotel is straightforward and easy to maximize. City's benefit can absolutely provide the same amount of value, but it requires a much larger booking, all right? $500. Now, if your hotel reservations frequently exceed $500, you probably have no trouble using this, all right? But if not, it might just sit there unused. So for this, I'm going to give the point to Chase. Now let's talk about the biggest news surrounding the Sapphire Preferred this year. But first, over the past year, you've probably heard me talking about Silo, the investing platform that enables you to earn points on your stocks. It's like what Bilt has done with earning points on rent, but for investing. Now we have an exciting update about Silo that I know viewers of this channel in particular will find interesting. They've just launched their travel portal where you can use Silo points to book travel at one cent per point with over 300 airlines and hotel brands. And they also have two transfer partners coming in the next month and more will be added, both airlines and hotels. If your account with Silo is big enough, you unlock status benefits. At $200,000, they'll cover your American Express, Blue Cash Preferred annual fee and Costco executive membership. And at $1 million, they'll cover your Amex Gold annual fee and even cover the $895 annual fee on your Amex Platinum too. They even say that if you are in the Chase or Citi credit card system instead of Amex, you should reach out to them because they may very well pay the annual fee on one of those cards for you instead. This is all in addition to up to 250,000 points on your portfolio balance each year and an up to 250,000 point welcome bonus in the first year. So a total of potentially 500,000 points in your first year. That bonus is only available until transfer partners launch, which is any day now. So if you've been thinking about creating a Silo account, this is your last chance to get up to a 250,000 point welcome bonus. While credit card companies give you points for spending money, Silo has turned that concept on its head and gives you points for saving and investing money. So if you want to get your Amex Gold and Platinum for free while also earning points on your portfolio that you can use for free travel, use my link silomarkets.com slash Ben and get started today. Now let's talk about the biggest news surrounding the Sapphire Preferred this year. Chase didn't just increase the hotel credit, they also refreshed several of the cards bonus categories to better reflect how people actually spend money today. The goal is clearly to make the Sapphire Preferred more than just a card you pull out on vacation. At the same time though, not every change has been positive. One of the more controversial updates is that Chase removed the long-standing 10% anniversary points bonus, a perk many loyal cardholders appreciated, although in reality it didn't deliver that much value. Travelers were also disappointed by changes affecting transfers to Hyatt. For new card members as of June 15th, transfers to Hyatt are at a 4 to 3 ratio and for current card members you will go down from 1 to 1 to 4 to 3 on October 1st. So while the refresh certainly added value in several areas, it wasn't an across-the-board improvement for everyone and that's where Citi enters the conversation. Unlike Chase, Citi didn't try to reinvent the Strata Premier this year, instead it just continues to focus on one thing above all else, earning points quickly through everyday spending. And depending on where your monthly budget goes, Citi may actually come out ahead. We'll break down exactly how the earning rates compare on both cards, which card earns more for groceries, gas, restaurants, travel etc, and whether Chase's transfer partners are enough to justify choosing the Chase Sapphire Preferred over Citi's impressive earning power. Alright, so let's get into these points earning rates, because this is where the Citi Strata Premier really starts to fight back against Chase. If your goal is to rack up points from everyday spending, Citi has built one of the strongest earning structures in the $95 annual fee category. The Strata Premier earns three thank you points per dollar on restaurants, supermarkets, gas stations, EV charging and air travel, plus elevated earnings on hotels and rental cars booked through Citi Travel. That's an incredibly well-rounded setup because it covers many of the categories that most households spend the most money in every month. Think about it, you're earning bonus points every time you fill up your car, buy groceries, go out to dinner or book a flight. For many people, that's going to account for a huge percentage of their annual spending. The Chase Sapphire Preferred also has a very competitive earning structure, but it takes a slightly different approach. You'll earn three points per dollar on dining, five points per dollar on travel booked through Chase, two points per dollar on all other travel purchases. Then we have two categories exclusive to the Preferred within the Chase system, I guess, which are three points per dollar on streaming services and online grocery. And then Chase just added two new categories, three points per dollar on gas and EV charging and three points per dollar on short-term rentals like Airbnb, Vrbo, etc. So which card earns more? Well, until recently, the Citi Strata Premier would have been the clear winner. But after adding gas and Airbnb, the Sapphire Preferred is a lot more competitive, although grocery being online only still really damages the card, right? Why not give three points per dollar on grocery, but with a $12,000 per year limit, right? That's $1,000 per month. I think that would cover most people and help to avoid abuse. So anyway, I'll give Chase half a point and Citi a whole point. And that brings us to what is arguably the biggest difference between these two cards. And that would be the points themselves, because earning points is only half the story. How much are these points actually worth? That depends on how you redeem them. Chase Ultimate Rewards have long been considered one of the strongest flexible points currencies in the largely because of the excellent transfer partners. Many travel enthusiasts consider Hyatt to be the single most valuable hotel transfer partner offered by any major credit card issuer. Even after the transfer ratio goes down to four to three, it will still be super valuable. It's not uncommon to get two, three or even four cents per point on luxury hotel stays if you redeem them strategically. On top of that, Chase also partners with United Southwest Air Canada Aeroplan, British Airways Virgin, Air France, KLM Flying Blue, Singapore Airlines and several others. Citi, meanwhile, has quietly built a very impressive transfer lineup of its own. You'll find airlines like Turkish Airlines, Avianca LifeMars, Flying Blue, Virgin, EVA Airways, Qatar Airways, Etihad and Choice Privileges on the hotel side. For experienced travelers who know how to book international award flights, Citi thank you points can be incredibly valuable. The difference is that Citi's sweet spots tend to require a little more knowledge. Chase is generally easier for beginners thanks largely to Hyatt and also the fact that the travel portal has the points boost feature where it increases the value of your points. So you can actually get good value out of Chase's travel portal. Sometimes you don't need to transfer to a partner at all. So for points, I think Chase wins. Although let's still recognize Citi with half a point. Now let's talk about travel protections because this is one area where Chase still has a significant lead. The Sapphire preferred includes trip cancellation and interruption insurance, primary rental car coverage, baggage delay insurance, trip delay reimbursement and several other travel protections that can save you hundreds or even thousands of dollars if something goes wrong. These are benefits you hopefully never have to use but when you do they can completely justify the annual fee. I've actually used these benefits not on the Sapphire preferred but on the Inc preferred, another Chase card, and I got like over $800 back for travel disruption that I had because of a storm flying back to the UK from France. Citi has improved its travel benefits over the last few years. Remember about five or six or seven years ago they cancelled all of these insurances and they're slowly kind of working their way back but they're playing catch up. They still don't match the breadth of protections offered by Chase. So if you're someone who travels internationally several times a year or frequently rents cars, the Sapphire preferred offers considerably more peace of mind. So after comparing everything, which card should you actually choose? Well, according to our scoring, Chase is double as good but I think that isn't really totally the whole picture. Like sure, if you're primarily looking for the biggest welcome bonus and a card that offers excellent travel protections with valuable transfer partners and easy to use hotel credit, I think the Sapphire preferred is still the better card overall as a travel card. Especially while that 100,000 point welcome bonus offer is available. That's simply too much to ignore. However, if you already have a strong travel card and you're looking to maximize points for everyday spending, particularly groceries, then the City Strata Premier makes a very strong case. Its point earning rates are among the best that you'll find for a $95 annual fee card, and over time those extra points from daily spending can easily outweigh the difference in welcome bonuses. For someone with a lot of grocery spend, the City card could be a clear winner. But either of these cards though could be a great one card setup to cover lots of common spend categories. Personally though, if I was starting from scratch today, I would probably apply for the Chase Sapphire preferred first. Not sponsored, just my opinion. Although I will put a link to the card down below somewhere. But this is an absolute. They're designed for slightly different types of cardholders. The Sapphire preferred is the better all-round travel card. The City Strata Premier is the stronger everyday points earner. And depending on your spending habits, either one could be the right choice. Now I'd love to hear from you. If you could only pick one of these in 2026, which one would it be and why? Let me know down in the comments. And don't forget, if you want to get your Amex Gold and Platinum for free, whilst also earning points on your portfolio, use my link silomarkets.com slash ben to get started with Silo before the end of July. Please leave us a like and subscribe for more credit cards, travel and personal finance content every week. And as always, thank you so much for watching. We'll see you in the next video. Bye.