Axis Ace Credit Card Review – The 2% cashback credit card

By | August 30, 2023
Axis Ace Credit Card

Axis Ace credit card is the latest offering from Axis Bank in collaboration with Google Pay. The card promises unlimited 5% cashback on bill payments using GPay and 2% unlimited cash back on all purchases. Axis Ace credit card is primarily an entry-level credit card pitched against the likes of ICICI Amazon Pay credit card and its own Axis Flipkart credit card.

Axis Ace Credit Card

Axis Ace Credit Card

Fees and Eligibility:

  • Joining fees: INR 499 + GST. Waived off for applications received until 31st Joining fees will be reversed upon spending INR10k within 45 days of card issuance
  • Annual Fees: INR 499 + GST. Annual Fee waived off on annual spends greater than INR200,000.

Rewards and Benefit:

  • Joining and recurring benefits:
    • None
  • Reward Points:
    • Base Rewards: 2% cashback on all spends. No cash back on fuel spends and wallet load.
    • Accelerated Reward Points:
      • 5% cashback on all bill payments (electricity, internet, gas, DTH and mobile recharge etc) done via GPay.
      • 5% cashback on BigBasket and Grofers, up to 31st Dec.
      • 4% cashback Swiggy, Zomato and Ola
    • Lounge Access
      • 4 complimentary domestic lounge access per calendar year.
    • Others
      • 1% fuel surcharge waiver. Max up to 500 per month. On transactions between INR400-4000.

Axis Ace Credit Card snapshot

What makes Axis Ace credit card stand out?

2% unlimited cash back on all transactions including insurance payments makes this card stand out. The 2% base reward rate is something that many cards even in the premium segment don’t offer. For eg Citi Premiermiles offers a base rate of 1.8% and HDFC Regalia offers 1.33%.

Further, Axis Ace credit card offers 5% unlimited cash back on utility payments done using GPay. This is applicable for electricity, internet, gas, mobile payment etc. This feature is a boon for many who pay large electricity bills every month. As the 5% cashback offer that, most other apps run eg. Payzapp etc., have a cap on cashback. While for someone with limited spends on utility bill payments using Payzapp or other apps still makes sense. As one gets to double-dip on points, get cashback on Payzapp (5%) + reward points on the credit card.

Further, by offering 4% cashback on Zomato/Swiggy and Ola, I guess Axis Ace is trying to take on the RBL Zomato partnership (not sure if this card has many takers any which ways) and the SBI Ola partnership.

RBL Zomato Edition Classic credit card offers 5% cashback on Zomato orders, but the same can only be used against Zomato future orders. With Axis Ace card, the 4% cashback comes as a statement credit. Besides, 4% cashback is available on Swiggy too. Therefore, Axis Ace cardholder is not tied to a particular platform.

Similarly, in case of SBI Ola credit card, wherein it offers 7% reward points on all Ola rides. However, the cashback is capped at 500 per month. What is means is that once your spends on Ola goes beyond ~7000, the reward rate starts declining. With Axis Ace credit card, that’s not the case. In fact, if someone spends 13,000 monthly on Ola, which may not be out of whack for many (~325 per ride, twice a day for 20 days in a month), Axis Ace card will be more beneficial than SBI Ola credit card.

Comparing Axis Ace credit card with ICICI Amazon and Axis Flipkart credit cards

Below is a snapshot of the reward rates across different categories for the 3 cards.

Axis Ace Credit Card Comparison

It’s quite evident that Axis Ace credit card excels in most categories except Amazon and Flipkart, where the respective cards offer higher cashback and Axis Ace offers only 2%. Nevertheless, depending upon one’s spending pattern on Flipkart/Amazon and other categories, the reward rates would vary. I sense that the Axis Ace card would excel in most permutations and combinations for simply offering 5% on utilities and at least 2% for all other spends. Further, one challenge with ICICI AmazonPay card is that not all ICICI Bank offers apply to it. I faced this very recently, was lucky that the final decision went in my favour. But, have to keep that in mind going forward.

Will I apply for this card?

Absolutely. Simply because there are not many cards out there that offer 2% cashback as base reward rate. Also, given that there is no joining fee for the first year, it’s like a free product trial for one year. Lastly, and this is more specific to me, my 2 primary cards are on Diners (HDFC Diners Black) and Amex (Amex Platinum Travel) platforms. Acceptability remains an issue with these. Thus, I need a solid card based on Visa/Mastercard platform. Again, I have the ICICI AmazonPay card, but if someone is offering me, 2% base reward rate against 1%, then why not have it.  🙂

What are your thoughts on Axis Ace credit card? Have you applied for the same? How is the application process? Do let me know by leaving a comment.

Photo by rupixen.com on Unsplash

Disclaimer

In the interest of full disclosure, Credit Cardz may earn a referral bonus for anyone that’s approved through some of the links in this post. However, opinions and views expressed here are of the author's alone and not those of the bank, credit card issuer, or anyone else and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities.

Author: CreditCardz

Hi, I am an avid credit card user who loves minting reward points on credit cards. I try to put every possible expense on credit card to earn maximum reward points and want realize my dream to travel the world using just rewards points.

13 thoughts on “Axis Ace Credit Card Review – The 2% cashback credit card

  1. Joyce

    Hi Harsh, Agree this is a better rewarding card than cobranded Amazon ICICI or OlaSBI or Axis Flipkart . But I still don’t know anyone personally who is able to used credit cards on Google Pay. Won’t that be a dampener? In fact, am using all the 3 based on their highest rewards available at the moment to use.

    Reply
    1. Harshvardhan Agrawal Post author

      You are saying that Gpay feature of allowing credit card may not be rolled out to all as of now? Well, that may happen. But maybe in a couple of months i guess the feature will be available to all. They have tied up with Axis, Kotak and SBI for this

      Reply
  2. Shashank

    Hi Harsh, I applied for this card on the basis of my existing Flipkart Axis credit card by calling up the customer care. The card was approved and dispatched with no other documents or intervention. Once I got the card, I did some transactions on Ola and found that beyond 10k, the reward rate drops to 2% from 4%. So, the unlimited cashback is actually limited in the backend. It’s not fair to not communicate the limits in the features page itself. Yet to see what the limits are for Google pay.

    Reply
    1. Harshvardhan Agrawal Post author

      Thats surprising and bad on part of Axis bank. So basically accelerated rewards have some limits.

      Reply
    2. Shailesh

      Hi Shashank,
      I also applied this card on basis of Flipkart CC through customer care
      I received the sms that card will be delivered in 14 days. My question is was your Flipkart CC got de-activated once you got Ace CC? I clearly told Customer Care I wish to use both Ace and Flipkart CC but I got the sms that its upgraded so having some doubts.

      Reply
      1. Harshit

        Hey Shailesh,

        I made available similar request. I’m still able to use the Flipkart card and see the same in the Axis mobile app.

        Reply
  3. Santhosh

    While for someone with limited spends on utility bill payments using Payzapp or other apps still makes sense. As one gets to double-dip on points, get cashback on Payzapp (5%) + reward points on the credit card.

    What does this mean brother? How do we get extra cashback on paying bills through Payzapp?

    Reply
    1. Harshvardhan Agrawal Post author

      Payzapp has offers where one gets upto 5% of bill amount ( max 125 rupees) cashback on utility bill payment every month. Also, similar offer on mobile recharges. 10% upto (max 50 rupees). So, one can get these cashbacks plus reward points on the credit card too

      Reply
      1. Santhosh

        Brother, so you mean customer can add to Payzapp Wallet through this credit card and then pay bills through wallet?

        I thought no cash back on ace card for loading e-wallets

        Reply
        1. Harshvardhan Agrawal Post author

          The thought was to say, for someone who has lower utility spends one can still get higher returns on other credit cards as compared to Axis Ace. for eg. Amazon ICICI card default reward rate is 1%, so using this card on Payzapp (direct bill payment, no wallet load), will give 6% returns on bill payments. Similarly Axis flipkart will give 6.5% returns.

          Reply
  4. Santhosh

    Thanks bro. In that view, this card gives 2% on all spends and Payzapp will give 5%. Total 7% is good deal.

    Reply
  5. Bharat

    The card gives cash back only on ola share, not sure if it’s available though in given pandemic situaion. Moreover try the card offer in gpay, till Feb 21, you can earn a google mini by spendign 10k.

    Reply

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