(Dead) Rakuten offering up to 30,000 points / $300 on top of up welcome offer

Update 5/15/25: Rakuten is no longer offering any cash back or Membership Rewards points for applying for Chase cards. All three cards are still listed on the site, but the tag, “No Cash Back.”

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Update 5/8/25: Although it lasted longer than we were expecting, the 30K/$300 offer to apply for the Sapphire Preferred and Ink Business Unlimited cards has now been reduced to 10K/$100. The Freedom Unlimited is down to 7.5K/$75.

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Shopping portal Rakuten is offering an incredible deal that may last today only (5/5/25): you can earn either $150 / 15,000 Amex Membership Rewards points or $300 / 30,000 Membership Rewards points when being approved for select credit cards through their links. These are terrific bonuses on top of strong welcome offers on a couple of qualifying cards.

The Deal

• Rakuten.com is offering bonuses when applying and being approved for the following Chase credit cards:
  • Chase Sapphire Preferred: $300 / 30,000 Amex Membership Rewards points
    • NOW: $100 / 10,000 Amex Membership Rewards points
  • Chase Freedom Unlimited: $150 / 15,000 Amex Membership Rewards points
    • NOW: $75 / 7,500 Amex Membership Rewards points
  • Chase Ink Business Unlimited: $300 / 30,000 Amex Membership Rewards points
    • NOW: $100 / 10,000 Amex Membership Rewards points
• Direct link to Rakuten

Key Terms

Quick Thoughts

This is an incredible deal. Rakuten is offering $300 back or 30,000 Membership Rewards points when you apply through their link and are approved for a Chase Sapphire Preferred card. Note that my account shows points because I earn American Express Membership Rewards points through Rakuten, though you can alternatively set up your Rakuten account to earn cash back (in which case it would be $300 cash back).

.That’s an amazing reward that stacks on top of an incredible welcome offer. Our Reasonable Redemption Value for Amex Membership Rewards points is 1.55c per point, making the Rakuten bonus worth around $465 based on that figure. It is certainly possible to get far more value yet out of American Express Membership Rewards points. Just to highlight a single sweet spot, Iberia business class to Europe from the northeast of the United States costs 34,000 points one-way during off-peak periods. If you get lucky and hit a transfer bonus, this reward from Rakuten could potentially get you a one-way business class ticket to Europe. That’s huge.

Keep in mind also that this offer is better than referring someone since referral bonuses on this card are only 10,000 points. Additionally, points earned through Rakuten offers typically do not generate a 1099, whereas those who earn $600 or more in referral bonuses typically do get a 1099.

Similar offers are available on a couple of other Chase cards: there is an offer for $150 / 15,000 points back after being approved for a Chase Freedom Unlimited card or $300 / 30,000 points back after applying for a Chase Ink Business Unlimited card. All of these are fantastic deals that make it well worth applying through Rakuten’s links on these.

How to earn American Express Membership Rewards points (or cash back) through Rakuten

Keep in mind that if you’re a Rakuten user and you want to earn American Express Membership Rewards points instead of cash back, you’ll need to first choose to earn Membership Rewards points. You’ll want to log in to your Rakuten account and go to account settings to change your earning preference.

New to Rakuten? Stack for up to 34,000 total points back for you + 4,000 for the referrer

If you are new to Rakuten, you can juice this up a bit further. There is currently a promotion offering $40 / 4,000 points for both sides when you register for an account with Rakuten and spend at least $40 to earn cash back. I don’t know for sure that applying for a credit card counts, but I would expect it would I actually expect that it may not since the terms of the referral promotion indicate that you should spend $40 with a merchant and earn some cash back in order to get the referral points. YMMV.

If you are newly-referred to Rakuten, you’ll see a message when you go to your account settings reminding you to select how to get paid. From there, you can select Membership Rewards points (as shown above). You’ll next be prompted to log in to your American Express account to link accounts. After logging in, you should get a message on the Amex side confirming that you’re linked.

Then it will bring you back to Rakuten to confirm that you’re earning Membership Rewards points.

You should see the offer to earn Membership Rewards points when applying for select Chase products once you have selected your earning preference as points.

Again, I expect that applying for and being approved for a credit card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred through this offer will trigger the 4,000 points for a new account holder, which means you should end up with a total of 34,000 points as a new user. The person who refers you will earn 4,000 points. Update: You may need to spend $40 as a new member in order for both sides to earn 4K points. Your mileage may vary.

If you are in a household where neither person has a Rakuten account, I think it would be possible for one household member to create an account and then refer the second household member for a Rakuten account to really maximize this. For instance, let’s imagine Ryan and Taylor are two household members and neither has a Rakuten account but both are primary cardholders on Amex cards that earn membership Rewards points. I think it would be possible for this to work:

• Ryan signs up for Rakuten through a referral (earn 4,000 points if and when Ryan earns points through an offer) and links Ryan’s Amex account
• Ryan refers Taylor to Rakuten
• Taylor signs up for Rakuten through Ryan’s referral, links to Taylor’s Amex account, and then applies for a Chase Sapphire Preferred card through Rakuten’s link and is approved. Taylor earns 30,000 points for the offer + 4,000 points for being a newly referred user. Ryan earns 4,000 points for referring Taylor.
• Ryan probably needs to make one small purchase through Rakuten that qualifies for rewards to earn the 4,000 point new user bonus

In the end, Ryan and Taylor should come out with a total of 42,000 Membership Rewards points (or $420 in cash back if they chose cash) — that’s 34,000 for Taylor (30K CSP offer + 4K new user bonus) and 8,000 for Ryan (4K for referring Taylor + 4K for being a new user). That’s a terrific deal.

The Chase Ink Business Unlimited and Chase Freedom card offers are certainly also intriguing considering that neither of those cards has an annual fee. Getting a big bonus on top of the welcome offer from Chase is a terrific deal on those as well.

Bottom line

This is a phenomenal deal. I’m surprised to see it offered and can not imagine it will last long. If you’ve been planning to apply for one of the three cards eligible, this is a terrific pot-sweetener that beats the referral bonuses so long as you value Membership Rewards points (or even if you’re earning cash back).

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