Essentially the most great time of the 12 months is upon us: It is the vacation season, and we’re checking off present lists for family members. For reward card fans, now can be the best time of the 12 months to earn 5 factors per greenback spent in your purchases.
Able to learn the way? Let’s dive into what choose Chase cardholders ought to know.
Earn bonus factors with PayPal in your Freedom card
For the month of December, PayPal is again as a bonus class on the legacy Chase Freedom* and the Chase Freedom Flex® (see charges and costs).
From now via Dec. 31, cardholders can earn 5% money again (as much as $1,500 in purchases) in one of many easiest-to-maximize classes of all time: PayPal (activation required).
In case you carry a number of Chase playing cards, nevertheless — particularly the Chase Sapphire Most well-liked® Card (see charges and costs) or Chase Sapphire Reserve® (see charges and costs) — you are not restricted simply to money again, although. Chase lets holders of each a Freedom or Freedom Flex card and a Sapphire Most well-liked or Sapphire Reserve card flip the money again earned with their Freedom household card into transferable factors. So for the month of December, that 5% money again turns into a whopping 5 factors on the greenback.
*This card is not out there to new candidates. The knowledge for the Chase Freedom has been collected independently by The Factors Man. The cardboard particulars on this web page haven’t been reviewed or supplied by the cardboard issuer.
Associated: 4 the reason why I like to recommend the Chase Freedom Flex to freshmen
The place can you employ PayPal?
It is common for PayPal to be a checkout choice when buying on-line — even with main retailers that settle for bank cards immediately.
Whether or not you might be trying out on-line with House Depot, Nordstrom or Goal, or wish to reload your Starbucks steadiness, PayPal is commonly a fee choice. Some bodily shops additionally now settle for PayPal as a fee type.
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As a simple instance, when you place an order from Goal.com, choose the Edit Cost choice, then select PayPal together with your linked Chase Freedom or Freedom Flex card. Then, so long as you activate the bonus by Dec. 14, you will earn 5% money again (or 5 factors per greenback spent).
Instance: Paying taxes with PayPal
TPG contributing editor for bank cards Matt Moffitt not too long ago used PayPal to pay his quarterly estimated taxes via Pay1040. He paid $1,474 in taxes along with his Freedom card with an extra $26 processing price, totaling $1,500.
As a result of he additionally holds the Sapphire Reserve, the Freedom’s cash-back earnings convert into Final Rewards factors — on this case, 7,500 factors price $154 primarily based on TPG’s December 2025 valuations.
After subtracting the price, that is a web achieve of roughly $128, making it a simple option to max out the bonus when you have unavoidable payments that settle for PayPal.
Are you able to earn bonus factors on person-to-person transfers with PayPal?
What about different PayPal choices, like sending cash to another person?
Particulars on Chase’s web site state that “Individual-to-Individual (P2P) transactions made together with your Chase Freedom card on PayPal will not be eligible for five%.”
Up to now, these transactions typically counted as bonus-triggering occasions in our assessments. Nonetheless, keep in mind that — in contrast to when trying out by way of a retailer’s on-line web site — if you ship cash to a pal or comparable, you are sometimes the one paying the PayPal price.
When this bonus class appeared up to now, I paid a pal again $120 by way of PayPal. There was an roughly $4 price to ship the cash, and I earned about 620 factors on that cost with my Freedom.
Since I even have the Sapphire Reserve, these 620 factors had been price about $13 primarily based on TPG’s December 2025 valuations — comfortably greater than the $4 price it price me to earn them.
If you do not have a premium Final Rewards card, factors earned on the Freedom are usually price 1 cent every, which might make these earnings price about $6.
That is nonetheless roughly $2 extra in rewards than the charges themselves. However even when you need not ship cash to a pal, you possibly can typically try with PayPal at lots of of on-line retailers, pay no further charges and nonetheless earn 5% money again (or 5 factors per greenback spent).
Associated: The facility of the Chase Trifecta: Maximize your earnings with 3 playing cards
Backside line
The largest problem of the rotating Freedom bonus classes is solely maintaining with them, since they alter each three months. The PayPal class did not start till the beginning of this month. Nonetheless, it is nonetheless fairly straightforward to maximise.
You’ll be able to set your eligible Freedom card because the default in your PayPal account after which try by way of that methodology when buying on-line via the tip of the 12 months.
In case you do this and have heavy on-line buying patterns through the vacation season, it is best to max out this quarter’s bonus class very quickly.
To study extra, learn our full assessment of the Freedom Flex.
Apply right here: Chase Freedom Flex
