CommBank Ultimate Awards Credit Card Review 2026
I’ve had good things to say about the CommBank Ultimate Awards card for a while now. No international transaction fee, two lounge passes a year, travel insurance that’s actually paid out for me — it’s earned its place. While I was sceptical when this round of changes landed, I still believe the card earns its place in my wallet.
From 29 September 2026, CommBank is closing the Awards points program, renaming the card the “Ultimate credit card,” and moving everyone onto its bank-wide Yello points system. From 1 January 2027, the $35-a-month fee waiver — the thing that made this card free for anyone spending $4,000 a month — disappears too. Put simply that’s $420 a year for a card a lot of people have been carrying at zero cost.
This isn’t really a “chase the points” card anymore — it’s shaping up as a premium travel card that’s close to fee-free in practice. The short version is below; the detail on how that adds up, section by section, follows after.
- 29 Sept 2026: CommBank Awards closes, the card is renamed “Ultimate credit card,” points earning moves to Yello.
- 1 Jan 2027: the $4,000/month fee waiver ends — $35/month, $420/year, no spend escape hatch.
- Unchanged: 0% foreign transaction fee, 2 lounge passes/year, travel insurance.
- New: $25/month Travel Credit + $10/month Dining Credit — they accumulate, and together equal the $35 fee.
- Yello points earning is weaker than old Awards, especially for airline transfers.
- Verdict: not a points card anymore — a near-fee-free premium travel card, if you’ll actually use the credits.
What’s Actually Changing With CommBank Ultimate Awards
CommBank is progressively rolling out these changes, and there are three key dates that matter.
Points Brotherhood exclusive — up to 15% off Airalo
Set up before you fly · discount applies automatically at checkout
Codes: DREWDEALNEW (new users) · DREWDEAL (existing users)
(Small referral our way if you use our link — doesn’t change your price.)
For many cardholders the cracks first started in October 2025, when CommBank pulled Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer as a direct transfer partner, along with Air Canada Aeroplan, Cathay Pacific Asia Miles, Emirates Skywards, Air France/KLM Flying Blue and every hotel partner — Marriott Bonvoy, Accor Live Limitless, Hilton Honors. Losing Singapore Airlines was disappointing, and I now rely on indirect transfers via Velocity. There’s a partial mitigant this time: Qatar Airways joins the Yello transfer partner list at 2.5:1, and it’s genuinely one of the leading international carriers out of Australia, even if I’d still take Singapore given the choice.
- 29 September 2026 — the card relaunches CommBank Awards closes. The card is renamed “Ultimate credit card.” Points earning switches from the old Awards rates to the new Yello structure (below). A $25/month Travel Credit and $10/month Dining Credit are introduced — but they expire if unused within 12 months, and only count if you spend them through CommBank’s own Travel Booking and Dine In Deals platforms.
- 7 October 2026 — Awards points conversion deadline Any CommBank Awards points sitting in your account convert to Yello points by this date. If you’ve been sitting on a stash for a big redemption, this is the moment to check the conversion rate before it happens automatically.
- 1 January 2027 — the fee waiver ends Right now, spending $4,000 in a statement period (that’s monthly, not $4,000 for the whole year) still waives the $35 fee. From 1 January 2027, CommBank removes that waiver. The fee becomes $35 a month — $420 a year — regardless of spend.
The $35 a month was never really a monthly fee. From 2027, it’s a $420 annual fee CommBank just never called one.
CommBank Ultimate Credit Card Fees: The $420 You Can No Longer Dodge
To be fair to CommBank, the $4,000-a-month waiver was generous while it lasted — plenty of everyday households clear that without trying. It wasn’t a high bar, it was the reason this card cost most people nothing to hold.
With the spend-level waiver gone, the only way to avoid the fee is to qualify through CommBank’s Wealth Package (a separate banking-relationship bundle, not something you get from card spend alone — see the FAQ below for the numbers) or cancel the card.
One way of thinking about it: the fee is offset by the $10 Dining and $25 Travel credits. This is a direct lift from how the Amex Explorer structures its fee credits — I treat mine the same way, using the travel credit to offset the annual fee. I’ve booked my first accommodation using a $100 credit and it worked. I prefer to book direct with hotels and airlines, but for a one-off hotel booking I think Hopper works well. I’m less sure how the dining credit plays out in practice — I haven’t tested it myself yet, so watch this space. The bottom line: if you actually use the hotel and dining credit, you can reasonably regard the card as “free.”
CommBank Yello Points vs the Old Awards Points
The bigger shift isn’t the fee — it’s what a dollar of spend is now worth in points, and what those points are worth when you actually redeem them.
Under the old Awards program, earn rates were simple: 3 points per $1 overseas, 2 points per $1 on supermarkets/petrol/dining/utilities, 1 point per $1 on everything else, capped at $10,000 of spend a statement period before dropping to 0.5. Under Yello, earn is tied to your CommBank relationship tier, not the card:
| Tier / category | Old Awards (per $1) | New Yello (per $1) |
|---|---|---|
| Base tier (“Yello”) | 1 pt (general) | 0.5 pts |
| Yello Plus | 1 pt (general) | 0.75 pts |
| Gold | 1 pt (general) | 1.0 pt |
| Diamond | 1 pt (general) | 1.5 pts |
| Overseas spend | 3 pts (all tiers) | 2 pts (all tiers) |
Tiers are relationship-based, not spend-based — CommBank sets them from your broader banking activity (transaction volumes, balances, home loan), not how much you put on this card. Put simply, a Diamond customer earns three times the points of a Base customer.
Here’s what that looks like on real spend — $48,000 a year, roughly the old free-fee threshold held all year:
| $48,000/year spend | Old Awards | New Yello (Base tier) |
|---|---|---|
| Points earned | 48,000 | 24,000 |
| Approx. value | — | ~$120/year |
Half the points for the same spend — and CommBank’s own redemption examples (gift cards, hotel nights, flights) value those points at only around $120 a year. Nowhere near the $420 fee once the waiver’s gone.
More importantly, points aren’t only earned by spending anymore. CommBank confirms Yello points are earned “across eligible banking and insurance, including card spend, new products and milestones” — extending into home loans, insurance and other parts of a CommBank relationship. The exact rates for those categories aren’t published yet, so treat it as a direction worth watching rather than a number to bank on.
None of this is unique to CommBank — it’s the direction every major program is heading. If points are still part of your strategy, it’s worth checking how they stack up against your other cards side by side in our Points Consolidator before deciding what to keep earning where.
Is the Foreign Transaction Fee Still Worth It? The $14,000 Break-Even
One of the biggest benefits of this card is the 0% international transaction fee, confirmed on CommBank’s own updated terms for the relaunched card. That’s real money against a card charging a typical 3–3.5% margin on overseas spend.
Once the fee is locked in at $420 a year from 2027, the question becomes: how much do you need to spend overseas for the FX saving alone to cover it?
Spend less than that overseas and the FX saving on its own won’t cover what the card now costs to hold — you’d be relying on the lounge access and insurance to make up the difference, which is a fair trade for some people and not for others.
Lounge Access and Travel Insurance: Still Decent, Not the Headline
These two are the least disrupted part of the card, and they’re genuinely fine.
Lounge access: two complimentary visits a year through the Mastercard Travel Pass app, covering over 1,300 lounges worldwide. Register the card in the app and it tracks your allocation separately from any other Mastercard you’re also carrying — worth knowing if you’re stacking lounge passes across cards. See our full credit card lounge access guide for how that stacking actually works.
Travel insurance: included, but not automatic — you need to spend at least $500 on prepaid travel using the card before you leave Australia and activate the policy in NetBank or the app before you go. I’ve had this pay out for a ski knock-out in Saas-Grund, so it’s not just fine print — it works when the conditions are met. Full comparison against the other major banks, including the gotchas, is in our credit card travel insurance guide.
Who CommBank Ultimate Actually Suits (and Who It Doesn’t)
Strip away the marketing and this card now fits a fairly specific set of people.
- The Diamond-tier homeowner who still travels — best earn rate, 10% back in travel credits, and the Wealth Package can waive the fee on a home loan you already hold. (Harder to find the travel budget once you’re carrying a seven-figure mortgage, but if you can still get away a couple of times a year, this is about as rewarding as CommBank gets.)
- The multi-card spreader who’ll never hit $4,000/month on this card alone — the $35 fee still buys $35 of credit plus 0% FX, lounge access and insurance, regardless of how concentrated your spend is.
- The genuine international spender — $12,000+ a year overseas, where the FX saving alone justifies the fee before you’ve touched a point or a credit.
- The domestic-only spender with a thin CommBank relationship — no home loan, no Diamond tier, no real Hopper or Dine In Deals use. $420 a year for very little; the profile this card actively punishes.
- The points-for-flights collector — Qantas and Velocity transfers both got a worse ratio and a new annual fee this year. There are better cards for that specific goal now.
- The set-and-forget cardholder — won’t activate the insurance, won’t book the lounge visits, won’t touch Hopper or Dine In Deals. Nearly all the value here needs a bit of active use.
So Is It Still Worth It?
Two-part answer, in short: as a pure points card, no — I suspect Amex will still be on top there. As a near-fee-free premium travel card, yes, for the right person from the list above, on the strength of the FX fee and the credits rather than the points.
One more option worth a mention if lounge access is the main draw: Bankwest’s More World Mastercard undercuts Ultimate on fee ($160/year vs $420) and offers five times the lounge visits — ten a year against CommBank’s two — plus 0% international transaction fees of its own. I’ve just signed up for one myself, so a full review is coming once I’ve put it through a few trips rather than going on the brochure alone.
Before you apply — or decide whether to keep it — it’s worth knowing your own numbers first. Our tools hub has the Balance Sheet and Budget Planner to check affordability, alongside the FX calculator and Points Consolidator linked above.
If you’re already weighing up FX fees on this card, the same logic applies to how you use data overseas — I switched to the Airalo eSIM for exactly the same reason and it’s saved more than a few roaming bills since.
Small referral our way if you use our link — doesn’t change your price.
CommBank Ultimate Awards / Ultimate Credit Card FAQ
Not the card itself — the CommBank Awards points program that sits behind it. From 29 September 2026 the card is renamed the “Ultimate credit card” and moves onto CommBank’s bank-wide Yello points system instead.
Yes, until 1 January 2027 — spend $4,000 in a statement period and the fee is waived, same as before. From January 2027, CommBank removes that waiver and the $35/month ($420/year) applies regardless of spend. CommBank’s Wealth Package can also waive one eligible card’s fee — it costs $395 a year and requires an eligible CommBank home loan. On the numbers it looks close to a wash against paying the fee directly, though the package includes other benefits beyond this card, so it’s worth checking your own situation rather than assuming either way.
Partly, and it’s worth checking the fine print. There’s a genuine opt-in Cashback Offers program in the CommBank app, but CommBank’s own Yello page confirms some existing cashback benefits are being removed from 1 October 2026 — the same date this earn restructure lands. What remains for higher tiers is framed as a percentage “back in travel credits” (5% at Gold, 10% at Diamond), not cash, and it’s redeemable only through CommBank’s own Travel Booking platform. There’s no simple, visible cashback line on everyday spend.
Yes. The $25 Travel Credit and $10 Dining Credit accumulate rather than resetting monthly — each grant sits in your Travel Booking Wallet or Dine In Deals account and expires 12 months from the date it was issued. Four months banked is $100, enough for a genuine booking. It’s forfeited if you close the card, and CommBank can change or remove the benefit without notice.
They convert to CommBank Yello points, with a conversion deadline of 7 October 2026. If you’re sitting on a large balance and want to use it under the old program’s transfer rates, do it before then.
Yes — 0% international transaction fees carry over into the relaunched card. It’s the one benefit untouched by the September 2026 changes, and the main reason this review still recommends the card for anyone with meaningful overseas spend.
It depends on your CommBank relationship tier, not just card spend: 0.5 points/$1 at base “Yello” tier, 0.75 at Yello Plus, 1.0 at Gold, 1.5 at Diamond. Overseas spend earns a flat 2 points/$1 at every tier — down from 3 points/$1 under the old Awards program.
The old program capped bonus earning at $10,000 of spend a statement period before dropping to 0.5 points/$1. CommBank hasn’t yet published an equivalent cap for Yello earning on this card — we’ll update this once the full terms land closer to the 29 September 2026 switch.
For most people, it’s worth judging as a fee-free-FX card rather than a points card. If you spend $12,000–$14,000 or more a year overseas, the FX saving alone covers the $420 annual fee. Below that, weigh the lounge passes and travel insurance against the fee to decide if it still stacks up for you.
Related Card Reviews
Spending overseas? Skip the card markup
Wise gives you the real exchange rate on a card built for spending abroad — no foreign transaction fee stacked on top
(Small referral our way if you use our link — doesn’t change your price.)
Thanks for the information, I just got my ultimate award card, on your opinion is it worth to subscribe on Qantas points for less points (0.8 for every dollar) or just collect the normal award points (up to 3points for every dollar) to spend at Flight centre?
Thank you
Hi Maykon, It really depends on where you want to go. Business Class International awards points are rare as hens teeth, while domestic is pretty good. The advantage of flight centre is you can use for accomodation rather than just flights. I personally keep pouring into points and never redeem for coupons. Hope that helps
Hi. Just wondering can you withdraw cash from your ultimate credit card? Thanks