[Update] Drop App: Earn Rebates by Linking your Credit Card

Update 2/27/20: Drop App Removes Ongoing Card-Link ‘Power Offers’ (Amazon, Etc.). They’ll now have temporary offers which you’ll claim in the app, instead of ongoing earn offers.

Update 2/20/20: A few months back, they lowered grandfathered users to .5% back on all their card-link purchases. Not nearly as lucrative now.

Update 12/30/19: They’ve increased Amazon to $50 minimum cashout. Minimum cashout now is $25 for places like iTunes, Nike, Gap, Olive Garden, and Groupon.

Update 11/28/19: They’ve lowered the card-link rates for grandfathered cards for Amazon, Walmart, Target down to .5% (instead of 2% or 1%).

Update 11/14/19: Kroger is now an option at 1%.

Update 11/14/19: They now only allow you to cash out for the lower dollar gift cards (e.g. Amazon $20 gc, Starbucks $5 gc, etc) if you have used their portal shopping option in the past 12 months. Those who only use this for the card link offers will need to accumulate $30 worth before being able to cash out, and even then won’t be able to cash out for Amazon and the like. I cashed out for $50 Nordstrom gc, there are a bunch of options at the $30 level like Nike and Groupon. You can also make a tiny $1 purchase through the portal to unlock the smaller gift card redemption option, e.g. a $1 Groupon. (ht Travelwithgrant)

Update 10/16/18: Drop has temporarily increased their referral offer to 5,000 points ($5) for the referrer and 5,000 for the new member. Standard offer is 1,000 for each. Our referral code is: doctorofcredit.

Drop App Review

The Drop app offers points on shopping purchases at top retailers like Amazon, Walmart, Target, various grocery stores and restaurants, and more. Simply link your credit or debit card in the app, and you’ll earn up to 2% back in the form of gift cards. Gift cards are not as good as cash back, but close!

You have to link your credit and debit cards to the app so they can see where you spent money. Then you’ll earn Drop points at select retailers.

Points can only be earned at the five specific retailers you choose from the list (full list below). After initially choosing five stores, it’s not possible to change your selection. Choose carefully.

There is a limit of 5,000 points ($5) which can be earned weekly, it resets each Sunday. Additionally, business purchases and manufactured spend purchases are excluded in the terms.

How to Join

Some of us signed up during Drop’s beta rollout. Drop now launched publicly and and you can signup without a referral. At times there is a special bonus for signing up with a referral link.

Our referral code is: doctorofcredit. The referrer gets a 1,000 bonus ($1) and you also get started off with 1,000 points ($1) for joining (sometimes you’ll get $5 for joining, depending on the promotion).

  1. Download the app Android link, iOS link
  2. Enter an invite code (ours is: doctorofcredit)
  3. Link a card; this is done by inputting your bank login, it’ll then link all cards in the login
  4. Choose the five retailers where you want to earn points

Now, any purchases made with a linked card at your selected retailers will earn points.

How Much are Points Worth?

Each point is worth 1/10 of a penny. For example, 1,000 points is worth $1.

When Drop says you’ll earn 20x per dollar on Amazon, that’s not 20% back, rather 2% back. And when you get a 1,000 point signup bonus, it’s not $10, rather $1.

The easiest way to think about the points is always divide by ten and you’ll get the value in pennies. 2000 points divided by ten is 200 pennies, or $2 earned.

List of Earning Options

Ongoing Offers

At launch, the Drop app had ‘Power Offers’ at top merchants which earned rewards on an ongoing basis by linking your credit card and spending at those merchants. In February 2020, they changed it to ‘Challenges’ offers which are temporary offers you claim in the app, you earn rewards by spending with a linked credit card.

You’ll see the points within 5 days from when you make the purchase.

One-Time Offers

Aside from the ongoing offers, you’ll also find some one-time offers. For example, currently they are running an offer to get 2,000 points ($2) on your next $20 Amazon purchase. We’ve seen offers like $75 for signing up with Wealthfront, $7.50 at Naturebox, and $20 back at Boxed.

Other Ways to Earn

Aside from offers, you can also earn points when you do qualifying activities such as adding your first card/bank, adding your second card/bank, and other app-related activities.

The only big offers are:

  • Get 1,000 points ($1) just for joining and 100 points (10 cents) for adding your first card/bank
  • 2,000 ($2) points for adding your second card/bank
  • 1,000 ($1) points for each friend you refer
  • 5,000 ($5) bonus after referring five friends

See all offers in the Discover tab > Unlock Bonuses. There are a bunch of smaller offers for linking social media and checking out their Twitter account, etc.

Note, you have to click on the tab to earn these bonuses. After linking a card/bank, click to get 100 points. After linking a second bank click to get 2,000 points. After referring five friends, click on the offer to get 5,000 points. The 1,000 point referral bonus should come automatically after your friend signs up without having to click anything.

(Please don’t leave any referral codes in the comments so that the discussion can revolve around the app itself. It’s just $1 per referral, and we’re not going to bother setting up a page for these referrals.)

List of Redemption Options

Update 12/30/19: They’ve increased Amazon to $50 minimum cashout. Minimum cashout now is $25 for places like iTunes, Nike, Gap, Olive Garden, and Groupon.

Update 11/14/19: They now only allow you to cash out for the lower dollar gift cards (e.g. Amazon $20 gc, Starbucks $5 gc, etc) if you have used their portal shopping option in the past 12 months. Those who only use this for the card link offers will need to accumulate $30 worth before being able to cash out, and even then won’t be able to cash out for Amazon and the like. I cashed out for $50 Nordstrom gc, there are a bunch of options at the $30 level like Nike and Groupon. You can also make a tiny $1 purchase through the portal to unlock the smaller gift card redemption option, e.g. a $1 Groupon. 

Points can be redeemed for gift cards. Here is the list of redemption options:

  • $5 Starbucks – 5,000 Points
  • $5 Aerie – 5,000 Points
  • $10 Amazon.com – 10,000 Points 
  • $10 Old Navy – 10,000 Points
  • $10 Dunkin’ Donuts – 10,000 Points
  • $10 iTunes – 10,000 Points
  • $10 American Eagle Outfitters – 10,000 Points
  • $10 Gap – 10,000 Points
  • $10 Nordstrom – 10,000 Points
  • $15 Groupon – 15,000 Points
  • $15 AMC – 15,000 Points
  • $15 Banana Republic – 15,000 Points
  • $20 Whole Foods Market – 20,000 Points
  • $25 Barnes & Noble – 25,000 Points
  • $25 Applebee’s – 25,000 Points
  • $25 Lyft – 25,000 Points
  • $25 Apple – 25,000 Points (Beware: this if for apple.ca)
  • $25 JCPenney – 25,000 Points
  • $50 Hotels.com – 50,000 Points
  • $50 Best Buy – 50,000 Points
  • $100 American Airlines – 100,000 Points

Most people should find one of these to be useful and pretty close to its value in cash. I’ll be redeeming my points for Amazon gift cards. (Note, if you have enough for $20, it’ll show you an option to redeem for $20 Amazon gift card. In practice, it’ll come as two separate $10 Amazon gift cards.)

Security

In terms of linking your bank logins to the app Drop uses plaid. This is the same back end provider that Mint, Acorns, Robin and others use. You can read more about their security set up here.

Final Thoughts

We’ve written a Complete List of Card-Linked Reward Programs, but this one tops them all in it’s current form.

To be able to get 2% back on all Amazon purchases, for example, is excellent since it stacks with all other deals you can do like use a credit card that earns a high earning rate and go through the JetBlue shopping portal. It’s simply an additional 2% back on your purchases.

The other deals are likewise excellent since they are at merchants we use everyday like Walmart and Target, grocery stores like Whole Foods, Safeway, and Trader Joe’s, eateries like Starbucks, Dunkin, Chipotle, and McDonald’s, as well as ride sharing apps Uber and Lyft. Let’s hope the app continues to offer great deals.

The beauty of card-link programs is they don’t interfere with any other reward programs. And Drop even works on debit cards. It might be possible, for example, to link your Target debit card.

The only downside is that you won’t be able to use a gift card to pay if you want to take advantage of Drop since the app only tracks what you bought with a credit card. As an example, if you like to buy Amazon gift cards on Gyft, PPDG, or Swych to earn 5x with INK on all your Amazon purchases, you won’t be able to get any extra Drop rewards on your purchases.

One thing to be aware of is that you are, of course, giving away your data by using the app, and we’re also forced to rely on their security systems when giving in our bank password.

Hat tip to Maximizingmoney for discovering this app

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EveryPennyEvan
EveryPennyEvan (@guest_1604869)
April 24, 2023 06:19

Has anyone redeemed a giftcard since they changed their giftcard structure? Wondering if it actually takes 60 days

Penny
Penny (@guest_1604961)
April 24, 2023 10:15

it looks like it is in place. I placed a Doordash and amazon GC order on 4/04, haven’t received it yet.

Davis
Davis (@guest_1295182)
December 6, 2021 10:13

 William Charles  Chuck might be good to write a post about drop premium. https://earnwithdrop.medium.com/drop-premium-is-here-c64be83289af. you get 1000 points for free each month and then there are better card offers. you can also convert your points into bitcoin/ethereum and then they can increase or decrease before you convert that back into points.

Onismurai
Onismurai (@guest_1147853)
February 20, 2021 00:40

Anyone know when Drop post the referral bonus? I use doc’s referral code and got 5k points pending since forever (already got several thousand points and fulfilled the requirement)

James Hillegass
James Hillegass (@guest_1141527)
February 7, 2021 21:30

I wish doc would stop posting drop offers. I earned a couple hundred thousand points and am completely unable to redeem the them. Horrible app. Please nobody use this. It is a waste if time.

sudocat
sudocat (@guest_1041992)
August 24, 2020 02:10

This app is retarded.
I signed up, and now the app is stuck at Pick 2 to start earning points seamlessly. There is no next button or any way to escape this other than to delete the app. F-

Christian R
Christian R (@guest_1028422)
August 2, 2020 23:20

Amazon redemption offer came back during the summer (I redeemed the $50 option twice in June), but now it seems like it is gone altogether again. Seems like they mixed up the other redemption options – ex. pretty sure spotify is new

sg77
sg77 (@guest_1021439)
July 23, 2020 01:02

Another new thing I saw in the Drop app: in the Games page, there’s a basketball game you can play once per day and get around 40 points.

sg77
sg77 (@guest_1021434)
July 23, 2020 00:56

When I looked at the Rewards page in Drop today, it shows a couple Flash Rewards: $10 iTunes for 10,000 points, $10 Dominos for 10,000 points. Ends in 19 hours from now.

i.e., lower point redemption options. It says there’s a limited number of them available.

Evan
Evan (@guest_988399)
May 28, 2020 19:52

I now have a ‘stockpile’ gift card I can redeem at the $25 level. This is a cool ‘hack’ to allow drop users to earn in ‘stockback’ instead of cashback

Evan
Evan (@guest_974684)
May 7, 2020 19:23

Just got an email so now officially dead:

We’re replacing Power Offers with Flash Deals, effective today.