Head to head
ether.fi Cash vs MetaMask Card
Both leave your funds in your own wallet. ether.fi pays 3% up to its tier cap and adds a credit line against ETH; MetaMask pays 1% in its mUSD stablecoin on the free card, with the 3% Metal tier currently paused. MetaMask is simpler if you already use the wallet.
| Feature | ether.fi Cash | MetaMask Card |
|---|---|---|
| Our score | 8.4 / 10 | 8.1 / 10 |
| Card type | Credit | Debit |
| Custody | Self-custody | Self-custody |
| Cashback | 3% to tier cap | 1% · 3% Metal (paused) |
| Paid in | ETHFI | mUSD |
| Annual fee | $0 | $0–199 |
| FX fee | 0% USD/EUR · 0.5% other | 1% abroad · 0.5% non-euro local (free) |
| Availability | EU excl. NL, FI, EE · UK · CH · NO · US · UAE | EEA · UK · CH · LATAM US sign-ups paused |
| Net value, eurozone* | +€342/yr | +€162/yr |
| Net value, Romania* | +€432/yr | +€103/yr |
*At €1,500 a month with a typical foreign-currency share for each place (10% in the eurozone, 85% in Romania, where local lei spending counts as foreign currency). Run your own numbers.
Who wins at €500, €1,500 and €3,000 a month
Net value per year from the same calculator that powers the country pages: cashback minus FX, conversion and annual fees, with €1,000 kept on the platform for balance-based cards. Category bonuses and promotions are not counted.
| Scenario | ether.fi Cash | MetaMask Card |
|---|---|---|
| Eurozone, 10% foreign · €500/mo | +€177 | +€54 |
| Eurozone, 10% foreign · €1,500/mo | +€342 | +€162 |
| Eurozone, 10% foreign · €3,000/mo | +€372 | +€324 |
| Romania, 85% foreign · €500/mo | +€155 | +€35 |
| Romania, 85% foreign · €1,500/mo | +€432 | +€103 |
| Romania, 85% foreign · €3,000/mo | +€547 | +€207 |
Where the difference comes from
Both keep your assets in your own wallet until you pay. The headline gap is three to one: ether.fi’s 3% on the first $2,000 a month (the first $800 of euro purchases) in its ETHFI token, against MetaMask’s 1% in the mUSD stablecoin on the free card. MetaMask’s 3% Metal tier would narrow that, but Metal orders have been paused since June 2026, so new users cannot get it.
Fees now cut the same way. MetaMask’s free tier charges 1% on any merchant outside your country and 0.5% when your stablecoin is in neither your currency nor the merchant’s; ether.fi’s free tier charges 0.5% outside USD and EUR. In the eurozone MetaMask spends mostly fee-free, but in Romania its 0.5% fee on lei halves its 1% cashback, which is what the Romania row shows. ether.fi is missing from three EU countries and paused nowhere; MetaMask is offered across the EEA, Switzerland and the UK, but has paused US sign-ups.
Choose ether.fi if…
you want the higher rate and the option to borrow against ETH.
Choose MetaMask if…
you want the lowest-friction setup and already live in MetaMask.