Can you downgrade United Explorer card?

Yes, you can. The only downgrade option available is the United Gateway card.

Can you cancel a credit card to avoid annual fee?

Yes, you can. Most of the time, canceling the credit card within 30 days of your annual fee posting will get you a refund. Some banks will not allow this, but most do.

Is downgrading a credit card better than canceling?

It is better for your credit to keep your credit history as long as possible. Usually, canceling a card means you will lose your credit history. As a result, downgrading to a zero annual fee card can help preserve your credit.

How can I change my credit card without hurting my credit?

You can downgrade your credit cards. Most of the time, you’ll keep the credit history, and it won’t hurt your credit.

Can you cancel a new credit card?

Generally, you shouldn’t. However, it is a rule with some banks that you can’t cancel new credit cards. Still, you generally shouldn’t because you might get on the blacklist of a bank.

How do I cancel my credit card online?

In the past, you could cancel your credit card online. Unfortunately, most of the major credit card issuers need to speak to you to cancel your credit card. Some card issuers can automatically cancel your card via automated phone lines.

Is bad to cancel a credit card?

It depends. You’ll lose your credit history if you cancel a credit card. Generally, you want to keep your oldest cards open, even if there’s an annual fee. This is because your credit score card could crash downwards otherwise.

How do I close a credit card account permanently?

The best way to close a credit card permanently is to call the number on the back of your card and close it down by talking to a customer service representative.

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How Do I Downgrade/Cancel My Credit Card? [Detailed Guide]

Updated: December 8, 2024, 12:02pm CST

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Key Takeaways
Downgrading Your Credit Card
Canceling Your Credit Card
How To Downgrade or Cancel Major Credit Cards
Final Thoughts

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Key Takeaways

Downgrading a credit card to a no-annual-fee option helps maintain credit history and avoid potential credit score impacts, while canceling may have adverse effects, particularly for old credit cards.
Not all credit cards can be downgraded, and you may be limited as to what card you can downgrade to.
Contact your bank before making any decisions, as they may extend retention offers.

Maximizing credit card rewards and building up your creditworthiness is all about discipline. It takes a lot of discipline to learn the ins and outs of credit card rewards, from transfer partners to award charts. The name of the game is using discipline to adapt to change.

Over time, credit cards may become more or less valuable to you. Whether you see more perks being added to your credit cards or annual fees increasing, credit cards are, more or less, evolving constantly over time.

If you’re in a position where you think a particular card you hold doesn’t deliver as much value as it did in the past, you’ll probably be wondering how to approach the somewhat uncomfortable situation of downgrading or canceling your credit card.

In this guide, we’ll be providing you with the blueprint on how to downgrade or cancel your credit card across the major issuers out there.

Downgrading Your Credit Card

Woman with credit card and laptop — Image Credit: Antonio Guillem via Shutterstock

There’s a difference between downgrading and canceling your credit card.

When you downgrade your credit card, you are telling the card issuer that this card is no longer for you, but you still want a lower-tier card to replace your old card.

There are 2 main types of downgrades:

Downgrading a high annual fee card to a lower annual fee card
Downgrading a high annual fee card to a no annual fee card

Reasons Why You’d Want to Downgrade

You received a welcome bonus and justified it by paying for the first year’s annual fee but can’t continue to justify paying an annual fee.
- Example: You opened the Citi Prestige^® Card and received a welcome offer bonus and want to downgrade it to the Citi Strata Premier℠ Card to still enjoy benefits but without a high annual fee.
You’ve held a card for a long time for the benefits but your situation has changed and you don’t use it that often anymore.
- Example: You have been a cardholder of The Business Platinum Card^® from American Express for many years to complement your business travel, but you don’t travel that much anymore so you downgrade your card to the American Express^® Business Gold Card.
You received a welcome bonus on a card and aren’t necessarily unable to afford an annual fee, you just want to downgrade it to a card you can keep for your credit history to improve your credit.
- Example: You opened the Chase Sapphire Preferred^® Card but want to downgrade it to the Chase Freedom Unlimited^® and keep the entire credit history.
You accrue points on a card and you need to keep a card open to store your points, otherwise, you’ll forfeit them.
- Example: You opened the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit CardInformation collected independently. Not reviewed by Capital One., have earned a lot of unused points, and want to downgrade it to the Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit CardInformation collected independently. Not reviewed by Capital One. so you can keep your points and not have to pay an annual fee (rates & fees).

As you can imagine, not all credit cards can be downgraded, and more specifically, you can’t just downgrade your card to any other card within a bank’s portfolio. Usually, you can only choose from 1 or 2 options to downgrade your card.

Also, if you downgrade from Credit Card A to Credit Card B, you won’t be able to get a welcome offer on Credit Card B in the future.

Canceling Your Credit Card

Man cutting a credit card to cancel — Image Credit: Bignai via Shutterstock

Canceling your credit card is completely different from downgrading your credit card. Canceling your credit card usually has adverse consequences on your credit report. In the long-term, closing your credit cards before you allow them to age will reduce your average age of accounts, which makes up 15% of your FICO score.

Generally, it is ill-advised to cancel your credit card if it is a very old card (>5 years of history), even if it has an annual fee. You can find your credit score plummeting if you start closing your old credit cards.

Reasons Why You’d Want to Cancel

Credit score aside, here are some valid reasons to close your credit card:

There are no palatable downgrade options available, so you have no choice but to close the card to avoid an annual fee.
- Example: would be if you held The Platinum Card^® from American Express and are dead-set on not paying an annual fee. The American Express^® Gold Card has an annual fee, and there aren’t any $0 annual fee options available.
You didn’t get a retention offer and you want to proceed with closing your card.
- Example: You held the U.S. Bank Altitude™ Reserve Visa Infinite^® Card and couldn’t get a retention offer, so you decide to close this card.
You need to close a card to comply with credit card application rules.
- Example: You already had the maximum number of American Express credit cards and needed to free up 1 “slot” to get a brand-new Amex credit card you really like.

Hot Tip: If you’re considering downgrading or canceling your card, be sure to call the bank and see if they are extending retention offers.

How To Downgrade or Cancel Major Credit Cards

Now that we talked about some of the motivations one might have to close or downgrade a credit card, let’s do a deep-dive into each of the major bank’s rules for closing or downgrading cards.

American Express

Image Credit: First Class Photography via Shutterstock

As soon as you downgrade or close your card, you’ll lose all perks associated with that card, effective immediately. These include any statement credits, lounge access, etc.

You’ll get monthly prorated refunds on any annual fees for any cards you decide to downgrade.

When Can You Downgrade/Cancel Your Card?

If you close or downgrade your card within 12 months of opening your card, you’ll put yourself at a massive risk of shutdown and being blacklisted from the bank. Also, if you close or downgrade your card within 12 months of accepting a retention offer, you’ll again put yourself at that same risk.

Basically, wait at least 1 year before you downgrade your card.

What Card Can You Downgrade To?

You can downgrade American Express cards within the same brand. For example, you can downgrade a Delta card to a lower-tier Delta card. You can’t downgrade a Delta card to a lower-tier Hilton card and vice versa.

Here are some common downgrade options:

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Credit Card	Downgrades To
The Platinum Card^® from American Express	American Express^® Gold Card
The Business Platinum Card^® from American Express	American Express^® Business Gold Card Business Green Rewards Card from American Express*
American Express^® Business Gold Card	Business Green Rewards Card from American Express*
Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card*	Hilton Honors American Express Surpass^® Card Hilton Honors American Express Card
Hilton Honors American Express Surpass^® Card	Hilton Honors American Express Card
Delta SkyMiles^® Reserve American Express Card	Delta SkyMiles^® Platinum American Express Card Delta SkyMiles^® Gold American Express Card Delta SkyMiles^® Blue American Express Card
Delta SkyMiles^® Platinum American Express Card	Delta SkyMiles^® Gold American Express Card Delta SkyMiles^® Blue American Express Card
Delta SkyMiles^® Gold American Express Card	Delta SkyMiles^® Blue American Express Card
Delta SkyMiles^® Reserve Business American Express Card	Delta SkyMiles^® Platinum Business American Express Card Delta SkyMiles^® Gold Business American Express Card
Delta SkyMiles^® Platinum Business American Express Card	Delta SkyMiles^® Gold Business American Express Card*

*All information about these cards has been collected independently by Upgraded Points.

The list goes on, but you can see the common theme that American Express downgrades must occur within the same brand of card.

How Do You Downgrade/Cancel Your Card?

You’ll want to call the number on the back of your card and get connected to a customer agent that can help process your downgrade.

If you’re looking to cancel the card, simply let the customer agent know that you want to close the account.

Bank of America

Bank of America offers lots of premium co-branded credit cards, as well as its own suite of Bank of America-branded rewards cards. It generally doesn’t offer ultra-premium cards.