Capital One Shopping review: Access coupon codes, gift cards, and online deals
Rating as of based on a review of services November 24, 2022.
Ranking
9/10
Capital One Shopping is a browser extension that scours the web for coupon codes, price drops, and other savings opportunities while you shop. You will need to provide personal data to access deals, but all in all, Capital One Shopping is a no-brainer.
Best for:
- Bargain hunters
- Online shoppers
- Busy people
The convenient Capital One Shopping browser extension makes saving money effortless while you shop online. You can get coupon codes automatically applied to purchases, track price drops, compare prices at competing retailers, and more. Best of all, Capital One Shopping is completely free!
If you’re curious what the catch is, you have good reason to wonder — but not to worry. To present you with the jaw-dropping deals, Capital One Shopping collects information about you, such as your email address and shopping history. However, according to its privacy policy, Capital One doesn’t sell or share your information.
Learn more about the pros and cons for Capital One Shopping, how it works, and more, so you can decide whether or not this free and simple money-saver is for you (spoiler: I think it is).
Pros & cons
Pros
- Strong reputation — Capital One Shopping, formerly Wikibuy, has established a healthy reputation among customers, boasting a 4.7 on Trustpilot and an A- from the Better Business Bureau.
- Easy to use — Once you’ve downloaded its browser extension, Capital One Shopping applies coupon codes and scans for better prices automatically.
- Completely free — Capital One Shopping is completely free to use. All you need to do is sign up for a membership, but you won’t pay a dime for it. In fact, you’ll save a few.
Cons
- Gathers your personal info — To help you access some great deals, Capital One Shopping collects your contact information, data on your shopping habits, and more. That said, according to its privacy policy, Capital One doesn't share or sell personal information with third parties for the third party’s own purposes such as marketing.
- Extension doesn’t work on mobile — If you want to spot Capital One Shopping deals through your mobile device, you’ll need to download the mobile app and search for deals there. The browser extension is not available on mobile.
- Some features could be improved — Next to its automatic coupon codes and price comparisons, Capital One Shopping’s rewards credits may seem limited, especially since you need a specific dollar amount to redeem them.
What is Capital One Shopping?
Capital One Shopping (founded in 2014 and formerly Wikibuy) is a free browser extension customers can use to collect coupon codes and compare prices automatically.
Once you’ve added the extension (available on Google Chrome, Safari, Mozilla Firefox, and Microsoft Edge) or downloaded the mobile app, saving is effortless. In fact, within the last year alone, Capital One Shopping customers have saved more than $160 million!
Truth be told, there really aren’t any red flags when it comes to this service — although there might be a pink flag. To receive a Capital One Shopping membership, you will need to provide access to some personal information (like your email address and shopping habits). According to its privacy policy, Capital One Shopping does not share or sell personal details, but it’s always a good idea to read the privacy policy for yourself to ensure you’re comfortable with the amount of data you’re sharing.
How does Capital One Shopping work?
Capital One Shopping offers multiple features to help customers locate deals and discounts, many of which require little to no effort from you.
For example, when you shop on Amazon (which Wikibuy was originally designed for), Capital One Shopping scans the site for comparable prices on the product you’re considering. As you browse other websites, the extension continues to work in the background, searching for coupons.
However, to make the most of other savings features, you may need to work a little harder. For instance, if you prefer to do your online shopping via a mobile phone, you’ll need to download Capital One Shopping’s app and search for deals there, rather than your browser.
How to use Capital One Shopping Rewards
When Capital One Shopping pops up on your screen with a list of coupon codes to try, sometimes those codes are accompanied with rewards credits. For instance, I’m headed to Maui with some friends in a couple of weeks and was recently shopping on Aerie for a new swimsuit. This pop-up appeared, offering 3.5% back on my purchase.
Later, you can redeem your Capital One Shopping rewards credits for gift cards, although you may have to wait a while. Shoppers need a certain dollar amount, such as $10 or $25, to swap their credits for cards.
How to remove Capital One Shopping
If you’ve found Capital One Shopping emails and pop-ups to be a bit obnoxious, you can adjust your notifications through their website. Visit capitaloneshopping.com, hover over “Account” on the upper right-hand corner of your screen, then select “Notifications” under the drop-down menu.
However, if you’re not pleased with Capital One Shopping and want to remove the extension altogether, doing so is just as easy as installing. The process varies based on your browser type, but the steps are fairly similar for each. If you have the extension on Google Chrome, for instance, here’s how to remove it:
- Right-click the Capital One Shopping button located at the top-right corner of your Chrome browser window.
- Select ‘Manage Extensions.’
- Click ‘Remove extension’ at the bottom of the screen to delete Capital One Shopping.
Capital One Shopping features
Capital One Shopping offers a lot of unique features, but each has the same purpose: to help you save money. Here are a few ways this extension puts cash back in your pocket.
Receive automatic coupon codes
When you’re shopping online and have finally hit the checkout screen, do you ever google “coupon codes”? Capital One Shopping does too — but they do it better.
Capital One Shopping’s automatic coupon codes may be its most helpful tool. When I was searching for a new swimsuit, for example, the extension found three coupon codes to try, plus 1% back on my purchase.
When this pop-up appears, all you need to do is click “Try Codes,” and Capital One Shopping will poke around to find one that works. Unfortunately, none of the codes worked for my swimsuit purchase. However, I shopped for some makeup recently, and between the coupon codes and rewards credit, Capital One Shopping shaved close to $10 off my order!
Locate some of the best prices
If you’re an avid Amazon shopper, Capital One Shopping has an Amazon-specific price comparison tool to make sure you get a great deal.
Once you’ve installed the browser extension, you’ll notice a couple of little green “S” buttons as you shop on Amazon.
The green “S” button on the left is for comparing prices, while the other “S” button on the right is for those who want to add an item to their watchlist (explained in the next section). The extension automatically searches prices with other retailers to present you with the most affordable offer.
In the case of this Breville Espresso Machine, Capital One Shopping found a massive deal — the same item for $106 less at another retailer!
Add items to watchlist
Another Amazon-specific feature is the “watchlist.” This is the second green “S” button, mentioned in the previous section.
This is an excellent tool if you’re shopping for something you don’t need immediately. For example, if you like to buy Christmas gifts throughout the year, you can add potential gifts to your watchlist, and Capital One Shopping will keep an eye out for price drops for 60 days. All you need to do is click “Add to watchlist,” and Capital One Shopping will alert you when discounts appear!
Earn rewards credit
As mentioned previously, sometimes Capital One Shopping offers a percentage back on your purchases (like the American Eagle/Aerie pop-ups I saw). You can redeem rewards credit for gift cards in your Capital One Shopping account, available at a number of retailers, including Lowe’s, Nordstrom, Nike, and even Walmart.
The catch here is that it may take a while before you can use your credits, since most gift cards are only redeemable for a specific dollar amount, like $10 or $25.
Review Featured Offers
If you’re not quite sure what you’re shopping for, start with Capital One Shopping’s Featured Offers.
This tool is available through the Capital One Shopping website. There are a variety of daily deals highlighted at the top of the screen, but if you scroll down just a hair, you’ll find countless others to browse!
My experience using Capital One Shopping
Before writing this article, everything I knew about Capital One Shopping was from Samuel L. Jackson. Every so often, the spokesman popped up on my TV screen during commercial breaks. “Capital One Shopping,” he’d say. “It’s kinda genius.”
I later received an invite from my Capital One credit card to install the browser extension. “It’s free and will supposedly save me money,” I figured. “What’s the harm?”
Turns out, Mr. Jackson was right; it is kinda genius. Most often, I forget that I even have Capital One Shopping, until I’ve hit a checkout screen, and the pop-up appears. Free, effortless access to coupon codes? Don’t mind if I do!
If I had anything negative to say about Capital One Shopping — which, for the record, I really don’t — it would be that I’d like to save more! Granted, I’ve only had the extension for a short period of time, but this is an occasional theme among Capital One Shopping reviews. Every so often, the extension falters, the coupon codes fail, and the price stays the same.
All this said, if it weren’t for this extension, I’d be paying more for products anyway! I would miss out on so many discounts. Instead, I’m saving cash in ways I didn’t know I could. A pop-up appears out of nowhere like a $5 bill found on the street, and I walk away with some extra money in my pocket.
Capital One Shopping compared
PayPal Honey
Price: Free- Key features: Savings finder, price tracker, rewards credit
- Reputation: More than 17 million users and more than $1 billion saved
Compared to Capital One Shopping, PayPal Honey, founded in 2012 and acquired by PayPal in 2020, is…well, nearly identical.
This browser extension/mobile app also scans your computer for coupon codes and monitors items you’re interested in for price drops (they call this feature “droplist,” as opposed to Capital One Shopping’s “watchlist”). These features are particularly helpful on Amazon, but Honey scans more than 30,000 sites to help you spot opportunities to save.
Honey customers can also earn rewards credit and redeem them for gift cards, a perk they call Honey Gold. However, you need to reach at least 1,000 credits to redeem them (amounts to a $10 gift card).
Rakuten
Price: Free- Key features: Cash back rewards, coupon codes, price tracker
- Reputation: More than 15 million users and more than $2 billion paid in cash back
Rakuten (formerly Ebates) was founded in 1997, so it’s a little more established than competitors like Capital One Shopping and PayPal Honey. Rakuten has similar features to these two competitors, such as scanning for coupon codes and price drops, but its network of 3,500+ stores isn’t quite as extensive.
This said, cash back is where Rakuten truly shines, as you can access in-store cash back offers through its mobile app.
There really is no reason why you couldn’t add browser extensions/mobile apps from Capital One Shopping and Rakuten (why not throw in PayPal Honey in the mix too?), and there’s no better time than now to do so. Rakuten is currently offering a $10 bonus for new customers (when you spend $25)!
Who should (and shouldn’t) use Capital One Shopping?
If you like saving money and shopping online, you’ll probably benefit from Capital One Shopping.
The browser extension and mobile app are completely free, essentially effortless opportunities to save a few bucks here and there. Capital One Shopping is a convenient shortcut for those of us who are too busy to search for coupon codes and affordable prices. Installing the extension/app takes minutes (if that), and that’s all you have to do to start reaping rewards!
Truly, the only folks who may want to steer clear of Capital One Shopping are those concerned about their privacy and/or those who prefer to shop in person. If you don’t feel comfortable sharing your browser history and personal information (even though Capital One Shopping doesn’t share or sell this data), you may find that the price of privacy outweighs the potential for savings.
FAQs
Is Capital One Shopping free?
Yes, Capital One Shopping is free. If anything, you’ll pay for the extension with data. Capital One Shopping requires access to your shopping history and some contact information to help you find amazing (and most relevant) deals.
How does Capital One Shopping make money?
Capital One Shopping makes money by partnering with specific retailers. When you shop with their partners, Capital One Shopping earns a commission on your purchase.
Is Capital One Shopping safe?
From my research, Capital One Shopping is safe to install and use. Per its privacy policy, although it collects your information (like your email address, browser history, etc.), Capital One Shopping does not share or sell personal details.
Summary: Is Capital One Shopping legit?
Capital One Shopping is a free browser extension that presents you with coupon codes, price drops, rewards credit, and more. It’s a savings tool that takes minutes to install, after which the discounts and deals essentially fall into your lap!
If there’s any downside to Capital One Shopping, it’s that you need to provide access to some personal information, including contact details and shopping habits. Capital One Shopping uses this data to present you with the most relevant offers, but its privacy policy indicates that your personal information remains private.
If that disclaimer doesn’t bother you, I say give Capital One Shopping a shot and see what you can save!
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