Credit cards in Denmark: a guide for expats

What do you need to get a credit card in Denmark?

Four things: a CPR number, a Danish address, MitID and an income the issuer can check. The first three come in that order. No CPR number without an address, and no MitID that works for online applications without a CPR number.

CPR number. You get it when you register your address at Citizen Service or one of the International Citizen Service centres. If you stay in Denmark for three months or more (six months for EU/EEA and Nordic citizens), you must register. You cannot get a CPR number before you have a permanent address and actually live there. The CPR number is also what you need to open a Danish bank account.

A Danish address. Bank Norwegian and Ikano Bank both state that you must live in Denmark. Bank Norwegian's travel insurance also requires the insured to have a registered address (folkeregisteradresse) in a Nordic country, so the cover stops if you move your registration outside the Nordics.

MitID. MitID replaced NemID, which closed for good on 31 October 2023. If an older guide tells you to log on with NemID, it is out of date. You can create MitID in the app by scanning your passport, or at Citizen Service. Without a CPR number you get a MitID with a P code instead, but most self-service solutions require a CPR number, so a P code will not get you far. GlobeCard and Resurs Bank both require MitID to apply.

Income and the credit check. Expect an individual credit check. Bank Norwegian, Ikano Bank, Eurocard and SAS EuroBonus Mastercard also check that you are not registered in RKI or Debitor Registret, two Danish registers of people with unpaid debts. Most issuers do not publish a minimum income. PlusGuldkort does, and it also requires membership of a Danish trade union that takes part in PlusKort.

We found no separate rules for foreign citizens in the terms we read. At Bank Norwegian you get an answer straight away: approved, rejected or sent for manual review.

Is a Danish credit card really a credit card?

Often not in the way you may know it from the US or the UK. Denmark is a debit card country. Danmarks Nationalbank notes that credit cards are used significantly less here than in Sweden and Iceland, and Nets, the only company that handles Dankort payments for shops, calls Dankort the payment Danes prefer.

Many of the cards Danish banks call credit cards are charge cards. You get one bill a month, and the bank takes the full amount from your account. Of the 41 credit cards in our comparison, 25 work this way. Some of them, such as Eurocard and Nordea Gold Mastercard, let you add an instalment agreement, and then interest applies. The other 16 have revolving credit built in: you can pay part of the bill and pay interest on the rest.

Each card in our lists carries a Danish label for its type:

• Kredit: revolving credit, with interest on what you don't pay back in time
• Månedsafregning: a charge card, paid in full every month
• Debet: a debit card, where the money leaves your account straight away

If you pay the whole bill every month anyway, a charge card does the same job and costs you no interest. You only need revolving credit if you want the option to spread a purchase over several months, and then the interest is the price.

Which credit cards can you get without switching banks?

In our comparison, 8 credit cards come from issuers that don't ask you to bank with them. They are the cards in the list at the top. Danish banks normally want you as a customer first: Danske Bank Mastercard Guld requires a Danske Konto, and Nordea only takes applications from its own customers. That is fine if you are opening a Danish bank account anyway, but not if you want a card on the side.

• Bank Norwegian is a Visa with no annual fee, travel insurance and 0,5 % cashback. More on it below.
• Ikano Bank Visa also has no annual fee, but charges a monthly admin fee if you pay by Betalingsservice or giro slip instead of through Ikano's iBOX. Ikano Bank states no interest-free period, as the card works like an overdraft on a Visa card: interest runs on the credit you use. Its travel insurance does not cover illness on the trip.
• Eurocard costs 480 kr. a year. It is a charge card, and you can add an agreement to pay in instalments. It includes cancellation insurance on trips you pay with the card, but no cover for illness abroad.
• GlobeCard Mastercard costs 245 kr. a year. It has revolving credit, no travel insurance, and you manage it in the Spendwise app.
• SAS EuroBonus World Mastercard costs 415 kr. a year and earns points with SAS. You need a free EuroBonus membership.
• PlusGuldkort has no annual fee, but only members of a trade union in PlusKort can get it.

Eurocard and the SAS card also come in pricier Platinum and Premium versions. Eurocard, GlobeCard and the SAS EuroBonus cards are issued by SEB Kort, the Danish branch of the Swedish SEB Kort Bank. Ikano Bank puts the point plainly on its own site: you don't have to switch banks.

Credit cards from Danish banks like Danske Bank and Nordea

Once you have a Danish bank account for your salary, the bank's own Mastercard is the obvious next step. The real price is the card fee plus the account or customer package the bank requires, so look at both.

• Danske Bank Mastercard Guld costs 795 kr. a year on top of the Danske Konto it requires. Travel insurance for trips in Europe is included, and you can upgrade it to worldwide cover.
• Nordea Gold Mastercard costs 900 kr. a year for ordinary customers, and you need to be a Nordea customer first. Worldwide travel insurance is included.
• Jyske Bank Mastercard Gold costs 200 kr. a year. Travel insurance is not included, but you can add it for an extra yearly fee.

Travel insurance mostly comes with the gold and platinum cards, and lounge access mostly with platinum and above. In our comparison, 24 of the 41 credit cards include travel insurance. Bank by bank, the cover is compared on Mastercard rejseforsikring, and the cards are listed on our pages for Danske Bank and Nordea. Those pages are in Danish, but the tables read the same way as the list above.

The fee you pay is not always the list price. At Danske Bank it depends on your customer package, and at Nordea young customers and customers with a home loan pay less. Ask for the price that applies to you.

Can you use a credit card with MobilePay?

Yes, if it is a Danish card and the issuer supports MobilePay. Dankort is a different thing: a Danish debit card, not a credit card.

MobilePay is the app Danes use to send money to each other and to pay in shops and online. To use it, you need MitID, a CPR number, a Danish or Greenlandic phone number, an e-mail address, a Danish bank account and a Danish debit or credit card. It takes Visa, Visa/Dankort, Dankort, Mastercard and Mastercard Debit, as long as the card is your own. A card from your home country will not do.

Whether a particular Danish credit card works in MobilePay is up to the issuer. Among the cards you can get without switching banks, Eurocard, GlobeCard, the SAS EuroBonus cards, PlusGuldkort and Ikano Bank list MobilePay. Bank Norwegian's card works with Apple Pay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay og Garmin Pay. MobilePay is not on its list, and money transfers such as MobilePay earn no cashback on the card.

Dankort is Denmark's national debit card. On its own it only works in Denmark, which is why most Dankort are issued together with Visa as a Visa/Dankort. The Visa part makes it work abroad. Visa/Dankort is a debit card: the money comes out of your account, and there is no credit or interest-free period.

A simple setup for daily life: a Danish bank account with a Visa/Dankort for everyday payments and MobilePay, plus a credit card for travel and online shopping. Read more in our guide to Visa/Dankort (in Danish).

Bank Norwegian: a free credit card with travel insurance

If you want a credit card that does not depend on your bank, Bank Norwegian is worth a look. Among the 3 credit cards with no annual fee in our comparison, it is the only one with travel insurance that covers illness, and the only one with cashback. It is a Visa, so it works abroad, and it has revolving credit up to 100.000 kr.

• Annual fee: 0 kr.
• Currency fee: 1,99 % on purchases in other currencies, online too
• Cashback: 0,5 % on purchases, used to pay your card bill, or CashPoints for Norwegian flights instead

The travel insurance covers private holidays that start and end in the Nordics, for you, your spouse or partner and children under 21. Two conditions matter for expats. You must have a registered address in a Nordic country. And you must pay most of the trip with the card: the terms say "Mindst 75 % af rejsens transport- og overnatningsudgifter betalt med kortet (egen bil: 75 % af brændstof, færge og overnatning)". In English: at least three quarters of your transport and accommodation costs, or of fuel, ferries and overnight stays if you drive your own car. A trip that starts in a home country outside the Nordics is not covered.

If you don't pay the full bill when it is due, interest runs on the rest. Here is Bank Norwegian's representative example, quoted in Danish as the bank publishes it:

In English, it shows what borrowing on the card costs over one year. Saml. kreditbeløb is the amount you borrow, and løbetid is how long you take to repay it. Variabel debitorrente is the variable interest rate, and ÅOP is the annual percentage rate with all costs included. Saml. kreditomk. is the total cost of the credit, månedlig ydelse the monthly payment and saml. tilbagebetaling what you pay back in total. The example assumes you get your bill digitally, as a paper bill costs extra.

Credit is expensive money. Pay the full bill every month, and the card costs you nothing in interest. Bank Norwegian is the only issuer we have an agreement with, and we earn money if you get the card through us. You can read how we make money (in Danish).

Does Revolut or Lunar have a credit card in Denmark?

No. Revolut, Wise and Lunar only offer debit cards in Denmark: you spend your own money, not a credit line. Revolut says outright that it does not offer credit cards in Denmark. Many expats arrive with a Revolut or Wise card, and both work for everyday payments here.

• Wise requires you to live in the EEA. There is no annual fee (0 kr.), but the physical card costs a one-off fee, and exchanging DKK to EUR costs 0,33 % on top of the ECB rate.
• Revolut Standard costs 0 kr. a year, but you pay for delivery of the physical card. The currency fee is 0 % on weekdays within a monthly limit. Above the limit and at weekends, Revolut charges a fee.
• Lunar Light costs 0 kr. a year, but you pay for delivery of the physical card. Lunar is a Danish bank, and you apply in the app with MitID and a passport or driving licence. You must live in the EU or EEA.

A debit card is fine for daily use. The difference shows when something goes wrong: with a credit card it is the issuer's money that has been paid out while you wait for a refund, and not your own. Read more in credit card or debit card (in Danish).

Danish credit card terms in plain English

Card offers in Denmark, including the tables on this site, are written in Danish. Danish uses a decimal comma, so a fee written as 1,5 is one and a half percent.

In our comparison, ÅOP on the cards with revolving credit ranges from 10,66 % to 24,6 %. On a card with an interest-free period, interest only starts if you don't pay the full bill when it is due. Ikano Bank Visa has no stated interest-free period, so interest runs from the day you use the credit. If you are unsure whether you can pay in full, choose a charge card or a debit card, and don't use the credit at all.