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In the US, debit cards are ATM cards tied to a bank account that can also be used at a merchant; when the merchant charges the card, money is deducted directly
by daxelrod 10y ago
In the US, debit cards are ATM cards tied to a bank account that can also be used at a merchant; when the merchant charges the card, money is deducted directly from the bank account. Debit cards usually have no rewards or bonuses associated with them.
Credit cards, on the other hand, are connected to a revolving line of credit. When a merchant charges the card, the issuer is essentially loaning the amount of the charge to the cardholder. (With most credit cards, interest only starts accruing a month after the charge; so people who pay their credit card bills in full are not paying interest.)
In the US, credit cards were introduced as a convenient alternative to checks or cash before debit cards existed. Because of cultural momentum, rewards, and fraud protection, they are as widely used as debit cards, if not more so.
- MrRadar 10y agoTo throw in a bit of confusion, most US debit cards can also be run on credit card networks (mostly Visa or Mastercard, though when I worked as a cashier I saw a few debit cards that used Discover or Amex). The cash is still directly debited from your bank account, but that lets you use the card at places that do accept credit cards but don't belong to any of the dozen different debit networks (STAR, Pulse, CO-OP, etc.). This is also why most US-based online shops prefer credit cards since it's assumed that even if you don't have an actual credit card you have a debit card that can be run as one.