Redeeming Your Swagbucks

So, you've earned some SB, and now you're looking to redeem! Here's some tips on how to get the most from your SB.

Edit 2019-Dec-13: Swagbucks is currently offering CAD$10 Paypal for only 750 SB. If you have a Paypal, always redeem for Paypal for as long as this deal lasts: its cents-per-SB rate matches the best of the other cards, and you get a lot more flexibility than a gift card.

IF Swagbucks has stopped offering this deal and I haven't had a chance to update this post yet, see below.

The best deal is usually gift cards for Amazon.com (that's .com, the American website; Swagbucks offers Canadians options for both American and Canadian Amazon gift cards). These get you 1 U.S. cent per SB. The minimum redemption is only $3.

Many items on Amazon.com ship to Canada directly, and of course there's always the option of shipping your goodies through an American friend, relative, or P.O. box service. Amazon.com even sells other stores' gift cards, letting you exchange your Amazon cards for a wide variety of American restaurants, clothing stores, and even grocery stores, just to name a few. (Note that Safeway Canada does not accept American Safeway gift cards (still useful if you're a British Columbian looking to do some cross-border shopping, though!); however, Whole Foods Canada does accept American gift cards. I haven't had a chance to try this myself, though, so I don't know what exchange rate they give you.)

Most of Swagbucks' non-Paypal Canadian gift cards have discounts on them, scaling up with larger cards to a maximum of 25% off at $100. That's potentially an even better deal than Amazon.com gift cards, depending on the current exchange rate. (Not all available gift cards have a $100 option, but some—notably Amazon Canada—do.) There are a bunch of options here, from iTunes to Kelsey's to Hudson's Bay. (If you're looking for Starbucks, though, you might get a better deal buying Amazon.com gift cards and using those to buy American Starbucks gift cards: Starbucks Canada accepts them, and I hear they give a pretty reasonable exchange rate.)

Paypal does have the advantage of flexibility, but it only gives 1 Canadian cent per SB and gift-card sales don't apply to it, so I don't recommend getting Paypal unless you really can't find a use for any of the discounted or American gift cards.