A self-custody Visa that spends your USDT and USDC without giving up your keys
Available in US
The OrbitX card is pitched at people who already hold their crypto in a self-custody wallet and want a Visa they can pay with, without moving coins onto a centralised exchange. It is not a bank account, it does not hold your balance, and it converts your stablecoin collateral at the moment of payment. The pitch makes sense for a specific reader, and it has gaps that matter, so it is worth walking through who the card suits, what it actually costs, and what the small print does and does not say.
Conditions are current as of October 28, 2026.
Verdict
I have given the OrbitX card a 5.7 out of 10. That score reflects a card that does the core job, spending crypto through a Visa, but leaves several everyday questions unanswered in its public pages, and that combination pulls it down. It suits self-custody holders who want to keep control of their USDT or USDC and spend against it. It does not suit anyone who wants a cheap, well-documented daily card or anyone who needs the kind of consumer protection a regulated bank or e-money institution provides.
The score table breaks the mark down by criterion, with the numbers copied directly from the card’s public documentation.
| Criterion | Mark | Why it gets that mark |
|---|---|---|
| Who can get it | 7 / 10 | International users get one set of terms, US consumers get another, and you must confirm you are not a US citizen for the international card, with no public country list. |
| Cost | 4 / 10 | Annual fees of $12 (Neo) or $30 (Lux); card prices of $100 for plastic and $350 for metal; Base ATM charges plus 2% plus $2; corporate FX of 1.50%. |
| Top-up options | 5 / 10 | Self-custody wallet collateralised with USDT or USDC, liquidated at the point of sale, but the supported networks are not stated. |
| Reliability and complaints | 5 / 10 | Run by OrbitX Network Group Pte. Ltd in Singapore, which says it is not a bank; issuer named Third National; App Store rating 2.5 out of 5 across two reviews, with one report of a transfer showing failed in-app while the sender’s side completed. |
| Everyday use | 8 / 10 | Virtual Visa available, plastic and metal listed, physical card described as “coming soon”; Apple Pay and Google Pay supported, ATM access included. |
| Total | 5.7 / 10 |
The audience note that runs through the rest of the review is simple: this is a card for self-custody holders spending against USDT or USDC collateral. If that is you, the rest of this page is about whether the card does that job well enough to justify its costs and its gaps.
Who they will give the card to
Two parallel sets of terms govern eligibility, and the split matters. The international consumer terms apply to most readers; a separate set of US terms applies to US consumers. To take the international card you have to confirm that you are not a United States citizen, and you also have to confirm that you are not on the OFAC sanctions list. There is no list of supported or unsupported countries, which means the only reliable check is to read the terms and confirm the citizenship attestation yourself.
For someone who is not American and not sanctioned, the door is open. For an American, the door opens onto a different version of the card, and the international version is not the one to apply for. The “anywhere but the US” framing is convenient for the provider but leaves the rest of the world without a clear yes/no per country. If you live somewhere with a strict payments regulator, you should expect the KYC step (covered in the next section) to be the moment that the answer is given.
Two practical points follow. First, because there is no published country list, eligibility is effectively decided after you sign up, during KYC. Second, the absence of a list is itself a signal: cards that can serve a country usually say so, because saying so sells cards.
How to get it
The signup flow is the standard crypto-card flow. You download the iOS app OrbitXPay, work through the KYC process, and apply for a virtual or physical card. The app’s age rating is 18+, and the KYC step exists. App release notes mention a KYC process and resubmissions, which is normal for any regulated card but tells you that you should expect to be asked for documents at some point.
The exact documents are not stated. The proof of address, the KYC levels (basic versus enhanced) and how long the review takes are all not stated. That is not unusual for a young card, but it does mean you should not assume a same-day approval.
The card itself is a Visa. A virtual card is available. The fee page lists plastic and metal, and pairs the Neo tier with a Visa Platinum, and the Lux tier with a Visa Signature, though the page itself is described as garbled. The app says physical cards are “coming soon”, which is a useful data point: if you are reading this and a physical card is essential to you, that is the line to watch.
Delivery is stated as one to four weeks, depending on location. The replacement cost, if you lose the card, is not stated. The interchange between tiers, what changes between Neo and Lux beyond the annual fee and the BIN, is also not clear, so the tier decision has to be made on the visible numbers rather than on a feature matrix.
What it really costs
The costs side of the card is the part that pulls the score down. The table below is the headline view, with values taken from the card’s public pages only.
| Fee or limit | Amount |
|---|---|
| Annual fee (Neo) | $12, paid annually only |
| Annual fee (Lux) | $30, paid annually only |
| Card price (plastic, Neo) | $100 |
| Card price (metal, Lux) | $350 |
| ATM | Base ATM charges + 2% + $2 |
| Consumer FX | Not found |
| Corporate FX | 1.50% on non-USD spend |
| Corporate deposit fee | 0.50% |
| Corporate transaction fee | $0.20 |
| Daily and monthly limits | Not stated |
The cost picture is split in two. On the issuance side, you have a $100 plastic Neo card or a $350 metal Lux card, plus an annual fee of $12 or $30, paid annually only. That is a significant fixed cost before you have spent anything, and it is the first thing to set against any cashback or convenience the card offers.
On the running-cost side, the consumer FX fee is not found in the public pages, which is a gap. The corporate terms publish a 1.50% FX fee on non-USD spend, a 0.50% deposit fee and a $0.20 transaction fee, and those numbers are the closest thing the public pages offer to a running-cost benchmark. ATM withdrawals add the ATM operator’s own charges plus 2% plus $2 on top, which is a meaningful surcharge if you only withdraw a small amount: $2 plus 2% of $20 is $2.40 on a $20 withdrawal, or 12%.
Limits, including daily and monthly spend, are not stated. The App Store listing, which is vendor marketing, claims no spending limits; that is not the same as the published terms saying so. For a card you intend to use for rent or payroll, you will want to confirm the limit in-app after sign-up.
Three everyday payments and what they cost
To make the costs more concrete, here are three everyday payments and how the fees would apply, based on the published numbers.
Coffee at home, $5, USD. No FX, no ATM, no annual fee in the line. The card association’s interchange is absorbed by the merchant; the only cost to you is the spread on converting USDT or USDC to USD at the moment of sale, which is not published as a number. If the spread is in line with stablecoin-to-USD markets, the cost is small; if it is wider, it is invisible to you, which is the more expensive kind of fee.
A meal in Europe, €40, converted to USD on a consumer card. The consumer FX fee is not found. If the consumer fee mirrors the corporate 1.50%, that is $0.60 on the transaction, before any conversion spread. The card’s USD-based collateral is converted by the card association on the way through, and the spread between association rate and mid-market rate is the second cost layer that the public pages do not state.
An ATM withdrawal of $100, domestic. ATM operator charge plus 2% plus $2, so at least $4 plus whatever the operator adds. The published numbers imply a minimum surcharge of $4 on a $100 withdrawal. Smaller withdrawals make the percentage term less important and the $2 fixed term more so: on a $40 withdrawal, the surcharge is at least $2.80, or 7%.
The honest summary is that the running costs are partly visible and partly opaque, and the gaps fall on the consumer side. For a corporate card user the fees are spelled out; for a consumer card user the consumer FX fee and the conversion spread are the two numbers you have to chase in-app.
How to top it up
The funding model is the most distinctive thing about the OrbitX card, and the one most worth understanding before you sign up. The card runs on a self-custodial wallet that you collateralise with USDT or USDC. The stablecoins are not loaded onto the card as a balance; they stay in your wallet, and at the moment of payment the platform liquidates the right amount of stablecoin to settle the transaction. The app shows two account types, a “Cash Account” and a “Card Account”, which appear to be the on-chain and off-chain sides of the same flow.
The model has two implications. The first is that you keep custody of your keys. The platform’s own terms say it does not hold custody of your collateral, which means the usual exchange-style risks (exchange failure, withdrawal freezes, insolvency) are not in play. The second is that liquidation is the moment of conversion, so you are exposed to the spread that the platform takes at that moment, and the published pages do not state the spread.
The networks on which the card accepts USDT or USDC are not stated. That is a meaningful gap. Stablecoins move on many networks, and sending USDT on a network the card does not support is a good way to lose the funds, because blockchain transfers are irreversible and there is no general recovery path. Circle stopped supporting USDC on Tron in February 2024, so the assumption that USDC on TRC20 is always available is no longer safe. Before you send anything, the safest move is to find the deposit address in the app and send a small test amount first, on the network the app indicates.
There is no separate consumer top-up process described. The collateral is the top-up. Withdrawal is described only in the negative: the terms say that any unencumbered collateral balance remains freely accessible, but the actual process of getting unencumbered collateral back into your own wallet is not described step by step. In practice that means the workflow has to be learned inside the app, and that is a friction point worth knowing about in advance.
Paying with it every day
On the day-to-day side, the card behaves like a normal Visa. The virtual card is available, and the app says physical cards are coming soon. Apple Pay and Google Pay are supported: the public terms explicitly cover both wallets, which is a positive signal because wallet support is not a given for crypto cards.
The merchant side of the question is what the card will not let you buy. Cash-like transactions are prohibited, which the terms read to include cryptocurrency, wire transfers, and betting. The card may also deny internet gambling, which sits inside MCC 7995 and is blocked by many issuers as a matter of policy. If your usual spending pattern includes crypto purchases through a card or sports betting, this card will refuse those authorisations, and that is a feature rather than a bug.
Rewards, in the conventional sense of cashback or points, are not stated. The card’s value proposition is the self-custody model rather than a returns programme, and the public pages do not publish a cashback rate, an earn rate or a sign-up bonus. If you are choosing between two cards and rewards are part of your decision, the comparison has to be made on the published numbers and on what the app shows after sign-up.
For managing the card, the iOS app is OrbitXPay. It has a 2.5 out of 5 rating on the App Store from two reviews, read 2026-10-21. That is a very small sample, and a Google Play listing was not found, so the rating is not a definitive verdict on the app, but it is the only public signal. Disputed charges have a stated process: report the charge within 60 days of posting, respond to a Notice of Dispute within 10 business days, and unresolved disputes after 30 days may go to arbitration. That is a workable process, and the 60-day window matches what most card networks allow.
Two things are missing on the everyday side. There is no stated freeze toggle, no stated 2FA on the app, and no stated limit-setting feature, so the controls that are now standard on bank and e-money apps cannot be assumed here. If those controls matter to you, the answer has to be confirmed in the app after sign-up.
What can go wrong
This is the section where the score is most exposed. The card is run by OrbitX Network Group Pte. Ltd, registered at 3 Fraser Street, #04-23A Duo Tower, Singapore, with UEN 202448623M. The company’s own pages say it is “not a bank or regulated financial institution”. The card is issued by a partner named Third National, under licence from Visa. That is a thinner regulatory layer than a UK EMI or an EU CASP, and the difference shows up at the moment something goes wrong.
The complaint picture from public sources is thin. There is no official incident page, and the Trustpilot page was not found. The only public review is one App Store comment, which warns that a bank transfer showed as failed in the app even though the sender’s side had completed, and that the support reply came from a non-official-looking email. With a sample of one, the lesson is not “this is a scam” but “support is the part to test before you fund the card”. A small, slow transfer with a known counterparty is the right first move.
The security model is the strongest card-suitability argument. Because the platform does not hold custody of your collateral, the usual exchange-failure scenarios (Mt. Gox, Coincheck, FTX) do not apply to the collateral. The risk sits with you: if you lose your seed phrase, the funds are gone; if a clipboard-hijacker swaps the address you copied, the transfer is irreversible. The card also states that it can liquidate collateral if a payment is not settled within one calendar day, or if the collateral value falls below outstanding charges, so a sudden stablecoin depeg or a slow wallet operation could trigger an unexpected sale.
Two other risks are worth naming. The first is sanctions: the terms require you to confirm you are not on the OFAC sanctions list, and stablecoin issuers themselves have frozen addresses on the OFAC list, so the card’s compliance posture is not just a term in the small print, it is also a property of the underlying assets. The second is support. The published support channel is [email protected], and the contact form’s languages and hours are not stated. If you need to recover a transfer or dispute a charge, the only known channel is email, and a reply in a working day is not guaranteed.
What to take instead
OrbitX sits in a small set of crypto cards that aim to let you spend stablecoins without giving up custody. The three cards below are the most natural alternatives, with their own trade-offs.
| Card | Score | What it does differently |
|---|---|---|
| Sponge | 4.9 / 10 | Virtual card only, issued by Rain under Visa; funded by moving USDC from the Sponge wallet; the published cost and FX numbers are not stated. |
| Xplace | 7.7 / 10 | Visa accepted in 160+ countries; virtual card instant, physical in 7-14 business days at the Silver tier and up to Platinum at $999/year; spends stablecoins on Solana with stated FX of 0% at Platinum and a tier-based cashback paid in USDC. |
| ether.fi | 6.7 / 10 | Visa issued in a long list of jurisdictions including several EU member states, the UK, Singapore and 31 US states; tiered FX from 0.5% at Core to none at Pinnacle; cashback paid in ETHFI on stated monthly caps. |
Sponge is the closest structural match: a virtual Visa funded by USDC, in this case moved from the Sponge wallet. Its public pages do not state the cost, the FX fee or the country list, and the score reflects that thin documentation rather than a known problem. If your priority is a card that spends USDC and you do not need a physical card, Sponge is worth a look, but only after you have confirmed the numbers in-app.
Xplace is the most fully-documented alternative. It has a tier structure (Basic free, Silver $99/year, Gold $249/year, Platinum $999/year), a stated 0% FX at the Platinum tier, and a stated cashback rate paid in USDC. The catch is that physical cards are described as Silver live and Gold/Platinum coming soon, and the country list is not stated. The Solana-based funding model is also narrower than the open-ended “send any supported token” model that some cards offer. If documentation matters, Xplace is the more legible choice.
ether.fi is the alternative with the clearest geographic framework. The card is issued only in a published list of jurisdictions, including EU member states, the UK, Singapore and 31 US states, with Belgium and Ireland eligible for a virtual card only. The FX fee is tiered, from 0.5% at Core down to zero at Pinnacle and VIP, and cashback is paid in ETHFI subject to stated monthly caps. The card accepts a broad set of tokens to a user-controlled Safe. The trade-off is that the reward token is a project token, not USDC, and the caps may be more restrictive than the headline rate suggests.
The honest reading is that Xplace is the strongest alternative on documentation, ether.fi is the strongest on jurisdiction clarity, and Sponge is the closest structural match to OrbitX. None of them is a drop-in replacement; all of them should be read in full before any decision.
Who I would recommend it to
The reader I would point at the OrbitX card is someone who already keeps USDT or USDC in a self-custody wallet, who is not a US citizen, who is comfortable with the 2% plus $2 ATM surcharge and the $100-to-$350 issuance cost, and who has read the published terms and accepted that the consumer-side FX fee is not stated. For that reader, the card does the job: it lets you spend a stablecoin balance at Visa merchants, through Apple Pay or Google Pay, without handing your keys to a third party.
The reader I would not point at the card is someone who wants a cheap, transparent daily card, who values the protections of a regulated bank or e-money institution, or who needs a US consumer product rather than the international one. For those readers, Xplace or ether.fi is a more legible choice, and an ordinary prepaid card from a regulated issuer is a more conservative one.
There is also a class of reader for whom the card is not a fit on principle. If you would prefer not to have your stablecoins liquidated by an algorithm at the moment of payment, if you want a stated cashback rate rather than a not-stated one, or if you need daily and monthly limits to be published before you apply, this card does not have the answers in its public pages. The answers may be in the app, but they are not on the website, and that is the gap that the rest of the score reflects.
Frequently asked questions
What is the OrbitX card?
The OrbitX card is a Visa, currently available as a virtual card with a physical card described as coming soon, that spends against USDT or USDC held in a self-custody wallet. The stablecoin collateral is liquidated at the point of sale, so the card does not hold a balance in the way a prepaid card does. It is run by OrbitX Network Group Pte. Ltd, a Singapore company, and issued by a partner called Third National.
How does the OrbitX card work?
You collateralise your self-custody wallet with USDT or USDC, and the card pays for purchases by liquidating the right amount of stablecoin at the moment of sale. The wallet is yours, not the platform’s, and the terms state that the platform does not hold custody of the collateral. The card shows up in the iOS app OrbitXPay and can be added to Apple Pay or Google Pay.
Is OrbitX a bank?
No. The company’s own pages say it is not a bank or a regulated financial institution, and the card is issued by a partner called Third National under a Visa licence. The regulatory layer is therefore thinner than a UK e-money institution or an EU payment institution, and the consumer protections that come with those licences do not necessarily apply.
Who owns OrbitX?
OrbitX is run by OrbitX Network Group Pte. Ltd, registered in Singapore at 3 Fraser Street, #04-23A Duo Tower, with UEN 202448623M. The card-issuing partner is named Third National, but the ownership of that partner is not publicly described.
Is the OrbitX card available in the United States?
US consumers can apply for a separate US version of the card, on a different set of terms. The international version requires the applicant to confirm that they are not a United States citizen. There is no published list of supported or unsupported countries outside the US, so eligibility is effectively decided during KYC.
Does the OrbitX card require KYC?
Yes. The app release notes mention a KYC process and resubmissions, and the app’s age rating is 18+. The exact documents, the KYC levels and the review time are not stated in the public pages, so you should expect to be asked for identity and address documents at some point during the application.
How do I top up the OrbitX card?
The funding model is the collateral in your self-custody wallet. You send USDT or USDC to the wallet, and the card spends against it. The supported networks are not stated in the public pages, so the safe move is to find the deposit address in the app and send a small test amount first, on the network the app indicates, before sending a larger sum.
How much does the OrbitX card cost to run?
The Neo tier costs $12 per year and the Lux tier costs $30, paid annually. The plastic Neo card is priced at $100 and the metal Lux card at $350. ATM withdrawals add the operator’s own charge plus 2% plus $2. The consumer FX fee and the daily and monthly limits are not stated in the public pages, and the corporate terms publish a 1.50% FX fee, a 0.50% deposit fee and a $0.20 transaction fee.
Is the OrbitX card safe?
The self-custody model is the strongest part of the safety story: the platform does not hold your collateral, so the usual exchange-failure risks do not apply to the funds in your wallet. The weaker parts are regulatory (the company is not a bank or a regulated financial institution), operational (the App Store rating is 2.5 out of 5 across two reviews, and the only public review reports a support gap) and personal (losing your seed phrase loses the funds, and a stablecoin depeg could trigger a liquidation).
Can I add the OrbitX card to Apple Pay or Google Pay?
Yes. The public terms explicitly cover Apple Pay and Google Pay, and the iOS app OrbitXPay is the entry point. The card uses a tokenised device number rather than the plastic PAN, which is the standard tokenisation model and which means the card number is never stored on Apple’s or Google’s servers.
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