Everything You Need to Know About the Wise Travel Card

Last updated on 22 September 2025

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When I finally committed to heading overseas to join my friend on the European Adventurer Contiki, one of the first things I thought about was charging my phone. Coz it tends to die rather quickly. The second thing I thought about was how does one pay for travel in 2024? And then my friend told me about the Wise travel card.

“It’s like a debit card, but you can load a bunch of different currencies on it, so you’re always paying in the correct currencies and not just raking up lots of New Zealand dollar fees with the exchange rate.”

Honestly, friend, say less. I’m sold.

When I hit that ‘Confirm’ button for the Contiki, the next minute, I was on the Wise website getting myself set up with an account.

In this post, we’re going to take a look at the Wise money card for travel, a bit about it, how it can be used, and what I intend to load into it. And what I thought about using the card when I was finally on the road.

Let’s get into it!

What is the Wise travel card?

Wise travel card, or simply the Wise card, is like an eftpos card, which you can load with different currencies. When you’re in a different country, you can convert money from the virtual wallet into the local currency, saving you the high exchange rates.

Super ingenious if you ask me. There are 40+ currencies that you can convert your money to and from, and you can do it all from the Wise app.

Ordering a Wise card for travelling

Given that I only had 2 months before I was headed over to the other side of the world (New Zealand is a long way away haha), getting myself a travel card with Wise was one of the first things I did after I confirmed my trip, as I mentioned before.

It’s super easy to do.

Head to Wise.com
Create your Wise account
Pop in your details
You’ve got an account!

I ordered mine on the 3rd of June and it arrived on the 18th of June. So that’s about 2 weeks, give or take a day (and New Zealand post is rather slow). But as soon as you set up your Wise account, you can download the app (more on that below!), and start using it straight away. You don’t even need the card if you don’t think you’ll use it.

Just remember, not everywhere will have PayWave, so having the physical card is probably a good idea. Also, you’ll be able to use it at ATMs.

Using Wise for travel

As a traveller, one of the things we need to think about is how we’re going to pay for things. It’s unreasonable these days to carry wads of cash about, especially if you’re going to multiple countries where the currency changes.

Of course, it’s always good to have a little cash on you for those places that don’t take cards, but for the most part, having a bank card like the Wise card is an excellent way to spend while you’re overseas.

On my Contiki trip, there were 16 different countries. Thankfully, most of the countries use the Euro, so it’s an easy conversation that’s needed only once. But there were a few spots along the way that changed currency: England with GBP, Albania with the Albanian Lek, and Bosnia and Herzegovina with the Convertible Mark (though it’s predominantly a cash society).

Where can you use the Wise card?

Think about the Wise card like an EFTPOS card. That means that you can use like just like one! Use the Wise card for online shopping, for paying at the checkout, and for getting cash out of an ATM if you need to (which I did once). Easy!

Does the Wise card expire?

Yes, just like a normal EFTPOS or credit card, there is a 3-year expiry on your physical Wise card. But you can order another one, just as you would with your normal bank cards.

What is the Wise app?

Wise (formerly TransferWise) has a really sleek app which you can download to do your conversions, wherever you are in the world. It’s super simple to use and is really user-friendly. I’ve already had a good play and managed to use it here in New Zealand, in preparation for the big trip!

How to use the Wise app

When you’ve downloaded the Wise app, you can log in and start using your new account. You can actually do a lot more with your Wise App than just top up your account.

There are 4 tabs at the bottom: Home, Cards, Receipients and Payments.

💡 Please note I’m referring to the Android app – the Apple one might be different.

Home

Here on the Home page, you’ll see an overview of your app. You’ll have your account information at the very top, and the chance to Earn a referral in the top right. Then you’ll see how much total money you have across all currencies.

Next up, you have three options:

Send: This is how you send money to someone else who has Wise.
Add Money: This allows you to add money from your home bank account to your Wise Account. You can add via Bank Transfer, Debit Card, POLi or Credit Card. Everything except Bank Transfer will have a small fee, but will come through faster.
Request: You can request money from another Wise account. Sort of like invoicing your friends if you pay for something at dinner.

Below there you will see the Bank Accounts you currently have open with Wise (we’ll come back to this).

Then you have some overviews:

Send Again: quickly pay someone you sent money to recently
Transactions: See your most recent transactions
Explore: This will give you an image like ‘Send wise to a friend’
Transfer Calculator: This shows you how your currencies are doing today, in graph form.
Do More with Wise: And then right at the bottom, it’s got some quick actions

Cards

Here you will see your Cards for Wise. You’ll have your digital one (which you can add to your Wallet), and also information about your physical card if you’ve ordered one.

You’ll be able to see your Pin, Card Details or Freeze your card if you’ve lost it or (hopefully not!) it’s been stolen. There are some often options for managing your card, too, and they’re pretty self-explanatory.

Recipents

Here you can see all the recipients you’ve connected with. If anyone on your contacts list also has Wise, you’ll be able to see them here. You’re also able to Add Recipient – follow the steps, starting with choosing their currency, to add a new recipient to your account.

Payments

The final tab at the bottom of the app is Payments. Here you’ll see all the payment details, like setting up automatic transfers, direct debits, recurring card payments, payment requests, bill splits (super handy!), payment tools (like your wisetag, sending you account via a link, auto conversions), and then your account details for each of your accounts.

How to convert to another currency using Wise

The bank account you’ve got when you first sign up will be whatever currency you set it up with – for me, that was New Zealand Dollars. You can see the bank account and how much money you have in it on the home page of the app.

To the right of that original currency, you’ll be able to add other currencies. For me I needed GBP and Euros. For a later trip, I also added Australian Dollars.

When you want to convert your home currency into another currency, you can select ‘New’ and then follow the prompts to add a currency.

Once you have your desired currency open (it essentially creates a bank account for you in that currency), you’ll be able to Convert your original currency into the new one. To do this, select the currency on the home page and then choose “Convert.” You’ll be able to choose which currency you’d like to convert into another currency, and how much you’ll get when you do.

You may need to allow a few hours for the conversion to happen. Once your currency has been converted, you’re able to use your Wise card or digital card in your Google Wallet or Apple Pay.

💡 Note: Even if you just have your original currency on your Wise card, when you go to pay for something, it will convert to the payment currency at the point of sale.

Woman on holiday at an ATM machine.

How to use your Wise card overseas

Now that you have the correct currency on your Wise card, you can start using it out and about on your travels! ✈️

Whenever you go to pay for something, Wise will take the currency out of the appropriate account in your Wise card. For example, if I swiped my PayWave card in France, it would take the correct number of euros out of my Euro account, even if there was money in my New Zealand account. It’s smart like that.

What currencies does Wise support?

There are so many currencies that Wise supports, and all the bigger ones will be covered. I did find, however, the Albanian Lek and the Bosnian Mark were not in the support list, but when we were in these countries, we were only there for a short amount of time, and we used our cards when we could, knowing it would do the conversion at the time. It would just come out of your Euro account. Or we used a little cash.

You can learn more about the currencies they support here.

My experience using the Wise card in Europe and the UK

As soon as I flew into London from Auckland (via Dubai), I was able to start using my Wise card. I did actually use it once in New Zealand just to make sure it was all hunky-dory and working fine (it was).

While I did order a physical card, I found myself mostly using the digital card, as nearly all places had PayWave and I didn’t want to take my wallet out of my bag if I already had my phone on me (safety, and all that!).

But I found it so super easy to just wave my phone at the machine and it took what it needed to take from my digital card. I ended up topping up my Wise card from my New Zealand bank account a couple of times, and the only thing I found to be annoying was that if I tried to do that on a weekend, then it would take under Monday (New Zealand time) for the money to come in. So do keep that in mind if you’re transferring money between your home account and Wise.

Since I absolutely love the Wise card for Europe and the UK, the next year, when my friend and I decided to pop across to Australia for a holiday, it was a no-brainer to open an Australian Wise account and transfer NZD to AUD. Again, incredibly easy to do, and very easy to use in Australia. I didn’t even take cash out to take with me for this trip.

So there we have it! My review of the Wise card and how much I actually love it for travel. I will definitely be keeping this and using it in the future – I can also use any of the extra money that’s on it, here in NZ. I just need to convert my Australian dollars back to NZD and I can use it like a normal card here at home.

👉🏻 Want a free physical card or a free transfer? Use my referral link here and you’re in!

If you’ve already used the Wise card for travel, what did you think? Let me know in the comments!