Ranking of prepaid cards in Belgium
Seven offers ranked, of which only four are prepaid cards in the strict sense. The Belgian market has emptied out: BNP Paribas Fortis withdrew its card in November 2020, bpost closed bpaid at the end of February 2026. What remains is the KBC group, Belfius, and payment accounts that do the same job under a different name. Fees taken from the issuers' official pages on 28 August 2026.
Fees checked on 28 August 2026
In brief
- The CBC Mastercard Prepaid is free with the CBC Pure Online account, and it is the only offer in the panel whose complete fee grid fits on the product page.
- The KBC Prepaid Card costs EUR 12 a year, with a balance capped at EUR 5,000 and top-ups limited to EUR 1,250 per operation.
- KBC and CBC prepaid cards work at neither toll booths, nor car parks, nor duty-free shops: the merchant has to be able to check the balance online.
- Filling up at an outdoor fuel pump requires EUR 125 of available balance, blocked before the amount of the fill-up is even known.
- Belfius charges EUR 1.25 per month per card, i.e. EUR 15 a year, without publishing its withdrawal fees on the product page.
- Every consumer legally resident in a member state has a right to the basic banking service, capped at EUR 16.34 on 1 January 2021 and indexed since: check that right before paying EUR 25 to Nickel.
- 01
CBC Mastercard Prepaid
8.7/10Annual feeFree with the CBC Pure Online accountNon-euro1.6% currency conversion feeNetworkMastercard - CBC BanquePros : No annual fee with the CBC Pure Online account, which is itself free. Loading, unloading and balance checks cost nothing, replacement through Card Stop is free, and the cardholder can be as young as 10. The product page publishes the entire fee grid, withdrawals and FX included, on a single screen.
Cons : It requires a CBC account. A euro withdrawal costs 1% of the amount with a EUR 5 minimum at an ATM, and 2% with the same minimum over a branch or bureau de change counter. As at KBC, the card is refused anywhere the merchant cannot check the balance online.
The best documented Belgian prepaid card, and the only one in this panel that costs nothing per year. The EUR 5 minimum per withdrawal makes it a card to pay with, not to draw cash from.
- 02
KBC Prepaid Card
8.2/10Annual feeEUR 12/year (EUR 1/month)Non-euro1.6% currency conversion feeNetworkMastercard - KBC BanquePros : Twelve euros a year for a Mastercard you can top up in a minute from KBC Mobile, with a balance that has no link to your current account. A third party can credit the card by ordinary transfer, using the account number and structured reference printed on the back. Withdrawals accepted wherever the Mastercard logo appears, capped at EUR 620 per four-day period.
Cons : No insurance at all: the product sheet lines up seven consecutive noes, purchase protection, online purchase protection, travel cancellation and extended warranty included. The balance is capped at EUR 5,000 and each top-up at EUR 1,250. Filling up at an outdoor fuel pump requires EUR 125 available before the amount of the fill-up is even known.
Solid for pocket money and online shopping, disappointing as soon as you leave Belgium. At EUR 12 it mainly makes sense if you already bank with KBC.
- 03
Nickel Classic
7.9/10Annual feeEUR 25/year membership, Classic card freeNon-euroSee the Nickel fee gridNetworkMastercard - Nickel (bpost)Pros : It opens in five minutes at a post office with an ID document, with no income requirement, no minimum deposit and no bar on people excluded from banking. Belgian IBAN, Mastercard Debit, Apple Pay and Google Pay, cash deposits and withdrawals at more than 650 Belgian points of sale. The first three withdrawals of the month at a Nickel Point are free.
Cons : Twenty-five euros a year, the highest membership fee in the panel, for something that is not a prepaid card but a payment account with no overdraft. On 28 August 2026 bpost still displays on its Nickel page a welcome offer reserved for former bpaid customers that expired on 30 April.
The one to take if you hold no account at all. If you already have one, you are buying the same service twice.
- 04
Belfius Mastercard Prepaid
7.3/10Annual feeEUR 15/year (EUR 1.25/month/card)Non-euroNot published on the product pageNetworkMastercard - BelfiusPros : A single pricing line, EUR 1.25 per month per card, whatever type of payment account it is attached to. The fraud policy removes the legal EUR 50 excess in case of loss, theft or unauthorised online use, on three conditions: no gross negligence, immediate blocking through Card Stop, and a police report within 24 hours.
Cons : Fifteen euros a year, the most expensive bank prepaid card in this panel. The product page stops at the annual fee and refers you to the tariff PDF for withdrawal and FX costs. Withdrawals capped at EUR 620 per four-day period, as at KBC.
The fraud cover justifies the three-euro gap with KBC. Sending you to a PDF for everything else does not.
- 05
Revolut Standard
7.1/10Annual feeFreeNon-euro0% up to EUR 1,000/month, then 0.5%NetworkVisa - RevolutPros : No fee, interbank exchange rate within the monthly cap, Belgian IBAN since 2025, a virtual card available immediately and a balance you cannot exceed. The junior account lets you hand a budget to a child while keeping control of it.
Cons : It is not a prepaid card but a debit card tied to the account balance: you cannot ring-fence EUR 50 without opening a dedicated pocket. Free withdrawals capped at EUR 200 a month, charged beyond that. Hotel and car-rental deposit holds are still refused.
The best cost-to-use ratio in the panel if you can impose your own limits. The control comes from you, not from the product.
- 06
N26 Standard
6.8/10Annual feeFree (EUR 10 physical card)Non-euro0% on payments, no monthly capNetworkMastercard - N26Pros : 0% FX on card payments with no monthly cap, where Revolut stops at EUR 1,000. European banking licence and a EUR 100,000 deposit guarantee. No overdraft is possible on the Standard plan.
Cons : The physical card costs EUR 10 and the number of free withdrawals is limited. N26 requires you to be 18, which rules it out for pocket money, the single most common reason Belgians buy a prepaid card.
Preferable if you pay a lot outside the euro zone and rarely withdraw cash. Beside the point for a teenager.
- 07
Wise (multi-currency card)
6.4/10Annual feeFree (EUR 7 issuance)Non-euro0.35% to 0.55%NetworkVisa - WisePros : No annual fee, real exchange rate and fees shown before every transaction. The balance can be held in several currencies at once, which no Belgian bank prepaid card offers.
Cons : The physical card costs EUR 7, FX fees are not zero, and Wise is a payment institution: funds are safeguarded but carry no bank deposit guarantee. No parental control function.
A currency tool before it is a budgeting card. Fine alongside another card, out of place on its own.
BNP Paribas Fortis in 2020, bpost in 2026: who still issues a Belgian prepaid card
The KBC group, under its KBC, CBC and KBC Brussels brands, and Belfius. The list ends there.
BNP Paribas Fortis and Hello bank! withdrew their prepaid Mastercards on 16 November 2020. bpost closed bpaid at the end of February 2026 and steered its former holders towards Nickel, distributed through the same post offices. The replacement is not the same product: bpaid was a prepaid card topped up at the counter, Nickel is a payment account with a Belgian IBAN and a debit card.
The difference shows in the balance. A prepaid card carries its own ring-fenced balance, with no link to a current account. An account without an overdraft carries the account balance. For anyone handing EUR 50 to a teenager without exposing the rest of their savings, that distinction decides everything, and it is what separates the first four items in this ranking from the last three.
The movement has gone one way for six years: no Belgian issuer has launched a prepaid card over that period. The [general guide to Belgian prepaid cards](/en/blog/guides/carte-prepayee-belgique) describes the landscape product by product; this ranking scores and orders them against five weighted criteria.
Sources: KBC - using your prepaid card - Febelfin - Prepaid cards in Belgium: the product guide
Why is a KBC or CBC prepaid card refused at a toll booth?
Because the merchant cannot query the balance online at the moment you drive through.
KBC states it plainly on its usage page: two conditions must be met, a sufficient balance and a balance that can be checked online. Failing that, the card does not go through. The bank lists the cases itself, and the list is worth reading before you buy: toll booths, car parks, drink and sweet vending machines, duty-free shops, the in-flight minibar. Those are precisely the places where you have no fallback in your pocket.
Fuel follows a related rule. To pay at an outdoor pump, the card must carry at least EUR 125 of available balance, sometimes more depending on the operator. The amount is blocked before the volume dispensed is even known, then reconciled a few days later. So you can have EUR 80 on the card, want EUR 40 of diesel, and walk home.
No Belgian comparison site mentions this list, even though it sits in plain sight on the bank's official page. If the refusal comes after the fact and you dispute a blocked amount, the [chargeback](/en/blog/guides/chargeback-carte-credit-belgique) route stays open, but it covers the amount, not the refusal itself.
Sources: KBC - prepaid card conditions of use - CBC - Mastercard Prepaid - Withdrawing cash with a Belgian credit card
The cost sits in the withdrawal, not the annual fee
Zero euros at CBC with the Pure Online account, twelve at KBC, fifteen at Belfius: the whole annual spread of the Belgian bank panel is fifteen euros.
One withdrawal wipes that out. KBC and CBC charge 1% of the amount with a EUR 5 minimum at an ATM, and 2% with the same minimum over a branch or foreign bureau de change counter. Withdrawing EUR 50 therefore costs EUR 5, or 10% of the sum. Withdrawing EUR 500 also costs EUR 5, or 1%. The prepaid card punishes small withdrawals, which is exactly what a teenager does with the EUR 50 you just loaded.
Outside the euro zone, the KBC group applies a 1.6% conversion fee, against 1.5% on most conventional Belgian credit cards. Belfius does not publish that rate on the product page of its Mastercard Prepaid and refers you to the tariff sheet. That layout detail has a direct consequence: two of the three Belgian issuers show their full grid, the third asks for a PDF.
On everyday use, EUR 600 loaded over the year in Belgium and two withdrawals of EUR 100, the bill comes to EUR 10 at CBC, EUR 22 at KBC, and EUR 15 at Belfius plus withdrawal fees I could not price from an official source. The [hidden fees of a Belgian card](/en/blog/guides/frais-caches-carte-credit-belgique) and the [detail of paying abroad](/en/blog/guides/paiement-etranger-carte-credit-belgique) apply to prepaid cards too.
Sources: Belfius - Mastercard Prepaid - National Bank of Belgium - The hidden fees of a Belgian credit card
Do you need a prepaid card, or an account?
If you are looking at prepaid cards because no bank will have you, Belgian law answers before the market does.
Articles VII.56/1 to VII.59/3 of Book VII of the Code of Economic Law give every consumer legally resident in a member state the right to a basic banking service: a current account with a debit card, allowing deposits, withdrawals, transfers, standing orders and direct debits, with no negative balance possible. The bank of your choice must provide it, or refuse in writing and free of charge while stating the appeal routes. The grounds for refusal are listed exhaustively: already holding a current account, holding EUR 6,000 in assets or EUR 6,000 in credit agreements, or falling under the anti-money-laundering law of 18 September 2017. Collective debt settlement is not among them.
The price is capped. The FPS Economy states a maximum of EUR 16.34 from 1 January 2021, indexed each year to the consumer price index. That page has not been updated since 17 May 2021 and shows no figure for 2026: I can give you the starting point and the indexation rule, not the cap in force today. It is an awkward gap on a right whose price is the whole argument.
The trade-off becomes readable. Paying EUR 25 a year to Nickel when a current account capped at roughly fifteen euros is owed to you by law means buying the convenience of the post office and the absence of paperwork. It may be worth that if three banks have already turned you down and you have no appetite to start again. It is not worth it if you have never asked. [Registration with the Central Individual Credit Register](/en/blog/guides/fichage-ccp-carte-credit-belgique) blocks credit, not payment accounts, and [how a Belgian card works](/en/blog/guides/how-credit-cards-work-belgium) explains why the two files do not travel the same route.
Sources: FPS Economy - basic banking service - Ombudsfin - financial services mediation - The CCP credit register in Belgium
From age 10 at CBC, the prepaid card as a first means of payment
CBC accepts a prepaid cardholder from the age of ten, the lowest age on the Belgian banking market.
The parent requests the card for the child, loads an amount from their own account and watches the balance. The sum loaded cannot be exceeded, there is no overdraft, and the card unloads as easily as it loads, through CBC Touch, KBC Mobile or the customer service line. For studies abroad, the same card sends EUR 200 in seconds instead of waiting on a cross-border transfer.
The downside is the one every holder gets: a EUR 5 minimum per withdrawal, refusal at machines that cannot check the balance online, and 1.6% conversion as soon as the spend leaves the euro zone. A Belgian student in Barcelona pays no conversion at all. The same student in London pays it.
One limit strikes me as badly placed. The EUR 5,000 balance cap per card, designed for pocket money, also applies to the adult who would like to use the prepaid card for travel, and each top-up is blocked at EUR 1,250. The product was calibrated for one use and sold to everyone. The [family card guide](/en/blog/guides/credit-card-family-belgium) covers the other arrangements available.
Sources: CBC - prepaid card from age 10 - Wikifin (FSMA) - Credit cards for the family
Rental deposits, hotels, subscriptions: the prepaid card stalls
A prepaid card cannot hold an authorisation.
A car rental firm or a hotel placing a deposit asks for an authorisation against a credit line, not an immediate debit from a loaded balance. None of the seven offers in this ranking answers that need, Nickel, Revolut and N26 included, paid plans and all. Recurring direct debits raise the mirror image of the problem: if the balance hits zero the debit fails and the service is cut, with no warning from the bank.
Chargeback, on the other hand, stays available. It comes from the Visa and Mastercard scheme rules rather than from the type of card, and a prepaid card qualifies like any other. The difference lies in how long you wait to get the money back, since it already left your balance instead of sitting on a monthly statement.
My conclusion fits on one budget line: a prepaid card is a second card, never the only one. As at 28 August 2026, no Belgian offer combines a strictly controlled balance with acceptance for deposit holds, and [car rental](/en/blog/guides/carte-credit-location-voiture-belgique) remains the case where this ranking will be of no use to you.
Sources: Card Stop - FPS Economy - payment services - Renting a car with a Belgian credit card
How we score.
A ring-fenced balance separate from the current account, or just a payment account with no overdraft.
Fees over twelve months, including free-of-charge conditions and any mandatory account.
Withdrawals, currency conversion, top-ups, replacement after loss or theft.
Merchants and machines where the card actually works, deposit holds included.
Minimum age, mandatory prior account, income requirements, credit-register situation.
Sources
Fees read off the issuers' official pricing pages on 28 August 2026. They can change without notice: always check the issuer's page before subscribing.
Frequently asked questions
Which Belgian prepaid card is cheapest in 2026?
The CBC Mastercard Prepaid, free with the CBC Pure Online account, which costs nothing either. Next come the KBC Prepaid Card at EUR 12 a year, then the Belfius Mastercard Prepaid at EUR 1.25 a month, i.e. EUR 15. Taken from the official pages on 28 August 2026.
Why is my prepaid card refused at a car park or toll booth?
Because those machines cannot check the card balance online at the moment of payment. KBC lists the cases on its usage page: toll booths, car parks, drink and sweet vending machines, duty-free shops, the in-flight minibar. The refusal has nothing to do with the amount available.
What does a withdrawal cost with a KBC or CBC prepaid card?
1% of the amount with a EUR 5 minimum at an ATM, and 2% with the same minimum over a branch or foreign bureau de change counter. A EUR 50 withdrawal therefore costs EUR 5, or 10%. Outside the euro zone a 1.6% conversion fee is added on top.
What is the maximum balance on a Belgian prepaid card?
EUR 5,000 per card at KBC and CBC, with top-ups limited to EUR 1,250 per operation. Belfius does not publish a balance cap on its product page but limits withdrawals to EUR 620 per four-day period, as KBC does.
Am I entitled to a bank account if every bank refuses me?
Yes. Articles VII.56/1 to VII.59/3 of Book VII of the Code of Economic Law give every consumer legally resident in a member state the right to the basic banking service: a current account with a debit card and no negative balance possible. Collective debt settlement is not a ground for refusal, and any refusal must be given in writing and free of charge.
Can you rent a car with a prepaid card?
No, in almost every case. The rental firm asks for a deposit authorisation against a credit line, which neither a prepaid nor a debit card can provide. None of the seven offers in this ranking meets that need, paid plans included.
Can a third party load a prepaid card?
Yes at KBC: the account number and structured reference are printed on the back of the card, and anyone can credit it by transfer. At CBC, loading, unloading and balance checks are free. At Nickel, the account is credited by transfer or by depositing cash at a post office.
Do you need an account at the bank to get its prepaid card?
Yes at CBC, KBC and Belfius: the prepaid card is an add-on to a payment account held with them. Nickel, Revolut, N26 and Wise require no prior account; Nickel opens in five minutes at a post office with an ID document.