Buying a gift card with crypto is easy. The hard part is that for a growing share of the things people actually subscribe to, the gift card does not exist at all.

Spotify stopped selling gift cards outright. Cursor and ChatGPT Plus have never had one. OnlyFans does not issue them. Meanwhile the brands that still run healthy gift-card programs — Netflix, Amazon, Uber, Careem — attach conditions that catch people out: the card is locked to the country and currency it was bought in, it is not refundable, and it will not keep a subscription alive once the balance runs dry.

This guide is the brand-by-brand check, done against each company's own terms in August 2026. It covers which gift cards you can still buy with crypto, which ones quietly disappeared, the four structural traps that apply to all of them, and where a reloadable card is simply the better tool.

The pattern is worth pausing on. Gift-card programs are healthiest in streaming and retail — categories built for gifting. They are close to absent across AI tools and creator platforms, which is where subscription spending has been growing fastest.

This is the section the marketplace listings skip, because there is nothing for them to sell you.

This is the one that surprises people, because the search results have not caught up. Spotify's own support page now states that gift cards are no longer available for purchase, and that previously purchased cards remain valid and can still be redeemed. Any site still advertising a "new" Spotify gift card is selling stock bought before the programme closed, or is not selling a Spotify product at all.

Even for legacy cards, the terms are narrower than most people expect: the value applies only to a standalone Premium Individual plan at full price. Family, Duo, Student and trial plans are excluded. Spotify's gift-card terms also state the value is not refundable and cannot be redeemed for cash except where the law requires it.

If you are funding Spotify with crypto, the working route is a card on the account, not a voucher. We cover the specifics in paying for Spotify with crypto.

Cursor sells subscriptions through Stripe and has never shipped a gift card or a gift-a-subscription feature — there is only a long-standing community feature request. Third-party sites selling a "Cursor gift card" are selling a prepaid Visa card with Cursor branding on the listing. Those sometimes clear the first charge and then fail at renewal, because a fixed-balance card dies the month it runs out. Full detail in our Cursor payment methods guide and in paying for Cursor with crypto.

OpenAI publishes no gift-subscription product. What exists are promotional and referral codes, which OpenAI's help documentation describes as single-use, non-transferable and tied to one account. They are not a stored-value instrument and you cannot buy them. See paying for ChatGPT Plus with crypto.

OnlyFans does not publish a gift-card product or policy. The "OnlyFans gift cards" sold by third parties are vouchers that convert into a virtual Visa or Mastercard, which OnlyFans then accepts as an ordinary card — so you are buying a card with extra steps and an extra margin. Our OnlyFans payment methods guide covers what the platform actually accepts.

Anthropic does sell official gift subscriptions for Claude, at claude.ai/gift, in durations of 1, 3, 6 and 12 months across the Pro and Max tiers. Pro runs $20, $60, $120 and $216 for those four durations.

But read what you are buying: it is a fixed-term grant, not a subscription. It does not renew. An unredeemed gift expires 365 days after purchase, and gifts cannot be stacked. It is an excellent present and a poor way to run your own recurring access. For that, see paying for Claude with crypto.

These are structural, not brand quirks, and they are the reason a gift card is a worse fit for recurring spending than it looks.

1. Region and currency lock. A Netflix code bought in USD works on a US account, redeemed in the country and currency it was purchased in. Amazon is stricter still: a US gift card only works on the US storefront, and a cross-marketplace attempt fails as an invalid claim code. For anyone spending across borders — a large share of crypto users — this is the trap that bites most often.

2. Nothing auto-renews. None of the verified programmes act as a set-and-forget renewal. Netflix and Spotify balances prepay the next cycles of an existing subscription and then stop; the plan either lapses or falls back to the payment method on file. Claude and X Premium gifts are fixed-term by their own terms. A gift card can buy you months. It cannot keep an account running.

3. Not refundable. Netflix states its gift cards are non-refundable, non-reloadable and carry no cash value except where the law requires otherwise. Spotify's terms say the same. If you buy the wrong region, that is usually the end of the money.

4. The expiry protection you have heard of is American. In the US, the CARD Act and Regulation E require gift-card funds to stay valid for at least five years from purchase or last load, and bar inactivity fees until twelve months of non-use. That floor is US-only. The UK sets no statutory minimum expiry, relying on unfair-terms law instead, and the EU has no single rule — the 2019 Vouchers Directive standardised VAT treatment, not expiry, so minimums are set country by country. Do not assume the five-year rule travels.

For the brands that do run a programme, several established marketplaces accept crypto directly. Naming them is more useful than pretending they do not exist.

Two honest caveats. First, these are resellers, so expect a spread or markup between what you pay in crypto and the card's face value — check the current rate at purchase rather than trusting any figure quoted in an article, including this one. Second, account and verification requirements differ by marketplace and by purchase size; platforms that advertise minimal verification generally apply thresholds above which checks begin.

Neither wins outright. It depends on the job.

We can put numbers to the mismatch, because we see where crypto-funded card spending actually goes. Across 90 days of anonymised SolCard transactions, sorted by share of categorised purchases:

The categories with the healthiest gift-card programmes are the smallest slice of real spending. Streaming, where gift cards are easiest to buy, is about 4% of purchases. AI tools, where they mostly do not exist, are roughly 23% — close to six times larger, at more than twice the average ticket.

That is the whole story of this topic in two rows. Gift-card infrastructure was built for the last decade's subscriptions. The spending moved. Our fuller breakdown is in what crypto card users actually buy.

Worth stating plainly, because this topic sits next to some ugly search intent. The FTC's current guidance is unchanged and worth repeating: no legitimate business or government agency will ever demand payment in gift cards. If someone instructs you to buy gift cards and read back the codes — a caller, an employer, a support agent, a romantic interest — it is a scam, without exception. Gift-card payments are close to irreversible, which is exactly why fraudsters ask for them.

For the recurring and cross-border cases above, the tool that fits is a card that behaves like any other Visa card at checkout but is funded with crypto.

SolCard issues virtual and physical cards you top up with SOL, USDC or USDT across nine or more networks, including Solana, Ethereum, Base and Polygon. The crypto converts to fiat when you pay, so the merchant processes an ordinary card transaction. Unlike a gift card, it is reloadable, it is not tied to one brand, and it is not locked to the country where you got it — which is what makes it work for a subscription that renews every month.

For a single gift to someone else, buy the gift card. For everything you are paying for yourself, month after month, a card is the simpler instrument.

No. Spotify's own support documentation states that gift cards are no longer available for purchase, though previously purchased cards can still be redeemed. Listings that still advertise them are selling old stock or a non-Spotify product. To fund Spotify with crypto, add a crypto-funded card to the account instead.

No. Cursor has no gift card and no gift-a-subscription feature, only an open community feature request. Third-party "Cursor gift cards" are prepaid Visa cards, and they commonly fail at the first renewal because the balance is fixed.

Yes. Anthropic sells official Claude gift subscriptions at claude.ai/gift in 1, 3, 6 and 12-month durations for the Pro and Max tiers, starting at $20 for one month of Pro. The gift is a fixed-term grant that does not renew, and it expires 365 days after purchase if it is not redeemed.

It depends on the marketplace and the amount. Requirements differ between platforms, and those advertising minimal verification typically apply thresholds above which checks begin. Assume that larger purchases attract more verification, whatever the marketing says.

No. A gift-card balance prepays upcoming billing cycles and then stops. Once it is exhausted, the subscription either lapses or falls back to the payment method saved on the account. For anything you intend to keep, a reloadable payment method is the reliable option.

It depends where you are. In the US, gift-card funds must remain valid for at least five years from purchase or last load under the CARD Act, and several major brands promise no expiry at all. That protection is US-specific: the UK sets no statutory minimum, and EU expiry rules are set nationally rather than EU-wide.

Usually not. Netflix codes must be redeemed in the country and currency of purchase, and Amazon gift cards are tied to a single marketplace, where a cross-region attempt is rejected as an invalid claim code. This is the most common way people lose money on gift cards bought online.