How we rank offers
Pure math from each offer's published terms. No paid placement.
Net dollars per day
Days to payout = the requirement window in the terms + the stated payout lag (worst case, so real life is often faster). Opportunity cost = cash you must park × (benchmark APY − the APY that cash earns in the account) × days/365. Today's benchmark is 4.00% APY. Opportunity-cost benchmark: a no-strings high-yield savings rate. 4.00% APY = Live Oak Bank Personal Savings as shown on liveoakbank.com/personal-savings/ on 2026-10-26. Net = bonus − opportunity cost. Net $/day = net ÷ days to payout.
Direct-deposit offers park $0, because your paycheck lands either way. Where the terms let the same deposit waive a monthly fee, we don't subtract the fee. Read each offer's fine print.
"Best for my cash" calculator
It uses the same formula. Offers that need more parked cash than you enter, or a direct deposit you can't make, drop down the list. APY-boost offers scale with your amount up to the published cap.
Bonus as APY
For offers that need parked cash: bonus ÷ cash × 365 ÷ days.
Effort
Starts at 1. Add 1 each for direct deposit, a $5k+ direct deposit, $10k+ parked, card spending, needing an invite or referral, and needing a credit product. Capped at 5. 1–2 = Easy, 3 = Some effort, 4–5 = Heavy lift.
Verification levels
| issuer | Terms read on the bank/fintech's own page on the last_verified date. |
|---|---|
| partial | Headline read on the issuer's page; some requirements come from an aggregator page (named in secondary_source). |
| aggregator | Only seen on a third-party roundup page we fetched (named in source_url). Not yet confirmed on the issuer's page. Treat as UNVERIFIED. |
| secondary | From a third-party page that quotes the issuer's terms; the issuer's own page blocked our fetch. Treat as UNVERIFIED until checked. |
Expiry & countdowns
Countdowns come only from published end dates. Offers with no published date say so. A script flags expired offers on every build, and your browser re-checks dates on load, so expired offers grey out even between updates.
Scope
Nationwide offers you can open online. We skip in-branch and single-state deals on purpose.
We use the same source-and-date standard as our sister sites, AI Money App Tracker and Advisor AI Index. BonusMath is published by the Fintech Lab team.