Whatever philosophies and processes Apple uses to ensure good user experience, its amazing.
Decided to get the Apple Card on a whim. No annual fees so why not.
Application was done through the iPhone Wallet app. Because Apple already has my email and address, all I did was enter birthdate, ssn, and income, and the card was instantly approved — and added to the app to use for Apple Pay.
Start to finish it took all of 2 minutes from when I got the idea to when I had a new payment acct on the phone ready to go.
When physical card got home, activation of it only needs an NFC tap of the phone…or instead just hit confirm in the app itself. No calling a number and talking to human or robot.
No forex fees. Did a few foreign purchases and charge converted to 1% atop of market rate. With a 2% cashback reward, thats a net 1% earned — better than most native cards outside the US.
The whole app to manage the account is just so much more pleasant than JPMC/AMEX/etc too… they really nailed the design.