Coin: A Single, Electronic Card to Hold All Your Credit Cards

August 5, 2014

I first heard about Coin many months ago, and thought it was a neat idea. Over the past week, I’ve been reading a bit more about digital currencies and have been thinking more about how I’m handling things like my logins and passwords, my online identities and accounts, etc. And as a result, my thoughts turned to my wallet.

I carry around a great number of cards, but don’t use all of them with much frequency. A majority of the things I have in my wallet are edge cases – things I simply have just in case, but maybe only ever use once every few months. It doesn’t seem very efficient, and the notion of having a single card that would serve as a proxy for all my cards seemed an interesting one.

Coin purports to let you store multiple cards onto one card, allowing you to shrink down the number of cards (credit, rewards, membership) you carry to just one. An app lets you scan your cards and transfer them to your phone… and the Coin card works just like any other card (with a toggle, letting you shift from one to another).

I’ve read up a bit on Google Wallet, but I’m hesitant to tie too much of my stuff to Google (like that hasn’t happened already). Coin seems like a way to transition over to a more electronic method of carrying my cards… while still retaining a bit of personal control.

The cards are being sold now for $100, but are available for pre-order for $50. If you’re considering trying one out, I’ll get $5 credit if you use this referral link (or any of the Coin links on this page).

The card is slated to be released in “Summer of 2014,” so I’m hoping that holds true. I look forward to using Coin for my first purchase: a new, thinner wallet.