The DBS Woman’s World Mastercard (WWMC) continues its downward trajectory with yet another devaluation to disappoint us loyal cardholders. Effective from 1st August 2025, the bank has announced a further reduction to the monthly spend cap for earning 4 mpd on online transactions, cutting it from S$1,500 to just S$1,000 per calendar month.

With the reduced cap, cardholders may need to reassess their credit card strategy and consider whether other cards in the market now offer better value for online spending.

DBS announced this latest change for WWMC cardholders in a statement posted on its website on 11th July 2025.

“With effect from 1 August 2025, please note that the cap for online bonus awarding on eligible spend will be revised from S$1,500 to S$1,000.”

DBS

This represents a 33% reduction in the spending threshold for earning the card’s headline 4 mpd rate for online purchases.

Sadly, this is the second significant cut to this benefit in just over a year.

The DBS WWMC’s 4 mpd earning cap has now been reduced twice in relatively quick succession.

This latest change represents a 50% reduction from the original S$2,000 monthly cap that made the card attractive to so many miles enthusiasts based in Singapore.

For full details about the card in it’s current guise with a S$1,500 monthly cap, see our recent comprehensive review, covering all its features.

No changes have been announced for the DBS Woman’s Card (not the WWMC), but that’s not the one we tend to focus on since it only offers 2 mpd on a maximum of S$1,000 online spend per calendar month, and is therefore of little interest to our readers.

The reduction to S$1,000 monthly cap significantly limits the card’s value proposition for regular online spenders. If you currently maximise the S$1,500 cap, from August you’ll see your high-rate earning potential cut by a third.

At the new S$1,000 monthly cap, cardholders can earn a maximum of 4,000 miles per month (48,000 miles annually) at the premium rate, before reverting to the standard (and lousy 0.4 mpd) earning rate for additional spending.

To put this in perspective, 48,000 miles is roughly equivalent to a round-trip Business Class ticket to Thailand or Vietnam, but it’s a far cry from the 96,000 miles annually that were possible in early 2024 – which was nearly enough for a round-trip Business Class ticket to Japan or South Korea, when the 4 mpd spend cap was S$2,000 per month.

The timing is particularly painful given how many daily transactions now take place online, like ride sharing, shopping, food delivery, groceries, movie tickets, streaming subscriptions, air tickets, and hotels.

One big benefit of the DBS WWMC card is that from its bonus earning category, unlike some competitors. However, with the reduced S$1,000 monthly cap, this benefit becomes less meaningful in practice – a single flight booking or hotel stay can easily consume the entire monthly allowance, making it far less useful than when the card offered more generous caps.

This devaluation continues a broader trend in the Singapore credit card market lately, where banks have been progressively reducing benefits and caps on premium earning rates. The DBS WWMC, once considered one of the more generous cards for online spending, has now seen its competitive advantage significantly eroded.

With this latest reduction, the DBS WWMC’s monthly bonus cap is now on par with competitors like the Citi Rewards Card, HSBC Revolution, and UOB Lady’s Card – all of which also cap their premium earning rates at S$1,000 monthly.

It leaves the UOB Lady’s Solitaire and UOB Visa Signature as the only specialised spending cards with monthly bonus caps significantly exceeding S$1,000.

The change particularly impacts the card’s utility for larger transactions that cannot be split across multiple cards, further reducing options for big-ticket expenses. However, the card retains some advantages, including its blacklist approach (where online transactions earn bonuses unless excluded) and the fact that it still awards points – as previously mentioned – for travel-related expenses, unlike some competitors that exclude travel spending.

The key drawback remains the card’s one-year points expiry period, which necessitates annual cash-outs that will now be at a maximum of 48,000 miles, instead of the previous 72,000 miles (and 96,000 miles before that), assuming you only earn in the card’s 4 mpd spending category.

For bonus miles with online spending, cardholders might want to look at alternative products such as:

For larger transactions or travel expenses, higher-cap alternatives include:

It’s worth noting that most alternative cards (except Citi Rewards) adopt a whitelist approach, where transactions only earn bonuses if their merchant category code is specifically included – different from the DBS WWMC’s blacklist approach where all online transactions earn bonuses unless specifically excluded.

Remember you have the rest of June and all of July 2025 to maximise the current S$1,500 monthly cap on your DBS WWMC card before the reduction takes effect, so there’s still some time to capitalise and also reassess your spend strategies going forward.

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The DBS WWMC’s journey from a S$2,000 monthly 4 mpd cap to just S$1,000 represents a 50% reduction in earning potential over the span of 18 months.

While the card maintains some utility for online spending and retains its advantage of not excluding travel purchases, the significantly reduced cap makes it far less compelling for regular users – and travel spend often easily exceeds S$1,000 per month for many of our readers.

The card’s one-year points expiry and limited transfer partner list further compound these concerns.

As the Singapore miles-earning credit card market continues to see benefits eroded almost across the board, cardholders must remain adaptable, ready to pivot their strategies as banks continue to tighten the screws on large-scale reward points earning.

(Cover Photo: Shutterstock)