Pay for Microsoft Ads with a crypto card

Microsoft Advertising, the platform behind Bing and the Microsoft Audience Network, offers prepay accounts, where you add funds before spending, and postpay accounts, where the card is charged after spend reaches a threshold or monthly. Crypto is not accepted directly, so advertisers who hold USDT bring a card that is funded with it.

A prepaid Mastercard in US dollars is accepted on both account types. Prepay is the natural fit.

Prepay or postpay

Choose prepay when you create the account if it is offered for your country. You add funds with the card, campaigns spend them down, and Microsoft never charges the card on its own. On postpay, Microsoft charges when spend reaches the threshold; keep the card balance above it and above the monthly minimum.

Set the account currency to US dollars at creation so that charges from the card carry no 2.5% conversion.

Adding the card

In Accounts and Billing open Payment methods, add a card and enter the details with the name and billing address from your CryptoCardex account. Microsoft may place a small temporary authorisation to verify the card. Prepay accounts then take an Add funds action for each top up.

If a payment is declined

Check the balance against the amount, then the billing address against the account country, then any pending 3D Secure code in your account. Retry once. If the account is new and Microsoft is reviewing it, payments wait for the review to finish regardless of the card.

What the card itself costs

The card costs $49.99 once and nothing per month. A top up is 3% plus the network fee. A purchase in a currency other than US dollars costs 2.5% of the amount, every approved purchase over $1 carries a $0.10 service fee, and the issuing bank's fee on a purchase is passed on at cost. All of it is in one table on the pricing page; if a charge is not there, we do not take it.

How to get the card and pay

1. Open the card. Sign up with an email address and pay $49.99 once for the virtual Mastercard. The card number, expiry date and CVV appear in your account about two minutes later. No passport and no selfie.
2. Top it up with crypto. Send USDT or USDC on TRON, BNB Chain, Polygon or Ethereum to the deposit address shown in the account. The top up costs 3% plus the network fee, and the balance is held in US dollars.
3. Pay at the checkout. Enter the card like any other Mastercard: number, expiry, CVV, the name from your account and the billing address it asks for. The merchant sees an ordinary card payment, not crypto.

Questions people ask

Does Microsoft Advertising accept prepaid cards?

Yes. Adding funds on a prepay account with the card is an ordinary Mastercard payment.

Is there a minimum top up?

Microsoft sets a minimum for Add funds that varies by currency; it is shown on the Add funds screen. Keep the card balance above it plus a dollar or two.

Can I move an account from postpay to prepay?

Not by yourself. Microsoft support can change it in some cases; otherwise a new account is created as prepay.