Capital One Platinum Secured

The Platinum Secured is a plain credit-building tool: a secured card with no annual fee, so the only cost of using it responsibly is the deposit that backs your line. That makes it a reasonable first step if you are starting from scratch or rebuilding after past trouble and want a card that reports like any other. The tradeoff is that it earns no rewards at all, so it gives you nothing back on spending while you build your history. The 28.99% APR is also steep, which means carrying a balance defeats the purpose; pay in full every month. No foreign transaction fee is a small plus, and it sits at #6 on our Best Secured Credit Cards list, but if you want cash back while you build, look at a secured card that earns it.