We have the Delta, American, and United cards right now. There are two overriding reasons to have those cards: the baggage allowance and priority boarding. The baggage allowance pays the annual fee for the cards if you make a couple of trips. And we have really been praising priority boarding lately when flights have been so full. And, these card cancel the effects of that horrible "basic economy" class, since the airlines have decided to consider Spirit a role model. All have about a $100 annual fee, though we do the $200 card for Delta since that gets us a companion fare, which has worked out well for us over the years. We don't really care that much about the miles we get from using the cards. It's not really meaningful.
Just be clear that the free checked bag perk varies. Delta is the best. If you have the card you get a free checked bag for everyone on the same ticket purchase. It does not even matter if you buy the ticket on the card. This is a big deal since some of my travel is for business and they buy the tickets. United is in second place. Theirs only applies if you buy the ticket with the card. Otherwise, it always works. American is the worst. Not only do you have the buy the ticket with the card, but it only applies to domestic flights. We still had to pay $25 for a checked bag to Curacao in May.
We actually have two of the United cards right now, one for each of us. The reason is that United is giving $100 credit towards Global Entry, so you can get Global Entry for free.
All three cards have no foreign transaction fees at this time.
I can't get too excited about earning miles on a credit card. We have other cards that pay cash, sometimes as much as 5%. We mostly just accumulate miles from travel and use that.
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