<prompt> Human: I have heard in the past that it hurts your credit to cancel credit cards. I currently have 2. One is an amex which I am very happy with. The other is a Bank of America I have had for five years but it has hardly any rewards or kickbacks and I would like to get another one where I can get high fuel rewards but I dont want to have 3 cards, it just seems like too much. I pay my credit card bills off every month in full. I choose to pay everything on credit cards take advantage of the air miles and other rewards.So what Im hoping to figure out is if canceling the BOA card will negatively effect me. And if canceling wont negatively effect my credit, what card has the highest fuel reward  <response>: First find and open the new card, try to get a high limit on it. Then close the old one.Closing a card can have two negative effects: you lose the credit that they were willing to give you, leading to a higher utilization rate if you dont adjust your expenses and you lose the payment history that you had with this card.Opening the new one before closing the old one could help with keeping your utilization rate low. It of course doesnt help with your average credit history, but yeah, I think the hit is minor and will repair within a few years. If you need a high credit score within the next half year or so because you want to get a mortgage, Id not switch now. If you dont, go ahead and switch and find yourself that better card. 