January 14, 2026 Rakuten Big Deal: Viator 22%

Today is the day to book any tours or activities as anything you book with Viator will be 22% cash back on Rakuten!

What is the Weekly Big Deal?

In 2025, Rakuten introduced their weekly Big Deals – each Wednesday, you will earn an elevated cash back amount at a specific merchant. Take for example, July 30, 2025’s Big Deal was $400 for SoFi!

January 14, 2026 Rakuten Big Deal: Viator 22%

This is the highest percent of cashback that Rakuten offers with Viator – even better than Black Friday, Online Monday deals!

About Viator

Part of the reason people love to travel is the incredible experiences that exist outside of their comfort zone. Viator can help you find the travel experiences you’re looking for. There are over 100,000 activities available on Viator, spread out across over 2,500 destinations. Even better, the platform was created to make mobile booking easier for people who want to book activities on the go. That means you can always skip the line by booking tickets in advance.

For an in-depth look at Viator and how I have used it (and continue to use) to make travel planning easier, read this

Viator Terms & Exclusions

• Exclusions:  Cash Back will be paid out on completed tours only. Cash Back is not available if card-linked offers, discount codes, or staff and student discount codes are used. Cash Back is not available on theme park purchases and virtual tours. Cash Back is not eligible for bookings made via Viator Travel Agent Program. Cash Back is not available on gift vouchers or purchases made with gift vouchers. Purchases must be made through viator.com to be eligible for Cash Back (app-to-app sales are not eligible).
• Special Terms:  Use of coupon/promotional codes not listed on Rakuten may void Cash Back.

Posting Time

• Cash Back will be added to your Rakuten account within a couple of weeks after travel has been completed.
  • As always, best practice is to use the Rakuten app to ensure that everything is properly tracked/cookied. It may seem like overkill but you’ll thank me with this advice: take screenshots + keep emails from Rakuten and Viator until cash back has been paid out!

Stack with Viator’s Own Reward Program For Even More Savings!

Viator Rewards

• Introduced in 2023, this program now gives you 5% of the tour price on eligible bookings upon completion (the amounts that you are seeing above right are when it was 10% of the activity/excursion price!)
  • You can see the rewards amount during booking or on your confirmation if eligible as well as Viator sending you an email once they have been added to your account
• Once added to your account, the funds can be used towards future bookings.
• Beautiful tips: Learn from my unfortunate mistakes.
  • 1: You will earn rewards in the currency of your first booking so all other bookings need to be in that currency to earn rewards (ie 1st: paid in US dollars, 5th: paid in British pounds – I did not earn on these and that was a decent amount of cash =/)
  • 2: Rewards expire 180 days after they are added to your account – I had over $200 expire!
    • Beautiful tip: To extend your rewards you can book an activity (make sure it’s cancel for free!), apply rewards and cancel. This will reset the expiration period to six months from date of cancellation.

Perhaps You are Wondering What is Rakuten and How to Use It for Cashback?

The TLDR is that Rakuten is a shopping portal that is paid by merchants for directing traffic and the corresponding sales to their sites and Rakuten in turn pays you a portion of that money you go through Rakuten to visit and buy from merchants.

Here’s my in-depth how to guide on Rakuten which includes my own shopping example with a big payoff, showcase of places and things you didn’t think you could earn cashback on (bank accounts, dining at participating restaurants!), payment info and so much more!

Is Rakuten Legit? Seriously is it worth it?

I am sure that there are some of you are that are wondering: is this even legit? Maybe it seems a little too good to be true or maybe a little sketchy? Or is this even worth my time to do?

This was what I was had earned between 6/30/2023 and when I published my guide on Rakuten in 08/2025, I have already earned almost $1,800 cash back (and remember that I primarily use the American Airlines shopping portal!) This is the amount that has been paid AKA how much I have received in cold hard cash (and AMEX Membership Rewards points) – showing that Rakuten really does work as I have received the cashback as promised and advertised!

Join Rakuten and Earn an Extra $50!

Simply use my referral link to sign up and place qualifying orders (that have been confirmed) totaling a minimum of $50 within 90 days of becoming a member! Note that you must be new to Rakuten and must be located in the 50 United States, D.C., or Canada to qualify. Rakuten will send a check or PayPal for the $30 in as soon as 15 days after your first purchase. Then get paid quarterly (you can have it sent as a check, deposit in your PayPal or converted to American Express points or Bilt Points!) or get paid instantly if you redeem your cash back as a gift card.

Why Should You Do This?

The question is why wouldn’t you do this? If you have been thinking about booking anything on Viator, this is the day to do it! It’s an easy way to earn cashback on the spending you were already going to do and a very easy way to do it! Why would you leave money on the table?