The best account for travel

There's only one major contendor in this space, and it's the Schwab Bank Investor Checking™ account. Charles Schwab:

1. Will reimburse all ATM fees, domestic and abroad

2. Provide phenomenal customer service

3. Will express ship a debit card abroad if something goes wrong (e.g., an ATM in Mexico eats it)

Case in point: I had all of my ATM fees reimbursed when I spent a month traveling in Southern and East Africa. I cannot emphasize how freeing it is to not have to worry about withdrawing cash wherever you are (even within the United States).

The only caveat is that they will require you to open up a brokerage account with them, but you do not have to fund this account. However, as you'll see in the investing section, Charles Schwab offers excellent investment-related products (including the brokerage account you open in conjunction with the checking account), and I can wholeheartedly recommend them.

Betterment is the only other checking account solution that reimburses all ATM fees, similar to Schwab. However, they have lower withdrawal limits and will push their investment products, which have higher fees compared to Schwab's suite of investment products.