Understanding free credit score services
In an effort to monitor your credit progress, you may have signed up with聽a free score service. But then you applied for a credit card or car loan and realized your free score was different from your聽. What gives?
It used to be that all free scores were from聽, FICO鈥檚 biggest competitor. And VantageScore used to have a different scoring range from FICO鈥檚 basic 300-850; now both have the same range for base scores (but the calculations are slightly different).
Free score services calculate your credit scores based on proprietary scores from the聽major credit reporting bureaus. You have hundreds of scores, and they can vary by which model is used and which credit reporting agency provided the data. (And in the case of credit cards and聽, the score may not even be on the same 300-850 scale.)
Let鈥檚聽dive into some聽of the free score services available today and the factors they use to determine your score.
Where to get a free FICO score
Discover credit cards have recently聽, not just their customers. The FICO score given is a base score derived from data from Experian.
Here are the factors used in FICO鈥檚 scoring algorithms:
- Payment history (35% impact on your score)
- 聽(30% impact on your score)
- Age of credit history (15% impact on your score)
- Account mix (10% impact on your score)
- Credit inquiries (10% impact on your score)
Where to get a free VantageScore 3.0
Like Discover, Capital One has begun to offer scores to anyone, not just its customers. You can get a TransUnion VantageScore 3.0.
Like a FICO score, VantageScore credit scores will range from 300 to 850. They are calculated with the following factors taken into account:
- Credit card utilization (high impact)
- Payment history (high impact)
- Derogatory marks (high impact)
- Age of credit history (medium impact)
- Total accounts (low impact)
- Credit inquiries (low impact)
The formula used to determine your VantageScore isn鈥檛 as precise as that of a FICO score. That鈥檚 not to say it isn鈥檛 useful 鈥� the VantageScore聽takes into account many of the same factors that the FICO score does.聽And if you have a high FICO score, you鈥檙e likely to also have a high VantageScore.
The VantageScore was created in聽a collaboration of all three major credit reporting bureaus, and it puts more emphasis on the last 24 months of your credit report than does the FICO. This puts people with a shorter credit history on a more equal playing field with those who have long credit histories.
Monitoring your score
Whichever score you choose to monitor, it鈥檚 smart to use the same version from the same credit bureau month after month. Looking at聽different scores each time isn鈥檛 very useful and can be frustrating. But watching one score over time can give you a good idea of where you stand and whether you鈥檙e progressing toward your goal.
Bev O鈥橲hea is a staff writer at NerdWallet, a personal finance website. Email: boshea@nerdwallet.com. Twitter:聽.
This article was originally published聽on .
