To find bank ratings, you can use free online tools from the FDIC and consumer research firms like BauerFinancial, or search the websites of the major credit rating agencies: Moody’s Investors Service, S&P Global Ratings, and Fitch Ratings. Most lookups take only a few minutes once you have the bank’s full legal name or its FDIC certificate number in hand.
What to Gather Before You Search
Banks often operate under marketing names that differ from their legal charter names. A bank you know as “First Community Bank” might be chartered under a different corporate name, or share that marketing name with unrelated institutions across the country. Before you search, pin down the full legal name and the state where the bank is headquartered.
The most reliable identifier is the FDIC certificate number, a unique code assigned to every federally insured bank. You can look this up for free through the FDIC’s BankFind Suite, which lets you search by name, location, or website and returns the certificate number along with financial data going back to 1992.1Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. BankFind Suite Using that number on any rating platform guarantees you are looking at the right institution.
One distinction trips a lot of people up. Large national banks are usually subsidiaries of massive holding companies. JPMorgan Chase Bank is the depository institution where your checking account lives; JPMorgan Chase & Co. is the parent corporation with its own separate credit profile. If you are trying to assess the safety of your deposits, you want the rating for the specific banking subsidiary, not the parent.
Credit Unions Use a Different System
Credit unions are not rated by the major agencies the way banks are. The National Credit Union Administration classifies credit unions into capital categories based on their net worth ratio. A credit union is considered well capitalized at 7 percent or higher, adequately capitalized at 6 percent, and undercapitalized below that.2eCFR. 12 CFR 702.102 – Capital Classification The NCUA publishes a free online tool for researching individual credit unions, and BauerFinancial rates credit unions using the same star system it applies to banks.
Free Consumer Tools
For most people, the fastest route is BauerFinancial. Their website lets you search by state, institution name, or type, and displays a star rating from zero to five without requiring an account or subscription. BauerFinancial compiles its ratings from the quarterly call reports banks file with federal regulators. A five-star or four-star rating means BauerFinancial recommends the institution.3BauerFinancial. Star Ratings The whole lookup takes about thirty seconds.
Because firms like BauerFinancial draw their revenue from consumers and subscribers rather than from the banks they evaluate, they sidestep a conflict-of-interest problem that has long dogged the major agencies, which are typically paid by the institutions they rate.
The FDIC’s BankFind Suite will not give you a letter grade, but it provides the raw financial data that ratings are built from. You can pull reports on a bank’s assets, liabilities, capital levels, and income, all drawn from the same call reports the rating firms analyze.1Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. BankFind Suite If you are comfortable reading financial statements, this is the most authoritative source. If you are not, stick with an interpreted rating from one of the consumer firms.
Rating Agency Portals
For a grade from one of the major agencies, go directly to the S&P Global Ratings, Moody’s, or Fitch Ratings website. Each has a search function where you enter the institution’s name. Most require you to create a free account before viewing detailed reports. The free tier typically shows the current letter grade, the date it was last reviewed, and the outlook. Full credit opinions sit behind paid subscriptions aimed at professional investors.
When navigating these portals, look for the “Long-Term Issuer Credit Rating” or “Financial Strength Rating.” A single bank can carry separate ratings for different types of debt or for short-term obligations, so filtering to the long-term rating gives you the broadest safety picture. Always check the date of the most recent review. A rating that has not been updated in over a year may not reflect current conditions.
The SEC registers credit rating agencies under a designation called Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organizations. As of early 2026, eleven agencies hold this registration, with Moody’s, S&P, and Fitch dominating.4U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Current NRSROs If you see a bank rating from an agency you do not recognize, checking that list tells you whether it is a registered firm.
Paid Reports
Weiss Ratings publishes quarterly guides to bank safety with detailed financial analysis, priced for institutional use rather than individual consumers. For most depositors, the free tools above provide more than enough information. Paid reports earn their price mainly in comparative analysis across hundreds of institutions, which matters more for professional portfolio managers than for someone deciding where to open a savings account.
How to Read the Grades
Rating agencies use alphabetical scales that look similar but are not identical. The SEC describes the typical scale as running from AAA at the top through AA, A, BBB, BB, B, CCC, CC, C, and finally D for default.5U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The ABCs of Credit Ratings Moody’s uses its own naming convention: Aaa, Aa, A, Baa, Ba, B, Caa, Ca, and C. The letters map to roughly the same risk levels, but a Moody’s “Baa2” and an S&P “BBB” occupy the same tier only once you know the translation.
The critical dividing line sits between BBB-minus and BB-plus (or Baa3 and Ba1 in Moody’s terms). Anything at BBB-minus or above is investment grade, meaning the institution has a strong enough financial position that regulated funds like pension plans and insurance companies can hold its debt. Anything below that line is speculative grade, sometimes called “junk.”5U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The ABCs of Credit Ratings For a bank, falling below investment grade is a serious red flag that usually triggers higher borrowing costs and increased regulatory scrutiny.
Agencies refine their grades with modifiers. S&P and Fitch add a plus or minus sign; Moody’s appends 1, 2, or 3, with 1 being the strongest within each tier. An A+ rating signals a slightly stronger position than a plain A, though both sit comfortably in investment-grade territory.
Outlooks and Watch Alerts
A rating alone is a snapshot. The outlook and watch status tell you which direction the agency thinks the grade might move. S&P Global Ratings distinguishes between two forward-looking signals. A “Rating Outlook” reflects the agency’s view of where a long-term rating could head over the next six months to two years. A negative outlook means a downgrade is possible if conditions deteriorate as expected.6S&P Global Ratings. General Criteria: Use of CreditWatch and Outlooks
“CreditWatch” is more urgent. It flags a potential rating change driven by a specific event, like a merger announcement or a sudden earnings collapse, and typically resolves within 90 days.6S&P Global Ratings. General Criteria: Use of CreditWatch and Outlooks When a bank lands on CreditWatch Negative, the agency is saying there is a substantial likelihood of a downgrade in the near term. That warrants closer attention than a negative outlook alone.
The Regulators’ Own Rating System
Beyond the letter grades from private agencies, federal regulators maintain their own classification that carries real enforcement power. Under the Prompt Corrective Action framework, the FDIC sorts every bank into one of five capital categories based on specific ratio thresholds:7eCFR. 12 CFR Part 324 Subpart H – Prompt Corrective Action
- Well capitalized: total risk-based capital ratio of 10 percent or higher, Tier 1 ratio of 8 percent or higher, and leverage ratio of 5 percent or higher.
- Adequately capitalized: total risk-based capital ratio of 8 percent or higher and Tier 1 ratio of 6 percent or higher, but short of the “well capitalized” thresholds.
- Undercapitalized: total risk-based capital ratio below 8 percent or Tier 1 ratio below 6 percent.
- Significantly undercapitalized: total risk-based capital ratio below 6 percent or Tier 1 ratio below 4 percent.
- Critically undercapitalized: tangible equity to total assets of 2 percent or less.
These categories are not advisory. Once a bank drops to critically undercapitalized, the appropriate federal banking agency must appoint a receiver or conservator within 90 days.8Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 12 U.S. Code 1831o – Prompt Corrective Action The bank is immediately barred from paying dividends, making risky transactions, or paying bonuses without regulatory approval. Even at the undercapitalized level, the bank must file a capital restoration plan and faces restrictions on growth. A private agency’s letter grade is an opinion. These regulatory categories are a legal trigger, and the underlying ratios are visible to anyone through the FDIC’s data tools.
What a Bad Rating Actually Means for Your Money
A common misconception is that a low bank rating puts your deposits at risk. For most people, it does not. The FDIC insures deposits up to $250,000 per depositor, per insured bank, for each ownership category.9FDIC. Understanding Deposit Insurance If your bank fails and your balances fall within those limits, you are covered regardless of what any rating agency said.
Ratings become more practically important when your deposits exceed the insurance cap, when you hold bonds or other uninsured products issued by the bank, or when a bank failure might disrupt access to your money for days or weeks during a transition. In rare cases the FDIC can invoke a systemic risk exception to protect uninsured deposits above the standard limit, as it did during the Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank failures in March 2023.10Federal Register. Special Assessment Pursuant to Systemic Risk Determination That exception requires approval from the Treasury Secretary, the Fed, and the FDIC Board, so it is an emergency backstop rather than something to count on.
If your deposits at any single bank sit under $250,000, a poor rating is worth monitoring but not worth losing sleep over. If you are above that threshold, the bank’s financial health matters a great deal more, and running the lookups described above is well worth the few minutes it takes.