Your FICO credit score is built from five factors, each weighted differently: payment history at 35%, amounts owed at 30%, length of credit history at 15%, new credit at 10%, and credit mix at 10%.1myFICO. How Are FICO Scores Calculated These are the five factors that affect a credit score, and knowing how much each one counts tells you where your effort actually moves the needle. The stakes are real: the gap between a strong score and a weak one can mean nearly a full percentage point on a mortgage rate, which adds up to tens of thousands of dollars over the life of the loan.2Experian. Average Mortgage Rates by Credit Score
Payment History: 35%
Whether you pay your bills on time is the single biggest input to your score. Credit bureaus don’t flag a payment as late until it’s at least 30 days past due, so a payment that slips by a few days may trigger a fee from your lender without showing up on your credit report.3Experian. When Does Debt Become Delinquent Once you cross that 30-day line, the damage is real. A single late payment can drop your score anywhere from 50 to 120 points, with the biggest hits landing on people who previously had excellent credit.
Late payments are graded by severity: 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, and beyond. The further behind you fall, the worse the mark. Under federal law, most negative entries stay on your credit report for seven years from the date of the original delinquency. Bankruptcy is the main exception; a Chapter 7 filing stays visible for ten years.4Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1681c – Requirements Relating to Information Contained in Consumer Reports The impact of any negative mark fades as it ages, but the seven-year clock is long when you’re trying to qualify for a mortgage.
Amounts Owed: 30%
The second-largest factor is how much of your available credit you’re currently using. Scoring models express this as a utilization ratio: your total revolving balances divided by your total credit limits.5Equifax. What Is a Credit Utilization Ratio Carry a $2,000 balance across cards with a combined $10,000 limit and your utilization is 20%. The common guidance is to keep this number below 30%, though people with the highest scores tend to stay well under 10%.
Utilization is calculated both per-card and overall. Maxing out one card hurts even if your combined utilization looks reasonable. High balances signal financial stress to lenders regardless of whether every payment lands on time. The upside is that utilization has no memory. Unlike late payments that linger for years, paying down a balance produces an almost immediate score bump once the lower balance is reported.
Asking for a credit limit increase is one of the fastest ways to lower your utilization without paying down debt. If your limit goes from $5,000 to $10,000 and your balance holds at $1,500, utilization drops from 30% to 15%. The catch is that some issuers run a hard inquiry when you request an increase, which can cost you a few points temporarily. Others only do a soft pull. Ask your issuer which they use before making the request, and don’t respond to the higher limit by spending more.
Length of Credit History: 15%
Three measurements feed this factor: the age of your oldest account, the age of your newest account, and the average age of all your accounts.1myFICO. How Are FICO Scores Calculated A profile anchored by a 15-year-old credit card tells lenders something different than a profile where everything was opened in the last two years. Longer histories give scoring models more data and generally produce higher scores.
This is why closing old accounts can backfire. Shut down your oldest card and the average age of your remaining accounts drops, along with the longest track record on your file. Even a card you rarely use adds depth. If it has no annual fee, keeping it open and running a small recurring charge through it every few months is usually the better move.
If you’re new to credit, being added as an authorized user on a family member’s well-established card can jumpstart your file. The account’s full history typically appears on your report, which can add years of on-time payments right away.6Experian. Will Being Added as an Authorized User Help My Credit Two things need to line up: the primary cardholder has to have a strong payment record, and the card issuer has to report authorized user activity to all three bureaus. Not every issuer does, so confirm first. And if the primary cardholder starts missing payments, those problems land on your report too.
New Credit: 10%
Every formal credit application produces a hard inquiry on your report. Each one usually costs fewer than five points, and the effect generally wears off within a year even though the inquiry itself stays on the report for two.7myFICO. Does Checking Your Credit Score Lower It A single application barely registers. The factor starts to matter when several new accounts open in a short window, which suggests to lenders that something has shifted in your financial picture.
Soft inquiries, like checking your own score or a lender pre-approving you for an offer, don’t affect your score. People sometimes avoid checking their own credit out of fear they’ll hurt it. They won’t.
Shopping for a mortgage, auto loan, or student loan is a special case. FICO models treat multiple inquiries for the same type of loan as one inquiry when they fall inside a defined window. For mortgages, that window is 45 days.8Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. What Happens When a Mortgage Lender Checks My Credit For auto loans, it runs from 14 to 45 days depending on the scoring model version.9Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. How Will Shopping for an Auto Loan Affect My Credit So do your comparison shopping in a concentrated burst rather than spreading applications across months.
Credit Mix: 10%
The final factor looks at whether you handle more than one type of credit. Scoring models distinguish revolving credit (credit cards and lines of credit where you decide how much to pay each month) from installment loans (mortgages, auto loans, and student loans with fixed monthly payments). Managing both well shows a versatility that a one-type file doesn’t.1myFICO. How Are FICO Scores Calculated
This is the smallest slice of the score, and it’s never worth taking on debt to diversify your mix. Nobody should finance a car they don’t need for the sake of adding an installment loan. But if you already have a car payment and a couple of credit cards, that combination is quietly working in your favor. Some rent and utility reporting services now let you add those payments to your credit file, which can help round out a thin profile, though coverage varies by bureau and scoring model.
What Your Score Range Means in Dollars
FICO scores run from 300 to 850, divided into five tiers:10Equifax. What Are the Different Ranges of Credit Scores
- Excellent, 800 to 850. Qualifies for the best rates and terms available.
- Very Good, 740 to 799. Near-best rates on most products; a score of 760 or higher generally locks in the lowest mortgage rates.2Experian. Average Mortgage Rates by Credit Score
- Good, 670 to 739. Considered acceptable risk by most lenders.
- Fair, 580 to 669. Often classified as subprime; loan approvals come with higher rates.10Equifax. What Are the Different Ranges of Credit Scores
- Poor, 300 to 579. Most conventional applications will be denied.
To put real numbers on the spread: as of early 2026, a borrower with a 620 score could expect a 30-year mortgage rate around 7.17%, while a borrower at 800 or above would see roughly 6.20%.2Experian. Average Mortgage Rates by Credit Score On a $300,000 loan, that gap adds up to more than $60,000 in extra interest over the full term.
Check Your Report and Fix Errors
You can pull your credit report from all three bureaus once a week for free at AnnualCreditReport.com. The bureaus permanently extended this access after it began as a temporary pandemic measure. Equifax also offers six additional free reports per year through 2026.11Federal Trade Commission. Free Credit Reports Checking your own report is always a soft inquiry and has zero effect on your score.
Regular review matters because errors are common. If you spot an account you don’t recognize, a wrong balance, or a late payment that was actually on time, file a dispute directly with the bureau. All three accept disputes online, by phone, or by mail.12Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. How Do I Dispute an Error on My Credit Report The bureau generally has 30 days to investigate; that extends to 45 days if you filed after receiving your free annual report.13Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. How Long Does It Take to Repair an Error on a Credit Report If the bureau can’t verify the disputed item, it has to remove it.