Credit utilization: the lever you can pull today
Of the five factors in your credit score, this is the one that moves fastest. Here's how to use it.
Credit utilization — the percentage of available credit you're using — accounts for ~30% of your FICO score. Unlike payment history (which takes years to build) or length of history (which you can't rush), utilization updates every month. You can go from a 680 to a 730 in 30 days by paying down a card. Nothing else in credit moves that fast.
The thresholds
Conventional wisdom says 'keep utilization under 30%.' More accurate: lower is always better. The tiers are roughly 0%, 1–9%, 10–29%, 30–49%, 50%+. Each step up hurts your score. Top scores (790+) typically come from people with utilization under 10% reported each month.
The reporting date trick
Your credit card reports your balance to the credit bureaus on your 'statement date' each month — not your due date. If you pay down your card before the statement date, the reported balance is lower, which looks better on your credit report. A common trick: make a payment a few days before the statement closes to manually control the reported utilization.
Don't close old cards
A closed card's credit limit no longer counts toward your available credit. If you close a $10,000-limit card, your total available credit drops by $10,000, and your utilization percentage goes up overnight — even if nothing else changed. Keep old cards open. Use them once a year so the issuer doesn't close them for inactivity.
Put this into practice
Worth tracks your accounts, budgets, and goals — so the concepts in this article aren't just theory.
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