Your credit score will be checked often throughout your financial life as banks and other lenders evaluate whether or not to lend you money or extend credit. Financial institutions prefer to lend to borrowers with good credit (typically meaning a credit score above 670). Finding out your score can be quick and easy, and it won't hurt your rating.

Can Checking Your Credit Score Hurt It?

The answer is basically no. Personally looking up your current score or credit report won't cause any damage. That's considered a soft inquiry, which has no effect. Whether a soft inquiry is done by you or by a potential lender (for example, a credit card company looking for new customers), your credit score will be safe as long as the inquiry isn't the result of your applying for a loan or other credit.

However, when a lender checks your credit report as part of a credit application you have made, that's considered a hard inquiry. Hard inquiries will show up on your credit report and may shave a few points off your score—most likely less than five—according to FICO, the major credit-scoring company.

Tools You Can Use to Check Your Credit Score

• See if your bank or credit card issuer already provides credit scores. Many banks and credit card issuers give their customers free access to their credit scores. Some also offer tools that will forecast how certain changes to your account, such as late payments or credit limit increases, could affect your score.
• Sign up for an account on a free credit score website. There are plenty of websites that offer free access to your credit score. Some also offer credit monitoring services for a fee. For basic credit score checks, these sites often don't require a paid subscription, though many will charge for more advanced features. Bear in mind that you probably have several credit scores based on different scoring systems, and the ones you can get for free may not be identical to the others.
  

Soft Inquiries vs. Hard Inquiries

As mentioned, soft inquiries have no effect on your credit score. Hard inquiries, also referred to as hard pulls, are another matter. They occur when a financial institution pulls your entire credit report, with your permission, to determine whether you're a good candidate as a borrower. This can result in a small reduction in your credit score for a few months, although the inquiry will be listed on your report for approximately two years.

Examples of Soft Inquiries

• Checking your own credit. This, as we've noted, has no effect.
• A current creditor checks your credit. If you have a credit card or loan, your creditor may want to keep tabs on your finances. Because this is not a new lender peeking into your financial history, it won't hurt your score.
• Your auto insurer looks at your credit file. The company that currently holds your car insurance policy may initiate a soft pull on your credit report in setting or adjusting your annual premiums. Since the mid-1990s, many insurers have used credit reports to determine a motorist's likely level of risk, stemming from a belief that better credit correlates with safer driving.

Examples of Hard Inquiries

• You apply for a new credit card or loan. When you fill out a credit card or loan application, you'll be giving the creditor permission to pull your full credit report.
• You request a credit line increase from an existing creditor. In this instance, the credit provider will pull a new credit report to decide whether or not to grant you that increase.
  

The Bottom Line

Knowing your credit score will give you a good idea of where you stand with current and future lenders. Checking it and your three credit reports periodically will not affect your score and can usually be done free of charge.