FICO Score Ranges

Have you ever wondered what a good FICO score range is? Don’t worry, you aren’t alone. There have been conflicting reports of the real FICO ranges for years. The Federal Reserve has listed 4 different ranges gathered from their “experts” of 300 to 900, 400 to 900, 336 to 843, and 395 to 848. That’s right, 4 different “experts” came up with 4 different ranges.

Fair Isaac, the company who created the FICO score says there is never really a score of 850 but yet their own documents say that it ranges somewhere in the “low 300’s to something close to 900”. Elsewhere they claim that FICO scores range from 300 to 850 but then preface it by saying that it is extremely rare to see scores on either end of the spectrum.

Experian, one of the three main credit bureaus claims the FICO score is roughly 400 to 900 yet elsewhere they say “The Experian/Fair, Isaac scores range from the high-300s to the mid-800s.”

Fannie Mae claims “credit scores typically used in mortgage lending range from approximately 300 to 900”. While Freddie Mac states “FICO scores range from approximately 400 to 900”.

Even the United States Government doesn’t really know. The U.S. Treasury department says the scores range from 350 to 850. The U.S. Department of Agriculture says “FICO scores generally range between 300 and 900”. And if that isn’t enough the U.S. Bankruptcy Court of Northern District California says “the top FICO score is 800”.

What Is the Real FICO Score Range?

Ok, we can go on and on about how everyone claims different ranges but let’s just combine them all and state that the low range of a FICO score is between 300 and 400, and the high range of a FICO score is between 800 and 900.

But What Is a Good FICO Score?

Well here is the real question isn’t it?

Anything over 720 is probably considered a “good” score. But it is important to note that a person with a credit score of 720 could get denied a loan or get a higher rate than someone with a score of 680 (for example) simply because there are many other factors that come into play. You may have a great credit score but if you lost your job and haven’t been working for 6 months the chances are slim that you will get approved for a loan.

Likewise, a score of 820 might not get you a better rate than a FICO score of 720. It depends on the lender and if they see both scores as “safe” investments they may offer the same rate to both.

Though the chart below isn’t exact, it shows a distribution of the different FICO score ranges.



Some have reported that the average credit score in America is 678 but Fair Isaac says the Median FICO Score in the U.S. is 723 (I’m sure this will change in light of recent economic conditions.)

The “median” is the middle number but not necessarily the average (also known as the “mean”). If you have five numbers (1,3,8,40,20) the median is 8 – the middle number. But the “mean” or “average” would be 14.4 because you take the sum of the numbers and divide by the number of numbers. This can of course bring even more extreme examples like this set of numbers:

(1,1,1,1,2,2,3,3,30,31,32,32,32,32,32,32,32)
Median (middle number): 30
Mean (average): 17.56

Fair Isaac uses the term “median” and not “average” or “mean”. They claim the middle number is 723. But the bigger question is what the FICO score actually predicts in terms of credit risk.

The FICO score attempts to measure the Delinquency Rate or the probability that you will make a payment 90 days late or worse (like a bankruptcy) in the next two years. It predicts that for people with a score under 500, it will happen 87% of the time. For those with a score of 750 and up, it will happen 3% of the time. And for people with a score above 800, the score predicts that only 1% will have a 90-day late payment or worse in the next two years.



The bottom line is that most people in lending will tell you that a FICO score of 720 is good enough but you should probably shoot a little higher to be on the safe side.