topic Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ... in General Credit Topics

How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

ktm — Fri, 20 Jun 2025 19:05:11 GMT

Many of us have contemplated how many credit cars one should have, or how many is too many. For many of us, credit cards make up the majority of our total credit accounts. Here is another take on this question:

CreditKarma has a "Credit factors" section under "Credit Health" when you log into your account. "TOTAL ACCOUNTS" is one of the six factors CreditKarma uses to help you evaluate your VantageScore. My rating is "Fair", which is color coded yellow, so I clicked on the "Learn more about ratings" button. The "Total Accounts ratings" dialog box pops up that says,

"Needs work: 0-10"

"Fair: 11-20"

"Excellent: 21+"

So according to CreditKarma, to have 'Excellent' credit, one needs to have 21+ credit accounts. This means total accounts - including all types of credit - not just credit cards - and closed accounts that still show on your report.

I wonder if this is actually a real number, and if so, where does this number comes from?

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

FicoMike0 — Fri, 20 Jun 2025 19:24:00 GMT

I think vs

3 scores number of accounts, more is better. Fico likes accounts reporting, three seems enough

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

GZG — Fri, 20 Jun 2025 19:32:10 GMT

@ktm wrote:
Many of us have contemplated how many credit cars one should have, or how many is too many. For many of us, credit cards make up the majority of our total credit accounts. Here is another take on this question:

CreditKarma has a "Credit factors" section under "Credit Health" when you log into your account. "TOTAL ACCOUNTS" is one of the six factors CreditKarma uses to help you evaluate your VantageScore. My rating is "Fair", which is color coded yellow, so I clicked on the "Learn more about ratings" button. The "Total Accounts ratings" dialog box pops up that says,

"Needs work: 0-10"
"Fair: 11-20"
"Excellent: 21+"

So according to CreditKarma, to have 'Excellent' credit, one needs to have 21+ credit accounts. This means total accounts - including all types of credit - not just credit cards - and closed accounts that still show on your report.

I wonder if this is actually a real number, and if so, where does this number comes from?

that comes from a website that is paid when you apply through credit cards with them and when most of its visitors only have a few cards, they're heavily finacially motivated to tell people they should have 298328902 cards to have an 'excellent' amount of cards

perhaps some part of vantage 3.0 scoring does care how many total accounts you have, but it's useless vantage 3.0 scoring

a person should have at least 3 credit cards, with at least two different banks, and ideally at least one visa and one MC. that covers you personally and covers you from a FICO credit perspective.

After that, you should have as many cards as you are willing to responsibly manage.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

SouthJamaica — Fri, 20 Jun 2025 20:42:45 GMT

@ktm wrote:
Many of us have contemplated how many credit cars one should have, or how many is too many. For many of us, credit cards make up the majority of our total credit accounts. Here is another take on this question:

CreditKarma has a "Credit factors" section under "Credit Health" when you log into your account. "TOTAL ACCOUNTS" is one of the six factors CreditKarma uses to help you evaluate your VantageScore. My rating is "Fair", which is color coded yellow, so I clicked on the "Learn more about ratings" button. The "Total Accounts ratings" dialog box pops up that says,

"Needs work: 0-10"
"Fair: 11-20"
"Excellent: 21+"

So according to CreditKarma, to have 'Excellent' credit, one needs to have 21+ credit accounts. This means total accounts - including all types of credit - not just credit cards - and closed accounts that still show on your report.

I wonder if this is actually a real number, and if so, where does this number comes from?

No it's not real, it's a Credit Karma scam intended to provoke people into applying for more cards with their affiliate links.

3 to 5 cards is plenty. Anything more than that won't help your credit in any way.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

JSUB — Sat, 21 Jun 2025 00:39:45 GMT

Credit Karma? The site that would say "Try these cards to increase your million dollar credit limit to $1, 010,000"?

😂

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

Gregory1776 — Sat, 21 Jun 2025 00:53:02 GMT

As said, credit karma (just delete it) is paid to recommend cards for you to apply for - and are probably paid even if you get denied for it.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

AndySoCal — Sat, 21 Jun 2025 02:51:01 GMT

I have 6 open accounts and 9 closed accounts my Vantage 4.0 does not show that score factor? Where did they get that number from they pulled it out of thin air .

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

bs1234 — Sat, 21 Jun 2025 03:39:15 GMT

@ktm wrote:

I wonder if this is actually a real number, and if so, where does this number comes from?

I can confirm 21 is a real number (and actually a positive integer). 21+ is less clear but with most reasonable assumptions that's real too.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

Thomas_Thumb — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:40:42 GMT

@ktm wrote:
Many of us have contemplated how many credit cards one should have, or how many is too many. For many of us, credit cards make up the majority of our total credit accounts. Here is another take on this question:

CreditKarma has a "Credit factors" section under "Credit Health" when you log into your account. "TOTAL ACCOUNTS" is one of the six factors CreditKarma uses to help you evaluate your VantageScore. My rating is "Fair", which is color coded yellow, so I clicked on the "Learn more about ratings" button. The "Total Accounts ratings" dialog box pops up that says,

"Needs work: 0-10"
"Fair: 11-20"
"Excellent: 21+"

So according to CreditKarma, to have 'Excellent' credit, one needs to have 21+ credit accounts. This means total accounts - including all types of credit - not just credit cards - and closed accounts that still show on your report.

I wonder if this is actually a real number, and if so, where does this number comes from?

Those front end rating summaries are not from VantageScore. So, they don't correlate directly to VS score.

However, both VS and Fico want to see a critical mass of accounts. The critical mass for optimal scoring is higher for VS. A total of 11 accounts (open+closed) appears to be a critical mass for VS. Fico is ok with fewer accounts but, fewest cards for an exceptional mix rating has been 7.

At one time I had 11 total accounts. However, 4 have aged off my reports. My file is no longer thick even though it is not considered thin.

You can get top tier scores (above 800) both VS and Fico with 3-5 accounts total. Nonetheless, additional accounts can further boost score and add stability in the long run. My profile was stronger when I had 11 total accounts.

The scoring algorithms don't penalize for having too many accounts. However, they do penalize for too many accounts reporting balances.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

FicoMike0 — Sat, 21 Jun 2025 22:16:21 GMT

@bs1234

I'm not familiar with the use of "+" , as in 21+, but it might be taken to express an element of the hyperreal extension to the reals, where R represents the reals and *R represents the hyperreals. 21+ could then represent the sun of 21 with one of the infinitesimals, which are not elements of the reals.

Keep in mind that the hyperreals are a proper subclass of the surreal numbers, which also include the transfinite ordinal numbers.

Like the reals, the hyperreals and surreals are uncountably infinite sets, one could argue, even more uncountable!

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

bs1234 — Sat, 21 Jun 2025 22:27:47 GMT

@FicoMike0 wrote:
@bs1234
I'm not familiar with the use of "+" , as in 21+, but it might be taken to express an element of the hyperreal extension to the reals, where R represents the reals and *R represents the hyperreals. 21+ could then represent the sun of 21 with one of the infinitesimals, which are not elements of the reals.
Keep in mind that the hyperreals are a proper subclass of the surreal numbers, which also include the transfinite ordinal numbers.
Like the reals, the hyperreals and surreals are uncountably infinite sets, one could argue, even more uncountable!

Good point I was considering if 21+ could mean the limit from the right, but decided that a "reasonable meaning" was >= 21, or perhaps > 21. Clearly I set the bar too low!

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

FicoMike0 — Sat, 21 Jun 2025 23:24:24 GMT

Btw, for those who think the answer to this thread is infinite, Here's an explanation of why infinity is not part of reality,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bq9xR5PUs6s

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

Thomas_Thumb — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:44:05 GMT

"To infinity and beyond"

- Buzz Lightyear

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

FicoMike0 — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 19:33:51 GMT

"Where the transfinite numbers dwell"

- Georg Cantor

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

Realist — Fri, 27 Jun 2025 11:54:39 GMT

As many as you can reasonably manage.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

FICOdawg — Mon, 30 Jun 2025 13:19:25 GMT

@Realist wrote:
As many as you can reasonably manage.

At what point do banks/CC companies start closing out accounts. Annual fees start catching up to you as well.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

coldfusion — Mon, 30 Jun 2025 14:00:03 GMT

@FICOdawg wrote:
@Realist wrote:
As many as you can reasonably manage.
At what point do banks/CC companies start closing out accounts. Annual fees start catching up to you as well.

When a card they issued you collects too much dust from non-use, your credit profile takes a sharp nosedive, or they see what they view as a warning sign that trouble may be on the horizon like a bunch of new cards or limit increases on existing cards reporting within a short timeframe. Every company has a different tolerance level, FNBO will start sending nag messages if a card hasn't been used in 3 months.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

Vinjints — Mon, 30 Jun 2025 14:16:43 GMT

If other banks notice CL Increases, that gives them pause? I understand how a CLD can cause a cascading effect, but why CLIs?

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

NoHardLimits — Mon, 30 Jun 2025 15:31:38 GMT

@Vinjints wrote:
If other banks notice CL Increases, that gives them pause? I understand how a CLD can cause a cascading effect, but why CLIs?

A sudden increase in levels of credit card limits (whether through new accounts or requested CLIs) could be seen as a prelude to bust-out fraud.

Re: How Many Credit Cards? Another Angle ...

FICOdawg — Mon, 30 Jun 2025 18:21:18 GMT

@NoHardLimits wrote:
@Vinjints wrote:
If other banks notice CL Increases, that gives them pause? I understand how a CLD can cause a cascading effect, but why CLIs?
A sudden increase in levels of credit card limits (whether through new accounts or requested CLIs) could be seen as a prelude to bust-out fraud.

This is why I don't understand banks letting people have numerous credit cards with total available limits far exceeding what they could practically afford. The reality is they obviously just look at the defaults as the cost of doing business given the large number of CC consumers staying on the minimum payment treadmill. Cha-ching.