Can I get this card?

My girlfriend asked me that while scrolling through her bank's credit card selection one evening. We'd just finished going over an introduction to credit card rewards and she was eager to get her free flight to the Maldives.

She gave me her credit score, which was decent, and I told her to apply. A few minutes later her application was complete and she hit submit. REJECTED. Gentlemen, guess who she was upset with? (Hint: It wasn't her bank.)

I've been working in consumer banking for a little over 2 years and people always ask me to “look into their situation.” To be honest, I don't even know where I would start if I needed to find the person in charge of applications here. I work on the technology side and I do know that the approval process is almost completely automated. The bank's system takes everything you provide, pulls your credit history, and makes a decision based on select criteria. Unfortunately for everyone, these approval metrics aren't on the application page.

If a bank decides that nobody with a FICO credit score under 550 should be approved for their card, they'll still let those people apply.

While similar to college admissions, there are special cases — but the theory behind CreditOdds is that aggregate data will outline the bank's approval criteria for each card.

My girlfriend was obviously upset that she didn't get the card, but she also knew from our earlier discussion that she had just received a “hard pull” on her credit. In short, when banks collect your credit history from a credit bureau that inquiry lowers your credit score. That's because these hard inquiries remain on your credit report for a few years and too many will make you appear as a high risk to lenders. It also means that immediately following a rejection isn't the best time to apply for another card.

Every approval-odds estimate on CreditOdds is built from records submitted by people who actually applied — credit score, income, outcome — not from bank marketing copy or estimated soft-pull APIs. The more people share their results, the sharper the picture gets for everyone reading next.

I'm only scratching the surface in the world of credit cards. If you're interested in learning more please visit the How It Works page.

Finally, this site only works with your help. I started this project by reading thousands of credit card forums to collect data points. If you've found value in what you've seen here please consider posting your results in the future.