Credit Karma started its life focusing on users’ credit scores and how to bump them up. It still does that, but it’s evolved into a more well-rounded personal finance app; you can now track your net worth, manage income and expenses, monitor your debt, and pay bills. That said, Credit Karma’s unending recommendations for financial products can be intrusive. It’s among the best budgeting and personal finance apps, but our Editors’ Choice winners and the apps we recommend more highly are Simplifi, which we recommend to most people, and Quicken Classic, which we recommend to power users. Both give you more tools for creating budgets and managing your money, though you still may want to use Credit Karma just for its in-depth credit score information.What Is a Credit Score?Your credit score is a measure of your creditworthiness and is at Credit Karma’s heart. Your credit score supposedly predicts how likely you are to pay what you owe in full and on time. Car dealerships and banks look up your credit score when you apply for a loan. Potential landlords and employers may even have requested your credit score.
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The score is compiled by three major credit bureaus, Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion, based on your history of paying your debts. If you’ve borrowed from a lender that reports to the credit bureaus for at least six months (usually a credit card), you have a credit score. It ranges from 300 to 850. The higher, the better.Keeping an eye on your credit score for changes is one way to watch out for financial fraud. If someone takes out a loan or line of credit in your name and doesn’t make payments on it, your credit score will drop.
Credit Karma specializes in helping you see your credit score often and understand all the things that define it.
(Credit: Credit Karma/PCMag)
How Much Information Does Credit Karma Need?To use Credit Karma, you must provide your name, address, and a few other personal details, such as your Social Security number, so the app can pull your credit information. That’s the core part of Credit KarmaTo get a thorough profile and an estimate of your net worth (and a wider swath of recommendations)—which is optional—you have to give Credit Karma the address of any homes you own and tell it about your vehicles. If you want to import income and expense transactions from your online financial institutions, you need to log in to your banks and financial accounts through Credit Karma and give it access to that data.How Credit Karma Helps You Manage Your MoneyCredit Karma isn’t the best app to use if you want detailed information about individual bank and credit card transactions. It only shows the vendor or income source, date, amount, and account. Apps like Monarch Money provide much more because you can see how your spending is lining up with your expectations through tables and charts, though there are no budgeting tools. The app tracks all the elements that comprise your net worth, like property and debts, but there’s no real way to analyze your cash flow, i.e., what you’re taking in versus what you’re spending. NerdWallet is better for that.Credit Karma does have tools for both tracking and paying bills, however. Once you set up a connection to a biller, you can see your upcoming payments, due dates, amount due, minimum payment amount, current balance, and any recent payments. You can either have the funds withdrawn by the biller through your online connection or you can pay from a Credit Karma spending account (more on Credit Karma’s affiliated banking services below). Quicken Classic is the only other app I’ve reviewed that supports bill pay.Credit Karma is owned by Intuit, the same company that owns TurboTax, so it makes sense that there’s now a tie-in between the two. A link on the app takes you directly to TurboTax’s opening pages. You can sign into an existing account or create a new one. The company says that the relevant data collected in Credit Karma will be imported into TurboTax when it’s time to file your tax return, though I wasn’t able to test it.
(Credit: Credit Karma/PCMag)
Another way Credit Karma helps you monitor your finances is with alerts. You can request notifications via email, in the app, or on your mobile device to tell you about data breaches or identity theft, changes to your accounts or credit report, and information related to your Credit Karma profile.Credit Karma’s Focus on Your Credit…and Its AdsCredit Karma shows you your credit scores and current net worth front and center when you first log in. But then it immediately starts suggesting financial products. They’re essentially ads, but some of them have been selected based on your credit profile, so your chances of being approved could be higher. NerdWallet has a similar setup but is not so aggressive. Its homepage has a few links to suggested financial products, but most of them are confined to the Marketplace section.
(Credit: Credit Karma/PCMag)
Credit Karma’s recommendations, like NerdWallet’s, are based on what it knows about you and the financial products themselves. Each offer includes your odds for approval. You can also search for credit cards using filters like rewards and balance transfers. The app posts a lot of information about these products through its own reviews, user reviews, descriptions, and comparisons. Credit Karma contributors, not the issuing companies themselves, provide this editorial content, making for more objective analysis.Keep in mind that Credit Karma’s offers do not represent the entire universe of financial service companies and products.What Can Credit Karma Teach You?As your credit score changes over time, you can take advantage of Credit Karma’s educational tools to learn more about that critical number and how you might be able to improve it. For example, you can see what factors determine your credit score: payment history, credit card use, derogatory remarks, credit age, total accounts, and hard inquiries (a request for your credit report from potential lenders). Each factor is assigned an impact level, so you know which ones weigh more heavily on your score.Credit Karma also makes your credit report available. The credit report lists all the credit accounts reported to the bureaus in your name, both closed and open. For each active account, you see a detailed overview of your payment history, balance and credit limit, date opened, and account status and type. There are also sections for other things that can affect your credit score, like hard inquiries, collections, and public records, such as bankruptcies and legal judgments.More tools help you better understand your credit. They include a credit score simulator that shows how your credit score might change based on new activity, like a missed payment or opening a new credit card. Calculators give you advice on paying down your debt faster and calculate the accrual cost of taking out a loan.
(Credit: Credit Karma/PCMag)
Credit Karma’s Affiliated Banking ServicesCredit Karma offers two bank accounts: a savings account (Credit Karma Money Save) and a checking account (Credit Karma Money Spend) through MVB Bank, Inc., Member FDIC. Should you choose to open them, you fund these accounts through an external bank account, but if you have your paychecks deposited into Money Spend via direct deposit, you could get paid up to two days early. A Visa debit card is included. These accounts have no fees and no minimums.PCMag isn’t in the business of evaluating financial products and has no opinion about whether these bank accounts are worth having.Credit Karma has another financial product called Credit Builder that can help you build credit while saving money. It’s designed for people who need help improving their credit score. To be eligible, you need a TransUnion credit score of 619 or lower and a Credit Karma Money Spend account. Credit Builder shows up as a line of credit on your credit report and serves as a savings plan where your dollars go into a locked savings account that you make contributions to until you reach a $500 savings goal. Your payments are reported to the credit bureaus, and once you reach the $500 threshold, the money is transferred out of the locked savings account and deposited into your Spend account. These services are provided by Credit Karma’s banking partner, Cross River Bank, Member FDIC. There are no added fees.Intuit Assist Makes Credit Karma SmarterCredit Karma backs up its money management features with a great support system. You can read how-to articles on different topics, chat with an agent, or call (but only if you have a Credit Karma Money account). The app goes further—it has a relatively new AI-powered personal finance assistant called Intuit Assist that provides personalized recommendations based on your Credit Karma profile and data. It might notice, for example, that your credit score has dropped and offer to help you make better financial decisions. Sometimes, you converse with an Intuit Assist persona, while other times, you might see a list of FAQs related to the current page. I like this addition, though it didn’t pop in on me very often while I was testing Credit Karma. It’s new, though. I assume the tool will evolve as more users interact with it.Is Credit Karma Safe to Use?Credit Karma has numerous security features. They include 128-bit or higher encryption, multi-factor authentication (which the PCMag security team recommends you use), and security questions. Like any other good personal finance app, Credit Karma automatically signs you out after a period of inactivity. You can read more about the app’s security practices here. Verdict: There’s No Reason Not to Sign Up, But It’s Not the Only Service You NeedThere’s really no reason not to sign up for Credit Karma. It’s free and you get detailed information about your credit. I wouldn’t make it my home for general personal finance management and budgeting, though. That’s best left to our Editors’ Choice winners, Simplifi, which is ideal for most people, and Quicken Classic, which is best for power users. Still, Credit Karma is a great place to check your current score quickly, learn why it is what it is, and get tips on improving it, all for free.
Pros
Free
Bill tracking and payment
Save and spend accounts, Credit Builder
New Intuit Assist
Good support options
View
More
The Bottom Line
Credit Karma helps you understand what goes into your credit score and net worth and how to improve both. Its targeted financial product recommendations can be intrusive, though.
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