Length of Credit History Explained

Length of credit history accounts for 15% of your FICO score. It's not the biggest factor — payment history and utilization matter more — but it's one that trips people up, especially when they close accounts or open too many new ones at once.

What the Scoring Model Measures

Under this category, FICO looks at three things:

1. Age of your oldest account: The longer, the better. Someone with a credit card opened 15 years ago has an advantage over someone whose oldest account is 2 years old.
2. Average age of all accounts: This is the mean age across every open account on your report. Having many new accounts drags this down.
3. Age of your newest account: Very new accounts suggest recent credit-seeking behavior, which can be a minor negative.

There's no magic number, but generally: 7+ years of average account age is considered good, and 10+ years is excellent.

Why Closing Old Accounts Hurts

This is the most common mistake people make. Let's say you have three credit cards:

• Card A: Opened 10 years ago
• Card B: Opened 5 years ago
• Card C: Opened 1 year ago

Your average age is (10 + 5 + 1) / 3 = 5.3 years. If you close Card A because you don't use it anymore, your average drops to (5 + 1) / 2 = 3 years. Your oldest account is now only 5 years. You've lost nearly half your credit age in one move.

On top of that, closing Card A removes its credit limit from your total available credit, which increases your utilization ratio. Double negative.

The Impact of Opening New Accounts

Every time you open a new account, it reduces your average account age. If you currently have an average age of 8 years and open a brand-new card, that new card starts at 0 — pulling the average down.

This doesn't mean you should never open new accounts. It means you should be strategic about it. Don't open 3-4 new cards in the same month. Space out new applications. And before applying, consider whether the benefit of the new account outweighs the temporary age hit.

This also intersects with hard inquiries — each application generates an inquiry that separately impacts the "new credit" factor.

What Happens to Closed Accounts

Here's something people don't realize: closed accounts don't disappear from your report immediately. A closed account in good standing stays on your credit report for 10 years after it's closed. During those 10 years, it continues to age and contribute to your average account age.

However, once it falls off after 10 years, your average age recalculates without it — and that can cause a score drop if it was your oldest account.

Closed accounts with negative information (like late payments) stay for 7 years from the first missed payment date.

Building Credit Age When You're Starting Fresh

If you're building credit from scratch or rebuilding after bankruptcy, credit age is working against you. Here are strategies to build it faster:

1. Become an Authorized User

When someone adds you as an authorized user on a credit card, that card's entire history often appears on your report — including its age. If a parent adds you to a card they've had for 15 years, you inherit that 15-year history.

This is the single fastest way to build credit age. Not all scoring models count authorized user accounts equally, but most do.

2. Open Your First Account and Keep It Forever

Whether it's a secured credit card or a student card, your first credit account will always be your oldest account. Treat it with respect. Never close it. Set a recurring small charge on it and autopay it in full.

3. Be Patient

This is the one factor where there's truly no substitute for time. You can improve payment history by paying on time. You can improve utilization by paying down balances. But you can't fake account age. Every month that passes with your accounts open adds to your history.

Credit Age and Credit Repair

During the dispute process, sometimes negative accounts get removed from your report. While this is generally great for your score (the removal of negative information outweighs the age impact), it's worth noting that removing your oldest account — even if it was negative — can reduce your average age.

In practice, the score benefit from removing negative items almost always exceeds any minor hit from losing account age. But it's good to be aware of the interaction.

FICO vs VantageScore on Credit Age

FICO and VantageScore handle credit age slightly differently. FICO requires at least 6 months of history before it can generate a score. VantageScore can score you with just one month of history. If you're brand new to credit, VantageScore may give you a score before FICO does.

Key Takeaways

• Keep your oldest accounts open, even if you barely use them
• Be strategic about opening new accounts — each one lowers your average age
• Authorized user accounts are the fastest way to build credit age
• Closed accounts in good standing stay on your report for 10 years
• Time is the only real solution — every month helps