--- title: How to Improve Your Credit Score | TIME description: Taylor Tepper explains how you can bump up a low credit score. canonical: https://time.com/video/qjf5hmwQ/ og:title: How to Improve Your Credit Score og:description: Taylor Tepper explains how you can bump up a low credit score. og:url: https://time.com/video/qjf5hmwQ/ og:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/qjf5hmwQ/poster.jpg?width=720 og:type: video.other twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How to Improve Your Credit Score twitter:description: Taylor Tepper explains how you can bump up a low credit score. twitter:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/qjf5hmwQ/poster.jpg?width=720 --- # How to Improve Your Credit Score > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: How to Improve Your Credit Score [Watch (HLS stream): How to Improve Your Credit Score](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/qjf5hmwQ.m3u8) (1:15)  _Published 2016-03-08. Taylor Tepper explains how you can bump up a low credit score._ --- Jul 27, 2023 7:44 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [Credit Scores 101](/video/xfAJXHnw/) ### Credit Scores 101 [What You Need to Know About Your Credit Score](/video/wl4h84ni/) ### What You Need to Know About Your Credit Score [Credit Card & Credit Score Myths](/video/PbCkIZQb/) ### Credit Card & Credit Score Myths --- ## Transcript Today on Dumb Money, what can I do to improve my credit score. I'm here to answer the money questions you think are too silly, stupid or scary to ask. I'm Taylor Tepper, and this is Dumb Money. This is pretty easy. The first thing you gotta do is just pay your bills on time. There are some details you should know and some myths that you should ignore but generally speaking you should get a credit card only if you can pay off balance every month. If you can't do that you're just not ready for a credit card. Let me say that again. Pay what you owe and pay it on time. That's the best way to raise your credit score and keep it from going down. Another tip. Don't use up too much of your available credit limit. Each card gives you an amount so that you spend each month. You don't want to spend more than 20 to 30 % of that. There's a myth though that the more credit card you take out the better your score will get. In fact if you're just getting started with credit cards and you open up a lot of new cards, it could be your standard VISA or MasterCard. Your score will go down a bit temporarily, but eventually, if you keep your spending the same, your score will go back up. A lot of cards, like the Discover IT cards, will give you a monthly FICO score, which really help you keep track of how good of a borrower you really are. [ MUSIC ] ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"How to Improve Your Credit Score","description":"Taylor Tepper explains how you can bump up a low credit score. ","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/qjf5hmwQ/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-03-08T23:54:32.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/qjf5hmwQ.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/video/qjf5hmwQ/","duration":"PT1M15S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/video/qjf5hmwQ/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}} ```