Their tagline is “Credit is complicated. ExtraCredit is not”.

So true. I’m sure you’re ready to hear what ExtraCredit is all about!

ExtraCredit is an online software slash website that gives you access to monitor your credit score and credit report.

Monitoring your credit is as important as giving your home a daily wash up. Having frequent access to your credit allows you to be on top of all the happenings and changes on your report. This way you have your finger on the pulse of your credit and know where you’re standing and what credit steps to take at any given time.

More than monitoring, ExtraCredit says they help you “Monitor it, Build it, Earn it, Protect it, Restore it”. How so? We’ll find out right here.

What is ExtraCredit all about

ExtraCredit is an all-encompassing, online credit monitoring website that gives you access to your credit scores and credit reports.

With ExtraCredit, you have some outstanding benefits which is what makes ExtraCredit special and your go-to monitoring tool.

There are so many credit monitoring sites out there. What makes ExtraCredit stand out from the others?

Monitoring your credit

Once you sign up for ExtraCredit, you get immediate access to all 3 credit reports; that’s Experian and Transunion and Equifax. On your reports you see your revolving and loan accounts, your credit history, your account balances and credit utilization, and more.

Experian, Transunion and Equifax are the 3 credit bureaus. They are the ones to whom the lenders report your credit information to, and then the credit bureaus present the info to you in the form of a credit report. Some lenders don’t report everything to each one of the 3 credit bureaus. This causes for you to sometimes see different facts or information being reported on one credit report (Experian for example), while it missing from the other credit report (Transunion for example).

Having ExtraCredit access to all 3 credit reports from each of the 3 credit bureaus is a huge plus. You get to see your entire credit picture without having information missing, which might happen if you view only one credit report out of 3.

28 Fico scores

More that that, Fico is a scoring model that produces your credit score, based on all your credit information. The credit bureaus then relay this credit score to you. Fico has loads and loads of versions that they can base your score on. That’s how you sometimes see one credit score number, while a lender might see a complete different number, just because you’re each viewing a different Fico scoring version.

At ExtraCredit, you get to see, hear this, 28 (!) Fico scores. That’s 28 different Fico versions to your score. Why is this important? Credit monitoring websites usually give you only one credit score. That score can either be from VantageScore or from Fico, which are both credit score modeling companies, but it will always be only one of the hundreds of versions. By having access to 28 Fico scores, you get to see the scores that really matter.

Not all lenders use the same FICO score version. By you having 28 different scores in front of you, you get to see any score the lenders will be seeing and you can therefore make sure your credit is good over 28 versions. After all, why should the lenders have more access to your many different scores than you yourself have?

Building credit, cashback, and protection

On ExtraCredit, you can choose to report your rent and utilities to show on your credit report. Besides for the benefit of having more tradelines on your report, if you pay your bills on time, it can really boost your credit score by having on-time payments reflecting.

Also, you get a $5 sign up reward! Not only that, you can earn up to $300 in cashback through ExtraCredit Reward it, including the cash rewards you get when getting approved for specific card offers, brought to you by ExtraCredit.

As for protection from the dark web, your credit is protected on ExtraCredit with its $1 million identity theft insurance. Plus, you have 24/7 identity monitoring and you get alerts when things seem fishy on your account. So protected you are.

Free trial

Did you want to know what sets ExtraCredit apart from the other credit monitoring sites out there? Besides for 28 Fico scores and 3 credit bureaus’ credit reports, here’s just another reason to Extra Credit.

With ExtraCredit, you get a 30-day free trial when signing up. Free 30-day trial + 3 credit bureaus = one fantastic resource.

Up-to-date design

The difference between using any credit monitoring site and using ExtraCredit, is like the difference of checking in to a 1-star hotel and checking in to a 5-star hotel.

The ExtraCredit software is up to date, eye pleasing and nicely designed. It makes all the difference when choosing this as your credit monitor.

Also, when you feel like the software is being maintained and kept current, you don’t feel like it was just created and thrown out there for people to use or not use. With ExtraCredit, you get the feeling that the developers and owners are right there behind the screen, bringing you the best of 2021 crediting.

ExtraCredit Pricing

ExtraCredit comes along with a free 30-day trial and then the price is $24.99 per month. You can cancel at any time.

If you’re looking to just monitor your credit reports or just view your credit reports then you can do it for free by other companies (check out a list here) so there is no need to pay for a service like ExtraCredit. But if you’re looking to see your different FICO scores (28 of them), then Extra Credit is the cheapest option to see 28 different Fico score versions and get a huge picture of your credit score standings.

Alternatives

Let’s compare two of the others credit monitoring sites to ExtraCredit.

MyFico

With MyFico, you can choose from 3 plans. With the most expensive plan at $39.95 a month, you get access to all 3 credit scores and credit reports updated monthly. Your credit scores are from Fico, which is nice.

You can go with the cheapest option at $19.95 a month but with that, you get just your Experian report.

So while my MyFico has the option for accessing all credit bureau’s reports and many Fico score versions, there’s no free trial 🙁

Experian

Experian.com offers only your Experian credit report, and you get a 7-day free trial. Once your trial is up, you have the option of upgrading to a plan for $24.99 a month, which will give you your Experian report updated daily and your Transunion and Equifax reports updated monthly.

So as you see, you can have the option for all 3 credit bureaus but the free trial runs only for the Experian-only plan.