Key Takeaway: Student loans can affect your credit scores positively or negatively, depending on how your accounts are managed. If you pay them on time, student loans will generally have a positive impact on your scores, but if you miss payments, your credit scores could drop.
Student loans can have a positive impact on your credit scores if you pay them on time, or they can harm your credit if you miss payments or default.
But student loans affect more than just your payment history. They can also affect other factors that credit scoring companies use to determine your credit scores, such as your credit mix, the length of your credit history and your recent credit activity.
Credit Karma provides free VantageScore® 3.0 credit scores, as well as free credit reports, from TransUnion and Equifax. If you’re interested in how your student loans influence your credit scores, you can start by viewing your TransUnion and Equifax credit reports for free through Credit Karma.
- How do student loans affect payment history?
- How do student loans affect other credit score factors?
- Can I remove student loans from my credit reports?
- Next steps: Monitor your credit
- FAQs about how student loans affect credit scores
How do student loans affect payment history?
Making monthly payments on your student loans by the due dates adds to your positive payment history, which is typically the most important factor to your credit scores. On the other hand, paying late or defaulting on a student loan can significantly harm your credit.
The federal government reports student loan payments as late once they are 90 days overdue. Private lenders may report late payments after only 30 days have gone by, so you have less leeway to fall behind on a private student loan.
If you’re having trouble making payments, consider contacting your servicer to discuss options like forbearance or deferment.
Will paying off my student loans help my credit?
Paying off student loans can help strengthen your credit in the long term, but the size of the impact depends on your financial history. You may see a larger improvement from paying off a loan if you had been behind on payments than if the loan was in good standing all along.
Your credit scores may drop a bit after you pay off a student loan because closing an account can alter your credit mix. But the effect would be temporary, and you can continue to build your credit by paying other accounts on time.
What Credit Karma data says about credit scores and student loan delinquency
A July 2026 analysis of Credit Karma’s 24.2 million members with student loan debt showed that the median VantageScore® 3.0 credit score of someone who is delinquent on at least one student loan is 543. Those making student loan payments with no delinquencies had a median score 139 points higher (682).
That doesn’t mean falling behind on a student loan will land anyone’s score in the lowest ranges. The impact can vary based on how behind you are on your student loan and how the rest of your credit profile looks. For example, a student loan delinquency may hit harder if your existing score is high, if you have a thin credit file, or if your report shows delinquencies on other debt, too.
Credit Karma data shows that members who are behind on student loan payments are nearly three times as likely to also be struggling with other debt (mostly from credit cards and personal loans) than those who are paying and fully current on their student loans.
Median credit scores, Credit Karma members with student loans
| Student loan status | Median VantageScore® 3.0 | Behind on other debt |
|---|---|---|
| Fully current – paying as agreed | 682 | 7.4% |
Behind on payments – at least one loan delinquent | 543 | 21.7% |
How do student loans affect other credit score factors?
Aside from payment history, student loans can affect other credit score factors positively or negatively, depending on when you opened your accounts and how they’ve been managed.
You have many credit scores, each backed by its own credit scoring model. These credit scores can vary depending on the model and credit report that’s being used.
Most credit scoring companies, like FICO and VantageScore, create credit scoring models with the same general credit factors in mind. In addition to payment history, those factors include credit utilization, length of credit history, credit mix and recent credit activity. Here’s how student loans can affect your credit scores through each of those factors:
- Credit utilization: Student loans don’t typically affect this credit score factor. Credit utilization reflects how close you are to the limits on your revolving credit accounts like credit cards. Because student loans are installment loans, there’s no way to “max them out” like you would a credit card.
- Length of credit history: A longer credit history is often better for your credit. So, a student loan that you took out several years ago may have a positive impact by contributing to a longer average account age. A student loan that you took out this year might have a slightly negative effect since it could bring the average age of your accounts down. However, this effect will lessen as your account ages.
- Credit mix: Taking out a new student loan could diversify the types of credit accounts you have open and improve your credit mix. But if you already have student loans, a new student loan doesn’t contribute to this factor. While it’s generally better to have a variety of credit types on your credit reports, it’s not a necessity when it comes to building credit.
- Recent credit activity: When you apply for credit, lenders check your credit, and those checks can show up on your credit report as hard inquiries. Applications for most types of federal student loans do not result in hard credit inquiries. However, hard inquiries might occur if you apply for a GRAD PLUS loan, your parents apply for a Parent PLUS loan, or you or your parents apply for private loans.
How long does it take to build credit?
How long it takes to build credit depends on many factors, including what’s on your credit reports, how you manage your accounts and what types of credit scores you’re using to track your progress. If you have little to no credit history, it can often take a year or more to build good-to-excellent credit.
If you have student loans and those accounts are already showing up on your credit reports, you’ve already begun the process of building credit history. To raise your credit scores into the good-to-excellent range, you’ll need to build upon that credit history with consistent on-time payments, as well as other good credit-building habits.
Late or missed payments on your student loans that have been reported to the credit bureaus will count as derogatory marks on your credit reports. If you have derogatory marks, it might take longer for you to build good credit.
Can I remove student loans from my credit reports?
You can’t typically remove information about your student loans from your credit reports unless the information is inaccurate in some way. The credit bureaus will remove accurate information themselves once enough time has passed.
Student loans that you paid on time remain on your credit reports for up to 10 years after the accounts closed. Negative information, such as data on missed payments or accounts that were sent to collections, stays on your reports for seven years.
If you spot a mistake about your student loans in a credit report, dispute the error with the credit bureau attached to the report. You can contact each of the three major credit bureaus online, by phone or by mail to start the dispute process.
Next steps: Monitor your credit
To make sure all the information about your student loans is correctly reported, keep an eye on your credit reports. It’s an especially good idea to check for errors when a new servicer takes over your student loans, since transfers between servicers have resulted in credit reporting mistakes in the past.
You can check your Equifax and TransUnion credit reports, as well as your VantageScore® 3.0 credit scores from those two bureaus, for free through Credit Karma.
If you find a mistake, contact the credit bureau attached to the report to dispute the error.
FAQs about how student loans affect credit scores
Yes, information about your student loans eventually falls off your credit reports. If you pay off a student loan as agreed, the account appears on your credit report for up to 10 years afterwards. Missed payments or a student loan that’s sent to collections can stay on your credit reports for seven years.
Yes. Missed student loan payments can lower your credit scores because they affect your payment history, which is generally the most important factor to credit scoring models. If you miss a payment, you may see a larger decline in your scores if you had excellent credit to begin with or if you made the payment long past its due date.
If you stop paying your federal or private student loans without getting permission to do so — like a deferment, for example — the lender will report that the loan is in default, which can harm your credit. In rare cases, private lenders might sue you. Instead of suing, the federal government is more likely to extend its power without a judgement, such as by directly garnishing your wages.
Deferring a student loan does not harm your credit. The account in deferral remains on your credit report and isn’t reported as delinquent. But, because you aren’t making payments while the loan is deferred, it doesn’t add positive data to your payment history during that time, either.