What actually moves your credit score
Canada has two credit bureaus, they hold slightly different files on you, and neither of them publishes the recipe. What is public is the list of ingredients, and that’s enough to make good decisions.
There are two bureaus, and their files can differ
In Canada your credit history sits with Equifax Canada and TransUnion Canada. They’re separate companies with separate files. A lender might report to one and not the other, so the two reports can genuinely disagree, and that’s normal rather than a sign something’s wrong.
Canada has two national credit bureaus, Equifax and TransUnion, and not every lender reports to both, so the file each one holds on you can differ.
Scope. Equifax Canada’s own account of how the two files are filled. A lender may report to one bureau, both, or neither, and may report to each at different times, so one file can be more current than the other. It does not say how often the two files differ in practice.
You can look at your own file. Checking it yourself is recorded as a soft inquiry, which Equifax Canada says has no effect on its scores, no matter how often you do it.
Checking your own credit report is a soft inquiry and has no impact on your credit score.
Scope. Equifax Canada’s statement about its own reports and scoring. Soft inquiries are visible to you on your own report but are not shown to lenders as credit-seeking activity.
If you’ve been avoiding looking because you’re afraid of what’s there, looking is genuinely free of consequence. The file already says what it says.
Payment history carries the most weight
Of everything on your report, whether you paid on time is the biggest input. Not how much you paid. Whether the payment landed by the date it was due.
Whether you pay your bills on time is the most important part of your credit score.
Scope. A description of relative importance, not a published weight. Canadian bureaus use more than one scoring model and do not publish the exact formula, so no specific point value can be attached to any single action.
This is why a small, boring, fully paid card can do more for you than a large one you use heavily. Consistency is the signal.
Credit utilization
Utilization is how much of your available credit you’re using. It’s tracked, it moves, and it’s one of the few things you can change quickly.
Canada’s federal consumer agency suggests using less than 30% of your total available credit.
Scope. General guidance, not a threshold guaranteed by any scoring model. Equifax Canada publishes the same rule of thumb. There is no cliff at this level. Utilization is recalculated as balances change, so a single high month is not permanent, but some scoring models also look at balance history over a period of months, so it is not erased either.
Two practical notes. The balance that gets reported to the bureau is often your statement balance, though that depends on when your lender reports, so a payment made before the cycle closes can lower the number that gets recorded. And utilization gets recalculated as your balances change, so a high month isn’t permanent. Some scoring models do look at balance history over time, so it isn’t erased either.
Carrying a balance does not build credit
This one deserves a clean answer, because it’s the most expensive piece of folklore in personal finance and a lot of people repeat it kindly, believing they’re helping.
You do not need to carry a balance for your card to help your credit. Paying on time is what registers. Leaving money unpaid adds interest and can push your utilization up, which works against you on both counts.
Canada’s federal consumer agency tells you to keep your credit utilization low even if you pay the full balance every month, and nowhere lists a carried balance as something that improves a score.
Scope. The agency’s list of what improves a score, not a statement that a carried balance is penalised as such. Its force here is partly the absence: no Canadian bureau or federal source publishes a rule that rewards leaving a balance unpaid, while both the agency and Equifax Canada name high credit use as something that counts against you. Some scoring models do treat a card with recorded activity differently from a dormant one, which is about using the card rather than about leaving money unpaid.
Use the card, pay it in full, repeat. That’s the whole build.
How long things stick around
Nothing on a credit report is forever, and the clocks are shorter than most people fear.
Negative information about credit cards and loans can stay on your Canadian credit report for up to six years.
Scope. The exact period varies by the type of information, your province or territory, and which bureau holds the file. Bankruptcy is six or seven years depending on the province. Positive information is kept longer, in some cases far longer.
Inquiries have their own clock, and the two bureaus keep them for different lengths of time.
A lender’s credit check stays visible on your report for three years at Equifax Canada and six years at TransUnion Canada.
Scope. This is how long the record remains visible, which is not the same as how long it affects a score. Retention can also vary by province. Neither bureau publishes how long an inquiry carries weight in its scoring.
Note the difference between an inquiry being visible and an inquiry mattering. A record sitting on your file for years isn’t the same as a record dragging your score down for years.
Age of accounts and mix
Lenders like to see that you’ve handled credit over time. That means the oldest account you have is quietly valuable, and every new one you open pulls the average down.
Opening a new credit account lowers the average age of your accounts, which can reduce your score.
Scope. Directional guidance, not a quantified effect. No Canadian bureau publishes how many points an account opening costs, and the effect depends on how long your existing accounts have already been open. Closed accounts in good standing stay on a Canadian credit report for years after closure, so closing one does not remove its age from your file straight away. The agency raises this point specifically in the context of opening a card to transfer a balance.
Having a mix of credit types is also a factor. The bureaus list it without saying how much it counts, which is reason enough not to take out a loan you don’t need for it.
Nobody publishes the formula
You’ll find articles with confident pie charts assigning an exact percentage to each factor. Treat those with some suspicion in a Canadian context. The bureaus describe the factors, they use more than one scoring model, and they don’t publish the weights.
Credit bureaus and lenders use different formulas to calculate a credit score, and they do not share the exact details.
Scope. The federal consumer agency’s statement. Equifax Canada’s own explainer, cited at the top of this guide, also says different scoring models may weight the same factors differently. Neither source gives a percentage for any factor, so the percentage breakdowns circulated online do not come from either.
That’s also why nobody, including us, can tell you what a given action will do to your number. Anyone who gives you a precise prediction is guessing.