How Canadians Can Check Their Credit Score and Report for Free

You can check your credit score and report in Canada for free, directly from a national credit bureau.

By Promissory.ca Editorial Team Reviewed against official Canadian sources Last updated: 2026-09-16

What a credit score actually measures

A credit score is a number a credit bureau calculates from the contents of your credit file. It compresses years of borrowing behaviour into a single value that a lender can compare against a cut-off. It is not a measure of your income, your savings or your net worth, and it is not one national number: different bureaus and different scoring models can produce different results from the same file.

In Canada, two national bureaus hold consumer credit files: Equifax Canada and TransUnion Canada. Lenders, utilities, telecom providers and other organizations may report to one, the other, or both. Because reporting is uneven, the two files rarely match exactly, which is why checking only one of them can leave you with a false sense of security.

What sits inside your file

Your file holds identifying details, the accounts reported in your name, your payment history on those accounts, how much of your available revolving credit you are using, the age of your credit history, the mix of credit you hold, public records such as bankruptcies, and the inquiries made by organizations that have pulled your file.

What is not in your file

Your salary, bank balances, investment accounts and medical history are not part of a credit file. Neither is a permanent black mark: most negative information is removed after a defined retention period, which depends on the type of information and the law that applies.

How to check your credit score in Canada for free

You do not have to pay to see your own information. Canadian privacy law gives you a right of access to the personal information an organization holds about you, and the bureaus operate free consumer channels alongside their paid products.

Ask a bureau directly

Both national bureaus accept requests for your consumer disclosure, which is the credit report itself. Requests go through their consumer websites or by mail, and you will need to prove your identity, usually with identifying details and copies of documents. The disclosure shows the accounts, balances, payment history, public records and inquiries in your file. A score is a separate output generated from that report.

Use a free score service

Several consumer services provide a free credit score in exchange for creating an account. They are usually funded by advertising, referral arrangements, or subscriptions for monitoring and identity features. There is nothing wrong with using them, but read the consent screens instead of clicking through, and note which bureau the data comes from. If a service demands your social insurance number, ask why, because a credit score can normally be retrieved without it.

Look inside your existing banking app

Many financial institutions display a bureau score inside their app or online banking at no charge to customers. That is often the lowest-effort route. The catch is that the number typically comes from a single bureau and a single scoring model, so it may differ from what another lender sees when you apply for something new.

What you can access, and what it costs

The table below summarizes the main routes. Nothing in the free column requires you to buy a product first.

If you want a complete picture, request your file from both bureaus rather than relying on a single service.

Your access and correction rights under PIPEDA

The Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act, usually shortened to PIPEDA, governs how private-sector organizations handle personal information in Canada. It gives you specific rights over your credit file:

• The right to know why an organization collects, uses or discloses your personal information.
• The right to give meaningful consent, subject to limited exceptions.
• The right to access the personal information held about you, including your credit report.
• The right to ask for corrections when information is inaccurate, incomplete or out of date.
• The right to complain to the Privacy Commissioner of Canada if those rights are not respected.

Those rights do not depend on buying anything. A paid monitoring subscription buys convenience and alerts, not access, because access is already yours.

Hard inquiries and soft inquiries

Not every look at your file is treated the same way. A hard inquiry happens when an organization pulls your file because you applied for credit: a card, a loan, a mortgage, a line of credit, sometimes a new phone plan. A soft inquiry happens when you check your own file, when a lender reviews an account you already hold, or when a business checks your file before sending a pre-approved offer. A hard inquiry may affect a credit score; a soft inquiry does not.

That distinction is why checking your own score is harmless. Where inquiries start to matter is a cluster of applications in a short window, which can look like someone scrambling for money. If you are shopping around, ask each provider whether it performs a hard or soft inquiry before you submit anything.

Reading your report: what to look for

A report is more useful than a score, because it is the raw material the score is built from. Work through it in a fixed order:

1. Confirm your identity details, including name spellings, addresses, date of birth and employer. A merged file can pull a stranger's accounts onto your report.
2. Look for accounts you do not recognize. This is the clearest early sign of identity misuse.
3. Compare balances and limits against your own statements.
4. Check payment history for late payments you never made.
5. Review the inquiry list for organizations you never dealt with.
6. Look for public records that should no longer appear or that belong to someone else.

Fixing errors and protecting your file

Bureaus hold what lenders report; they do not independently verify every entry. If something is wrong, dispute it in writing with the bureau and attach supporting documents. The bureau is expected to investigate and to correct information it finds inaccurate or incomplete, and it will normally contact the lender involved. Contact the lender as well, because only the lender can change what it reports. Keep copies of everything and note the dates. If a genuine error is not corrected, you can escalate a complaint to the Privacy Commissioner.

The everyday protections are unspectacular but effective: use unique passwords, avoid reusing the same login across financial accounts, be cautious about giving out your social insurance number, and review your file on a regular schedule rather than only when you are about to apply for credit.

Why your file matters beyond the score

Canada caps the cost of credit. Under the Criminal Code, the criminal rate of interest is 35% per annum, and an agreement that exceeds that ceiling can be treated as a criminal offence. Payday lending sits under a separate provincial regime: in provinces that permit it, the cost is capped at $14 per $100 borrowed, dishonoured-payment fees are capped at $20, and the maximum payday loan is $1,500. Quebec does not permit payday lending at all. A short payday loan at that capped cost still carries an effective annual rate far above the criminal ceiling, which is a useful reminder that high-cost credit is not a substitute for a stable borrowing relationship.

A file with missed payments, maxed-out revolving accounts or a recent string of applications tends to produce higher pricing, smaller limits or outright refusals. That is not a moral judgment; it is how lenders price risk. The most valuable thing you can do for the cost of your borrowing is keep your file accurate and unremarkable.

Promissory.ca is a Canadian loan comparison and information site that connects visitors with licensed lending partners. We are not a lender, we do not provide financial advice, and nothing here guarantees that any application will be approved.