Most comparison sites bury the cards you can actually get. We put approval odds first, show the deposit and the annual fee before you click, and flag every card that has a real path off the training wheels.
They work differently and suit different situations. Pick the one that matches the cash you have available today.
Ranked on approval realism, total first-year cost, and whether the card actually helps you graduate.
2% at gas stations & restaurants (up to $1,000/quarter), 1% everywhere else
No rewards programme
Unlimited 1.5% cash back on every purchase
No rewards programme
No rewards programme
No rewards on the base card
A rough range is enough. Nothing you enter is stored on our servers or sent anywhere.
Every card shows your realistic approval chance — not a wall of offers you'll be declined for.
Deposit, annual fee and APR side by side, with first-year value worked out for your spending.
Fewer hard inquiries means less damage. We point you at the one card most likely to say yes.
Subprime unsecured cards advertise "no deposit" and then charge more in year one than a secured card charges in three. The deposit isn't a cost — it's refundable. The annual fee is the cost, and it never comes back.
Yes — but be selective. At 500 your realistic options are secured cards, credit-builder cards, and a small number of unsecured subprime cards. Secured cards have the highest approval rates because your deposit removes the issuer's risk. Several cards on this site run no credit check at all, so your score isn't the deciding factor.
What you should avoid at 500 is applying to mainstream rewards cards. Each declined application adds a hard inquiry and knocks a few points off, making the next application harder.
Usually, yes. The deposit is refundable — you get it back when you close the account in good standing or graduate to an unsecured line. In exchange you typically get a much lower annual fee and a far better APR than an unsecured subprime card charging $75–$99 a year against a $300 limit.
If the deposit is genuinely out of reach, look at credit-builder cards, which need no deposit at all.
Most people see the first movement in three to six months, provided two things are true: you pay on time every single month, and you keep your balance under about 30% of the limit — ideally under 10%. On a $300 limit that means staying below $90, and preferably below $30.
Payment history is the single largest factor in your FICO score. One missed payment can undo months of progress, so set up autopay for at least the minimum.
Experian, Equifax and TransUnion each keep a separate file on you, and lenders don't all check the same one. A card that reports to only one bureau builds only one file — so a lender pulling a different bureau sees nothing. Every card listed here reports to all three.
We may earn a commission when someone is approved for a card featured here. That's how the site stays free. It does not change the ratings — those are set editorially against fixed criteria, and cards that pay us nothing are ranked on the same scale as cards that do. Where a card is genuinely poor value, we say so plainly in its cons.
