Is 18 Credit Cards Too Many? What Clark Howard Thinks

Is 18 credits cards too many? What about 30?

A California listener named Perry called into The Clark Howard Podcast recently to ask about credit card churning. “I have maybe 18 credit cards, most accumulated by getting card signup bonuses,” he said. “I use maybe three cards regularly and pay all charges off every month.” His credit score? 830. His question was whether he should proactively close the dormant cards before issuers do it for him.

In most cases, “just leave them be,” Howard said. “You’ve got a score that almost nobody has.”

Howard pointed out that closing accounts would likely result in a lower credit score. Two of the five FICO scoring categories are directly affected when you close an old card: credit utilization (30% of your score) and length of credit history (15%). Closing a dormant card hits both at once.

Consider Perry’s profile. Assume his 18 cards carry an average credit limit of $10,000, giving him roughly $180,000 in total available credit. If he charges $4,000 a month across his three active cards and pays in full, his reported utilization is around 2%. That ultra-low ratio is a major reason he sits at 830. Now suppose he closes 10 unused cards with $100,000 in combined limits. His available credit drops to $80,000. Same $4,000 balance, but utilization jumps to 5%. This might impact his FICO score.

The length-of-history hit is even bigger. Closed accounts in good standing stay on your report for about 10 years, then fall off. A card opened in 2008 and closed today still helps your average age of accounts until 2036, when it disappears and your average age suddenly drops. Perry suggested he would keep the oldest card and the card with the largest limit. That makes sense since those two are doing the heaviest lifting on his score.

Howard’s one carve-out is annual fees. “If you want to close some that have annual fees that you’re not using, fine, if you’re getting no benefit from them.”

Who Should Follow This Advice

Howard’s “leave them be” strategy works for someone like Perry. He’s a disciplined credit user, pays in full, and has no upcoming major loan application. It also works for anyone with a high score, low utilization, and a long credit history they would rather not erode.

It does not fit anyone who finds open credit lines tempting. If having 18 cards in a drawer leads to $25,000 in revolving balances at 24% APR, the score math is irrelevant.

Aggressive churners chasing fresh signup bonuses may also run into issues. “It’s now common with people playing the game, Perry, is that they have as many as 30 cards,” Howard said. But issuers are tightening up. Chase was the first to impose application limits, and more issuers are mimicking Chase.

What about fraud? “The only outside risk you face is that you have a card you’re not using, somehow a criminal gets a hold of the number, and they start charging,” Howard said. “But as you know, as long as you notice that those charges are there and you dispute them within 60 days, you’re not responsible for those.” He suggested setting transaction alerts on every dormant card and checking statements monthly.

“I don’t see any reason for you to do anything different, Perry, because you’re benefiting from all the rewards,” Howard said. “The banks think they’re clever as could be, offering all these things, hooking people. But you’ve been able to make it work completely to your advantage.”

Tips for Using This Strategy

1. Pull your full credit report from annualcreditreport.com and list every open card with its limit, opening date, and any annual fee.
2. Flag only the annual-fee cards you no longer use. Call the issuer and ask to change to a no-fee version of the same card. That preserves the account age and limit while killing the fee. If they refuse, consider closing it.
3. Set a small recurring charge (a streaming service, a subscription) on the cards you want to keep open, with autopay from checking. That keeps issuers from closing them for inactivity.
4. Turn on transaction alerts for every card to catch fraud inside the 60-day dispute window.