Credit Card Interest Rate Statistics: 2026 Report

Published: November 4, 2026By Benjamin Margolis, Founder and Managing Editor, The Fintech Index

Our analysts reviewed 47 quarters of Federal Reserve G.19 credit card interest rates at commercial banks from February 2015 to August 2026, the monthly bank prime loan rate for the same period, revolving consumer credit balances, and quarterly credit card delinquency and charge-off rates through Q2 2026, 464 data points in all, to show what carrying a card balance costs as of Q4 2026.

Credit card interest is the price of carrying a balance from one month to the next. Card issuers set rates as a margin over the prime rate, which moves with Federal Reserve policy, so card rates rose quickly when the Fed raised rates in 2022 and 2023. They have barely fallen since the Fed began cutting.

We took the average card rates from the Federal Reserve's G.19 Consumer Credit release, which reports two quarterly rates: one on all card accounts and one on accounts that were charged interest. We set those against the monthly bank prime rate, revolving credit balances from the same release, and the Fed's delinquency and charge-off rates on credit card loans at commercial banks.

In the following sections, we compare card rates by year, the gap between card rates and the prime rate, revolving balances, delinquency and charge-off rates, and the yearly interest on a typical balance.

Card Rates Have Held Near 22% Since 2023

The average rate on accounts that were charged interest shows what a cardholder carrying a balance pays. We gathered the November reading for each year from 2015 to 2025 and the latest reading, August 2026, for both G.19 rate series.

Key Findings

• The rate on accounts assessed interest rose 8.66 percentage points from November 2015 to August 2026, and 6.31 points of that came between November 2021 and November 2023.
• The highest reading on record was 23.37% in August 2024, and every reading since has ranged from 21.52% to 22.83%.
• The rate on all accounts, which includes cardholders who pay in full, was 21.19% in August 2026, 1.17 points lower than the rate on accounts that paid interest.

The Gap Over The Prime Rate Is The Widest On Record

The gap between card rates and the prime rate shows how much of the price is the issuer's margin and how much follows Fed policy. We subtracted the bank prime rate for the same month from the rate on accounts assessed interest.

Key Findings

• The gap widened in every year from 2016 to August 2026, from 10.11 to 15.61 percentage points.
• The prime rate fell 1.75 points from its 8.50% peak to 6.75% by August 2026, while the card rate on accounts assessed interest fell only 0.39 points from November 2023.
• The four widest gaps since 1994 all came in 2025 and 2026.

Revolving Balances Have Passed $1.35 Trillion

Revolving credit balances show how much debt the rates apply to. We gathered seasonally adjusted revolving consumer credit for December of each year from 2015 to 2025 and for August 2026.

Key Findings

• Revolving credit fell 12.6% in 2020, from $1,092.0 billion to $954.6 billion, as households paid down cards during the pandemic.
• Balances then grew 36.1% from December 2020 to December 2023, the same years card rates rose most.
• Growth slowed after 2023, and revolving credit rose 4.1% from December 2023 to August 2026.

Card Losses Have Eased But Remain Higher Than Before The Pandemic

Delinquency and charge-off rates show how many cardholders fall behind and how much banks write off. We gathered both rates for credit card loans at all commercial banks for Q4 of each year and for Q2 2026, the latest quarter.

Key Findings

• The charge-off rate more than doubled from 1.63% in Q4 2021 to 4.18% in Q4 2023, and reached a recent peak of 4.69% in Q3 2024.
• By Q2 2026 the charge-off rate had fallen to 3.82%, close to the 3.78% of Q4 2019.
• The delinquency rate was 2.85% in Q2 2026, down from 3.22% in Q2 2024 but higher than every Q4 reading from 2015 to 2022.

A $5,000 Balance Now Costs About $1,100 A Year In Interest

The interest on one balance shows what the rate changes mean for a household. We applied the rate on accounts assessed interest to a $5,000 balance carried for one year, using simple interest.

Key Findings

• At the August 2026 rate, a $5,000 balance costs about $1,118 a year in simple interest, 63.2% more than the $685 it cost at the November 2015 rate.
• The same balance costs $274 more a year than at the November 2019 rate, before the Fed's 2022 increases.
• Monthly compounding adds to the cost, so the figures here are a floor for a cardholder who carries the full balance all year.

What Card Rate Data Means For Borrowers In 2026

Card rates rose with the Fed's increases in 2022 and 2023 but have not followed its cuts, so the average rate on balances is still about 22% and the gap over the prime rate is the widest on record. Balances have grown past $1.35 trillion, and charge-offs, while lower than in 2024, remain at pre-pandemic levels.

If the prime rate keeps falling and issuers keep their margins, card rates will drop only slowly. Lower-rate cards, balance transfers, and installment loans give cardholders who carry balances the clearest way to pay less.

So if you carry a credit card balance from month to month, compare your card's rate with the 22.36% bank average and move the balance if you can get a lower one.