# Soft Inquiry

*Borrowing & Credit — Finicade finance glossary*

A soft inquiry is a look at your credit file that does not affect your score — checking your own report, a pre-approval, or a landlord screening.

A soft inquiry is a look at your credit file that doesn't affect your score — checking your own report, a pre-approval offer, an employer or landlord screening, or a lender's periodic account review. Only you can see most of them. The practical consequence: checking your own credit is free and harmless, so the widespread belief that looking at your score lowers it is simply wrong. Pre-qualification tools use soft pulls; the real application is what triggers the hard one.

**Also known as:** soft pull, soft credit check

**Related terms:** [Hard Inquiry](https://finicade.com/glossary/hard-inquiry), [Credit Report](https://finicade.com/glossary/credit-report), [Credit Score](https://finicade.com/glossary/credit-score), [Credit Bureau](https://finicade.com/glossary/credit-bureau)

Source: https://finicade.com/glossary/soft-inquiry