Does pre-qualification hurt my credit score?

The distinction between soft and hard credit pulls is critical for shopping personal loans. Most marketplace pre-qualifications use only soft pulls, so you can get 3-5 offers without affecting your score at all.

Hard inquiries appear on your credit report and cost 3-7 points temporarily. They stay on the report for 24 months but only meaningfully affect your score for the first 12. Multiple hard inquiries for the same loan type within a short window (14-45 days depending on scoring model) typically count as one inquiry under FICO's rate-shopping logic.

The practical implication: pre-qualify with as many lenders as you want, then only accept a final offer from the lender whose disclosed APR you're committed to. The hard pull only happens at that final step.