

Tip: Another common question credit newbies often have is: What is the difference between Visa and Mastercard? Honestly, not much. For example, if you have a Visa card, your credit card number starts with the number 4.ģ: Travel and entertainment, including American Express It’s known as the major industry identifier (MII).

Not type-of-card, like balance transfer or rewards, but rather the card providing company or industry.

The first number on your credit card signifies your type of card. Here’s what each section of your credit card number means. The answer to this mystery is that the numbers mean different things, depending on where they fit the pattern on your card. A trillion is just a 1 with 12 zeros after it, which would be far more than enough to give every card in the world a unique number. Your credit card may have as many as 16 digits. When we’re typing the numbers to buy something online, however, we can start to wonder about things like, “What do all these numbers mean?” or “Why are there so many numbers?”įirst, let’s talk about why there are so many numbers. It’s easy to use credit cards almost every day, without giving the numbers on the cards a second thought.
