FICO vs AFRM Comparison

Founded in 1956, Fair Isaac Corporation is a leading applied analytics company. Fair Isaac is primarily known for its FICO credit scores, which is a widely used industry benchmark to determine the creditworthiness of an individual consumer. The firm's US-centric credit scores business accounts for most of the firm's revenue and profits and consists of business-to-business and business-to-consumer services. In addition to scores, Fair Isaac also sells software primarily to financial institutions for areas such as analytics, decision-making, customer workflows, and fraud.

Founded in 2012, Affirm is a market leader in the buy now, pay later space with around $36 billion in transaction volume in fiscal 2025. Affirm offers both zero-interest financing, which is merchant-subsidized, and interest-bearing loans, which function as personal loans that are approved on a per-transaction basis. Over 70% of Affirm's transaction volume comes from its interest-bearing loans, which also constitute the majority of its revenue. Affirm primarily operates in the United States, which accounted for more than 95% of its revenue in 2025, but it has also expanded to Canada and the United Kingdom.