How we collect and verify CD rates

Every rate on APY Ledger is copied from the institution's own website, checked automatically before it is published, and linked to the page text it came from. When a number cannot be verified, we show the last verified number and its date instead of guessing.

Where the rates come from

We start from the official lists of U.S. banks (FDIC BankFind) and credit unions (NCUA call report data), find each institution's CD rate page, and read it once a day. Some institutions price CDs by location; for those we enter one ZIP code for each state where the institution has branches and publish the rates for each ZIP separately.

We do not copy rates from other rate websites, and we do not get around websites that block automated access.

How each rate is checked

1. Two independent extractions. Two different AI models read the same page text separately. The term, minimum deposit and APY of every rate must match exactly, or nothing from that page is published.
2. The number must be on the page. Every APY must appear in the page text we read.
3. Plausible values. APYs must be between 0% and 8% and terms between 7 days and 10 years.
4. Large changes are confirmed. If the number of rates changes by more than half, or any rate moves by more than 1.5 percentage points, we wait for a later collection to show the same result.
5. Real pages only. Error pages, security challenges and pages showing the wrong ZIP code are rejected.

In testing on 18 institution pages and 47 page versions (868 rates), this process reproduced every rate exactly. We still treat a rate as current only as of its "last verified" time.

Right now

• Institutions tracked: 26 (26 live).
• Collections in the last 7 days: 118; passed every check: 88%.

A new institution is published after its page passes every check on three separate days. If an institution fails for more than two days its page is marked as not recently verified, and after seven days it is removed from rankings.

Benchmarks

Treasury yields come from the U.S. Treasury's daily par yield curve and are converted from bond-equivalent yield to APY: (1 + y/2)2 − 1. Inflation is the year-over-year change in the CPI-U from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The national average is the FDIC's monthly "national rate": the average CD rate paid by all insured banks and credit unions, weighted by deposits.

What we do not do

Rankings are ordered by APY only. Institutions cannot pay to change a rate or a ranking. We do not give investment advice; confirm terms with the institution before opening an account.