“Top CD rates today” usually means a rotating table of bank names that’s stale by the time you find it. What doesn’t go stale, at least not for another month until the FDIC’s next release, is the shape of the national rate curve. And that shape, as of 20 July 2026, tells you something most people shopping for a CD never check: the term you’d instinctively lock into isn’t the one paying the most.
The full curve
Here’s the FDIC’s complete CD average as of 20 July 2026, term by term:
| Term | National average | National rate cap |
|---|---|---|
| 1 month | 0.23% | — |
| 3 months | 1.15% | — |
| 6 months | 1.38% | 5.56% |
| 12 months | 1.68% | 5.53% |
| 24 months | 1.56% | — |
| 36 months | 1.34% | — |
| 48 months | 1.26% | — |
| 60 months | 1.36% | 5.78% |
Plotted out, the curve looks like this:
View the data
| 1mo | 0.23% |
|---|---|
| 3mo | 1.15% |
| 6mo | 1.38% |
| 12mo | 1.68% |
| 24mo | 1.56% |
| 36mo | 1.34% |
| 48mo | 1.26% |
| 60mo | 1.36% |
Source: FDIC — National Rates and Rate Caps, effective 20 July 2026, accessed .
Two things jump out, and both matter more than any single bank’s headline rate.
Finding one: the shortest CD pays less than a savings account
At 0.23%, the 1-month CD sits below the FDIC’s national average savings rate of 0.38%. Read that again: locking your money up for a month, giving up the right to touch it, currently pays less on average than an account you could withdraw from the same afternoon. That’s not a typo in the data. It’s a structural feature of how banks price short-term CDs when they don’t especially want your money for four weeks. There is essentially no scenario where a 1-month CD beats a decent high-yield savings account at current national averages — you’d be accepting less access and a similar or lower return for nothing in exchange.
Finding two: the curve is inverted
Look at where the peak actually sits. It isn’t at 60 months, where you might expect the longest commitment to earn the richest reward. It’s at 12 months, at 1.68%. From there the average falls: 1.56% at 24 months, 1.34% at 36 months, 1.26% at 48 months, before ticking back up slightly to 1.36% at 60 months, still below the 12-month peak.
That shape is called an inverted curve, and it isn’t random. Banks set longer-term CD rates based partly on where they expect interest rates to be over the life of the deposit. When the rate on a 3-year CD is lower than the rate on a 1-year CD, banks are effectively signaling that they expect the broader rate environment to be lower, not higher, a few years out. You’re seeing the market’s own expectations priced into the curve, term by term.
Practically, this changes the calculus of “longer term, better rate” that a lot of CD advice leans on by default. Right now, based on the national averages, committing for 12 months captures close to the best available rate on the curve. Committing for 36 or 48 months locks you into a lower rate for a longer period — the opposite of what most savers assume they’re trading for by going long.
None of this means a 5-year CD is a bad idea for everyone. Someone who wants a rate locked in for half a decade, regardless of what happens to the curve in year two, is buying certainty, not chasing the peak. But if the goal is simply “get the best rate the CD market is offering right now,” the data says look at 12 months first, not 60.
Why an inverted curve happens at all
A CD’s rate is, in effect, a bank’s bet on where its own cost of funds is headed over that term. When a bank offers a 12-month CD at 1.68% but a 36-month CD at only 1.34%, it’s telling you, whether it means to or not, that it expects its own funding costs, and by extension broader deposit rates, to be lower two and three years from now than they are today. That expectation isn’t unique to one institution; because the FDIC figure is a national average across thousands of banks, the same shape showing up in the aggregate data means it’s a broadly shared view across the banking system, not a quirk of one aggressive or conservative bank’s pricing desk.
It’s worth comparing that to the policy backdrop. The Federal Reserve held its target range at 3.50–3.75% at its 29 July 2026 meeting, and three of its members actually wanted to raise rates rather than hold — a detail that cuts against a simple “rates are about to fall” narrative even while the CD curve is priced as though the medium term brings lower rates than the near term. Both things can be true at once: a central bank holding firm today, and a deposit market pricing in eventual softening over a multi-year horizon. The CD curve is a read on that longer horizon, not a prediction about next month.
What this means if you’re choosing between 12 and 24 months
If the 12-month rate is the peak and the 24-month rate is lower, the honest question isn’t “which term pays more”; that’s already answered. It’s “am I confident I can revisit this decision in a year.” If yes, taking the 12-month rate and reassessing at maturity, using whatever the curve looks like then, captures the current peak without permanently committing to today’s shape of the curve. If you’d rather not think about it again for a while, the 24-month term still beats the 36- and 48-month averages, so going a little longer than 12 months costs less on the curve as it stood on 20 July 2026 than going considerably longer.
The penalty you’re actually agreeing to
A CD’s rate is a contract, and breaking it early has a cost. Withdraw before maturity and the bank charges an early withdrawal penalty — commonly structured as a set number of months of interest, deducted from what the CD would otherwise have paid. On a CD you’ve held only briefly, that penalty can eat past the interest earned and dip into the principal you deposited. The exact formula isn’t standardized nationally; each bank sets its own in the account disclosure, so it’s worth reading before, not after, you fund the CD — especially on a 12-month term you’re opening specifically because the rate curve favors it.
The rollover trap at maturity
The other detail that costs people real money isn’t the penalty. It’s what happens if you do nothing. Most CDs auto-renew at maturity into a new CD of the same term, at whatever rate the bank is currently offering, unless you actively withdraw or redirect the funds during a short grace window (often just seven to ten days). Miss that window on a CD that opened when rates were higher, and your money can silently roll into a new term at a lower rate, or into a term further out on the curve than you’d choose today, given how inverted it currently is. Set a calendar reminder for the maturity date the moment you open the account; it’s the single easiest way to avoid losing the rate advantage you opened the CD for in the first place.
Where this fits with everything else
A CD makes sense specifically for money you’re confident you won’t need before the term ends. It trades liquidity for a rate that’s locked against exactly the kind of central-bank uncertainty this article’s data reflects. Still weighing whether that trade is worth it at all? Our guide to high-yield CDs walks through when a CD beats a savings account and when it doesn’t, and the CD rate reference page shows how the FDIC data behind these numbers gets built. If a big-bank staple is the real alternative you’re weighing, see how Chase’s high-yield savings account stacks up, or browse the wider savings accounts hub for other options. Whatever you pick, put the maturity date on your calendar the day you open the account.