Quick Business Loans: A Small Business Guide

Fast business loans that you can apply to and receive funding for in as little as 24 hours.
Last updated Jan. 24, 2025
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If you’re looking for quick business loans for your company, you probably have one thing in mind: You need capital—now. Good news! You have a handful of options to choose from when it comes to a small business loan that will give you fast access to capital.
In this guide, we’ll break down the types of loans that lend themselves best to fast funding as well as the pros and cons of a quick business loan.

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Best Lenders for Quick Business Loans

When you’re looking for quick business loans, your options are limited to lenders with a fairly expedited underwriting process—those that can review and approve your application in a matter of days.
On the whole, this is going to restrict you to working with online/alternative lenders since bank loans require a much more lengthy and rigorous process. Of course, there is a price to pay for speed and convenience, meaning fast business loans are often more expensive than their slower counterparts. But for many business owners who find themselves in a financial pinch, the tradeoff can often be worth it.
Curious about your online loan options? Our guide tells you all you need to know about your top options for an online business loan and how to apply for one.
» MORE: Read Fundera’s guide to online business loans.

Types of Quick Business Loans

Certain types of financing products, like lines of credit and short-term loans, lend themselves better to speed than others, like SBA loans or long-term loans. Here, then, are the types of business loans that are mostly likely to give you fast access to funds.

Short-Term Loans

Best for: Quickly covering unexpected or one-off expenses.
How fast is this type of loan?
Short-term business loans from online lenders can often be funded as quickly as one day.
A short-term loan is a straightforward loan product: You receive a set amount of cash upfront that you agree to pay back, along with fees and interest, over a predetermined amount of time.
Short-term loans offer shorter repayment periods—typically ranging from three to 24 months—and higher rates (10% to 99%) than their longer-term, slower-to-fund alternatives. They also come with more frequent repayment schedules, usually daily or weekly, rather than the monthly payments required for a long-term loan.
The upsides of a short-term loan, in addition to the funding speed, include more flexible qualification requirements (you can often qualify with a credit score in the 600s) and a number of online lenders now available to offer you these quick business loans.

Lines of Credit

Best for: Flexible financing to cover cash flow or fund an immediate small project.
How fast is this type of loan?
Lines of credit issued by alternative lenders can fund as quickly as a couple of days.
Although business lines of credit can be issued by banks and credit unions as well as online lenders, you’ll find that the latter will be able to fund your line the fastest.
When you’re approved for a revolving line of credit, you can draw from a pool of funds whenever you want or need to pay for a business expense. You only pay interest on what you draw, and when you’ve repaid in full, your credit line gets reset to its original amount.
With a line of credit from an online lender, you’ll generally be looking at shorter repayment periods—typically six to 24 months—and higher interest rates than you’d get from a more traditional lender. On the flip side, an online lender can often fund your business line of credit within a couple of days after you apply.

Equipment Financing

Best for: Businesses that need to purchase equipment.
How fast is this type of loan?
You can be approved and funded for equipment financing with some online lenders in as little as two days, and potentially end up financing 100% of the cost of the equipment.
If you’re on the hunt for quick small business loans that can provide fast cash for purchasing a piece of equipment—whether a vehicle, machinery, or even office furniture—equipment financing may be the best option for you.
Equipment financing is different from term loans in one key way—it’s a form of asset-based lending. With asset-based loans, the asset you’re financing serves as your collateral in case you default on the loan. This built-in security gives many lenders the ability to consider less-qualified loan applicants.
If you have a specific need to purchase equipment and you don’t yet have the savings to cover it, then equipment financing may be your best quick business loan option.

Invoice Financing

Best for: B2B businesses looking to smooth out cash flow issues.
How fast is this type of loan?
If you’re able to qualify for invoice financing, then it will be one of your quickest business loan options—you could receive funds within a day.
Invoice financing solves a common business problem: You’re waiting on customers to pay your invoices, and their delays are creating a serious gap in your cash flow. In the worst cases, this could mean you’re about to miss payments on your end.
Invoice financing, also called accounts receivable financing, can be a quick solution to your cash flow problems. Much like equipment financing, accounts receivable financing uses your outstanding invoices as collateral. Invoice financing companies typically advance you up to 90% of the total value of those collateralized invoices, giving you cash for your outstanding invoices right away. You’ll get the remaining percentage back, minus the lender’s fees, when your customers pay.
Because lenders for this type of financing tend to focus more on your outstanding invoices and the creditworthiness of the customers who will be paying them, this type of quick business loan can be easier to qualify for, even if you don’t have the strongest credit history or many years in business.

Merchant Cash Advance

Best for: Businesses that can’t qualify for other financing options; covering immediate cash flow issues.
How fast is this type of loan?
With a merchant cash advance, you can often be approved and funded on the same day—with almost no paperwork involved. (Check out some of your other options for small business loans that require little-to-no documentation.)
Due to their approval and funding speeds, merchant cash advances (MCAs) are commonly associated with fast small business financing. But their speed and accessibility make them the most expensive way to secure business funding.
With an MCA, you agree to pay back a lump-sum advance from the provider, plus a fee, by letting the provider take an agreed-upon percentage from your company’s daily credit and debit card sales. That means MCAs have the potential to cut heavily into your daily cash flow.
Because your repayment is based on a percentage of your daily sales, during slower revenue times, you’ll pay less back to the lender. But on the other hand, your successful sales days will be heavily impacted by your MCA repayments.
One of the biggest caveats to be aware of when considering a merchant cash advance is that the fees for this type of financing are calculated using a factor rate rather than an interest rate. This makes it difficult to calculate the actual APR on an MCA—although you can, and should , convert factor fees into APRs (many online calculators are available to help you do just that). When you do so, you’ll find that APRs on a merchant cash advance can range from 40% to 350%.
Ultimately, MCAs will only be a worthwhile option if you’ve exhausted all of your other financing possibilities. Generally, if you have a less-than-ideal credit score or immediate cash flow issues, you’ll appreciate that MCAs are so fast and easy to qualify for. However, they’re one of the most expensive—and least regulated—financing products on the market. So you’ll want to take caution before applying for and agreeing to one.

Pros and Cons of Quick Business Loans

Pros

✔️ Speed: With these products and lenders, you can apply for the business funding you need and receive it fairly quickly—often within a few days.
✔️ Streamlined application process: Many of these quick business loans require limited documentation, so you can complete the application quite easily.
✔️ Variety of options: You have a variety of products to choose from depending on your need—lines of credit, short-term loans, invoice financing, and more.

Cons

✖️ Cost: Overall, any financing products that optimize speed and accommodate limited documentation are going to be more expensive than a slower-to-fund alternative.
✖️ Short repayment terms: You’ll find that with quick small business loans, because you need funding fast, you only have a short amount of time to pay back your debt.
✖️ Hard to pay back: Because of the short repayment terms and often steep interest rates, quick business loans can be difficult to pay back. In particular, you’ll want to be careful with products like merchant cash advances, which are often very expensive and cut into your daily sales. Although it’s very easy to qualify for these types of products, they can create a cycle of business debt that is difficult to break.

Fundera Can Help

Curious to see whether you qualify for a quick business loan? Fill out one simple application with Fundera, and we’ll show you your options. This won’t impact your credit score, and there’s no obligation to get your funding through one of our partners.
Let’s get you funded!

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