Interactive Brokers vs Barclays 2023

Alongside the cost per trade, most UK online brokers also charge a monthly, quarterly, or annual management fee, which varies based on the account type and balance. Based on our thorough review, Interactive Brokers offers better pricing than Barclays for share dealing.

Assuming a £30,000 portfolio size, here are the total annual costs for share dealing with both brokers, given different monthly activity scenarios.

5 trades per year - Interactive Brokers would cost £15 per year, while Barclays would cost £60 per year.

12 trades per year - Interactive Brokers would cost £36 per year, while Barclays would cost £102 per year.

36 trades per year - Interactive Brokers would cost £108 per year, while Barclays would cost £246 per year.

120 trades per year - Interactive Brokers would cost £360 per year, while Barclays would cost £750 per year.

3 fund trades per year - Interactive Brokers would cost £24.75 per year, while Barclays would cost £59 per year.

Interactive Brokers offers investors access to ISA, SIPP, Share Trading, CFD Trading, Funds, ETFs, Bonds - Corporate, Bonds - Government (Gilts), Investment Trusts, Spread Betting and Crypto Trading, while Barclays offers investors access to ISA, SIPP, Share Trading, Funds, ETFs, Bonds - Corporate, Bonds - Government (Gilts), Investment Trusts and Advisor Services. Investing encompasses a wide variety of asset classes, so finding a broker that offers every investment type you are interested in is important.

Our testing concluded that Interactive Brokers is better for research than Barclays. Interactive Brokers offers more research options, including research reports, articles, and analyst ratings.

To compare the trading platforms of both Interactive Brokers and Barclays, we tested each broker's website, trading platform, trading tools and stock trading app. All features compared, Interactive Brokers offers a better share dealing platform and Interactive Brokers offers a better stock app for mobile trading.