Barclays vs Lloyds Bank 2024

Barclays Smart Investor offers a wide range of investments and accounts and is a good value for those with a midsize portolio who like flat fees. On the downside, it can be complicated to open an account as a non-Barclays bank customer, and you can’t buy or sell investments through the app if you don’t have a Barclays bank account.

It's easy for current Lloyds Bank customers to open a Lloyds Bank Share Dealing investment account. But there are other platforms that are easier, more comprehensive and cheaper to use, including Halifax, which is also owned by Lloyds Banking Group.

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, Lloyds Bank 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 - Barclays would cost £78 per year, while Lloyds Bank would cost £40 - £95 per year.

12 trades per year - Barclays would cost £120 per year, while Lloyds Bank would cost £40 - £172 per year.

36 trades per year - Barclays would cost £264 per year, while Lloyds Bank would cost £40 - £412 per year.

120 trades per year - Barclays would cost £768 per year, while Lloyds Bank would cost £40 - £1084 per year.

3 fund trades per year - Barclays would cost £0 per year, while Lloyds Bank would cost £0 per year.

Barclays requires a minimum deposit of £0, while Lloyds Bank requires a minimum deposit of £0. From our testing we found for accounts between £0 - £250,000 Barclays charges annual custody fees of £48 - £500, while Lloyds Bank charges annual custody fees of £40.

Barclays offers investors access to ISA, SIPP, Share Trading, Funds, ETFs, Bonds - Corporate, Bonds - Government (Gilts), Investment Trusts and Advisor Services, while Lloyds Bank offers investors access to ISA, Share Trading, Funds, ETFs, Bonds - Corporate, Bonds - Government (Gilts) and Investment Trusts. Neither have CFD Trading, Spread Betting and Crypto Trading. Investing encompasses a wide variety of asset classes, so finding a broker that offers every investment type you are interested in is important.

Self-invested personal pensions (SIPPs) and individual savings accounts (ISAs) are tax-advantaged savings accounts that are an important tool for many individual investors. You can read more about how these accounts operate at Gov.UK: Click here for SIPP information and here for ISA information. Our analysis finds that Barclays offers traders access to SIPP and ISA accounts, while Lloyds Bank offers traders access to ISA accounts.

In our analysis of top brokers for share dealing in the U.K., we research whether each broker offers the ability to trade cash cryptocurrency, such as bitcoin and ethereum, which is still a somewhat rare offering amongst major U.K. brokers. Our review finds that neither Barclays nor Lloyds Bank offer crypto investing.

Our testing concluded that the website of Barclays is better than the website of Lloyds Bank. Barclays offers more functionality, is cleanly designed, and is, overall, easier to use for beginners and casual investors.

To compare the trading platforms of both Barclays and Lloyds Bank, we tested each broker's stock trading app. All features compared, our analysis finds that Lloyds Bank offers a better mobile app. Dive deeper: Best Stock Trading Apps UK.

Educational offerings are of particular importance to those who are newer to investing, and we examine the availability of several different types of educational materials in our analysis. Our research finds that Barclays offers traders access to Education (Share Trading), Education (Funds) and Education (Retirement), while Lloyds Bank offers access to neither of these. Neither have Client Webinars and Client Webinars (Archived).