Best UK Trading Platform 2026

Best UK Trading Platform 2026: Share Dealing, ISAs and CFDs

Q: What is the cheapest UK trading platform?

For dealing, Trading 212 — free commission, no platform fee and a 0.15% conversion fee. For a large fund portfolio, AJ Bell can be cheaper because it charges nothing on fund holdings above £500,000. For frequent share dealing on a big portfolio, Hargreaves Lansdown’s £12.50 monthly cap plus its £3.95 frequent-dealer rate is competitive despite the higher headline percentage.

Q: Which platforms offer a Stocks and Shares ISA?

All the major ones. The distinction worth knowing is who runs it. Trading 212, Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell, IG and CMC run theirs in-house. eToro’s three ISAs all run on Moneyfarm’s platform, meaning a different FCA firm, a separate FSCS claim, and holdings sold to cash on a transfer in.

Q: Which platforms offer a SIPP?

Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell, Trading 212 and IG. eToro and CMC Markets do not. Note that IG’s SIPP is administered by a third party, Options Pensions, at £205 a year — disclosed on IG’s own charges page but easy to miss when comparing headline platform fees.

Q: Do these platforms pay interest on cash?

Some do, and the terms vary sharply. eToro pays 2.75% to 3.55% AER on USD balances. AJ Bell pays 1.75% in an ISA and 2.05% in a SIPP but nothing above £2,000 in a dealing account. Trading 212 publishes no rate on its website. Cash earning interest is often held in money market funds rather than as a deposit, which places it outside FSCS deposit protection.

Q: Can I buy fractional shares?

On Trading 212 yes, across Invest accounts and ISAs. On eToro yes, from a $10 minimum. AJ Bell states you must buy whole shares. Fractional shares are useful for regular investing into high-priced US stocks, but check transferability — fractions often cannot be moved to another provider and must be sold first.

Which UK trading platform is best in 2026? FCA-regulated share dealing, ISA and SIPP platforms compared against active-trading and CFD platforms on cost.

At a glance

There is no single best platform, because two different products are sold under one name. Investing platforms charge a percentage of what you hold and give you an ISA and a pension. Trading platforms charge per trade and give you leverage. Buying the wrong one costs more than choosing badly within the right one.

Percentage platform fees are capped on shares, not on funds — which decides whether a large portfolio is expensive or cheap.
AJ Bell caps at £3.50 a month on a dealing account or ISA but £10 on a SIPP. Hargreaves Lansdown caps at £12.50 across all three.
Trading 212 charges no dealing commission and no platform fee and runs its ISA in-house.
eToro’s ISAs are not eToro’s — all three run on Moneyfarm’s platform (MFM Investments Ltd, FRN 629539), so the FSCS claim would be against Moneyfarm.
IG’s SIPP is administered by a third party at £205 a year, disclosed on IG’s own charges page.

Which UK trading platform is best?

It depends entirely on which of two jobs you are doing, and they are not close to the same job.

If you are buying shares and funds to hold — in an ISA, a pension or a general account — you want low custody fees, cheap dealing and a wrapper that suits your balance. Cost is dominated by the annual percentage, not the per-trade charge.

If you are trading actively — leveraged positions, short holding periods — you want tight spreads, low commission and fast execution. Cost is dominated by per-trade charges, and the platform fee is usually zero.

The mistake that costs the most is using a CFD account to hold a long-term position. Overnight financing accrues daily and will quietly exceed any dealing commission you saved within months. If you intend to own something for a year, own it — do not rent it with leverage.

Platform and custody fees compared

A correction worth making, because it is widely reported the other way round. Hargreaves Lansdown’s share cap is not different between ISA and SIPP — three of its own pages agree it is £12.50 a month in all three wrappers. AJ Bell is the one with differing caps: £3.50 on a dealing account or ISA against £10 on a SIPP.

The cap is what decides this for a larger portfolio. On £100,000 of shares, an uncapped 0.45% would be £450 a year; capped at £12.50 a month it is £150. On funds, where AJ Bell tiers rather than caps, the arithmetic runs differently again — and above £500,000 in funds AJ Bell charges nothing at all.

Table 1 — Custody and platform fees

Table 1 — Custody and platform fees
Platform	Share custody fee	Cap	Fund custody fee
Trading 212	Free	—	Free
Hargreaves Lansdown	0.45%	£12.50/month — same across Fund & Share, ISA and SIPP	Tiered from 0.45%
AJ Bell	0.25%	£3.50/month dealing account and ISA · £10/month SIPP	0.25% to £250k · 0.10% £250k–£500k · nil above £500k

Dealing commission

Two things are doing the work in that table. The frequent-dealer discount — both HL and AJ Bell drop their commission sharply once you cross a monthly deal count, and HL waives it entirely for regular monthly investing. And the conversion fee, which for anyone buying US shares from a GBP account is usually the larger number.

Compare 0.15% against 0.75% on a £20,000 US position. Trading 212 charges about £30 to convert; eToro charges about £150 — and charges again on the way out, and again on every dividend. Neither appears in a headline commission table, and over a decade the difference dwarfs the dealing charges people actually compare.

Table 2 — Dealing commission and conversion

Table 2 — Dealing commission and conversion
Platform	UK shares	US shares	FX conversion
Trading 212	Free	Free	0.15%
eToro	$1 or $2 per side	$1 or $2 per side	0.75%, including on dividends
Hargreaves Lansdown	£6.95 (0–19 deals last month) · £3.95 (20+) · free by monthly Direct Debit · £29 by phone	Same online tariff plus FX	Tiered
AJ Bell	£5.00 online · £3.50 if 10+ deals last month · £25 by phone	£5.00 online · £25 by phone	0.75% first £10k · 0.50% next £10k · 0.25% above £20k · dividends 0.50%

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Which platforms offer an ISA, a SIPP and a Cash ISA?

The eToro ISA is a different firm’s product. All three eToro ISAs run on the Moneyfarm platform, with custody at Barclays and Saxo. That is not hidden — eToro discloses it — but it changes two things. Your FSCS claim would be against MFM Investments Ltd, not eToro, and on a transfer in your existing holdings are sold to cash rather than moved across in specie. For anyone consolidating an ISA, that second point can trigger a real cost.

Want to test a platform before you move an ISA to it?

Capital.com offers a free demo with no minimum and publishes its full fee schedule without a login — a straightforward way to see how a platform behaves before you commit anything.

Open a free demo account

Capital Com (UK) Limited, authorised and regulated by the FCA, firm reference number 793714

CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Pepperstone Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (firm reference 684312). 72.9% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. Capital.com publishes 65% under the FCA. This is a paid affiliate link: we may earn a commission if you open an account. It does not change our ranking or what we publish.

Table 3 — Wrappers available

Table 3 — Wrappers available
Platform	Stocks & Shares ISA	SIPP	Cash ISA	Who runs the ISA
Trading 212	Yes	Yes	Yes	In-house — Trading 212 UK Ltd
Hargreaves Lansdown	Yes	Yes	Yes	In-house
AJ Bell	Yes	Yes	No	In-house — AJ Bell Management Ltd, FRN 211468
IG	Yes	Yes	No	In-house; SIPP administered by Options Pensions at £205/year
CMC Markets	Yes	No	No	In-house
eToro	Yes	No	Yes	Moneyfarm — MFM Investments Ltd, FRN 629539

Interest on uninvested cash

Since rates rose this stopped being a rounding error. It is now one of the clearest differences between platforms, and one of the least advertised.

Two traps here. AJ Bell’s dealing account pays nothing above £2,000 — so a large cash balance parked there earns effectively zero, while the same money in its SIPP earns 2.05%. And Trading 212 publishes no rate on its website at all, only in the app, which means any rate you see quoted for it on a comparison site came from someone’s screenshot rather than the firm.

Note also that cash earning interest on these platforms is frequently held in qualifying money market funds rather than as a bank deposit. That is disclosed, and it matters: money market fund holdings sit outside FSCS deposit protection.

Table 4 — Interest on cash

Table 4 — Interest on cash
Platform	Rate	Condition
eToro	2.75% AER on $1–$50,000 · 3.55% above	USD cash balance only; must be toggled on
AJ Bell	SIPP 2.05% (£0–£100k), 2.40% above · ISA and LISA 1.75%	⚠ Dealing account pays 0.75% on the first £2,000 and 0.00% above it
Trading 212	not published on the website	Rate shown in-app only

Fractional shares

We have marked Hargreaves Lansdown as not published rather than repeating a widely quoted position, because the most recent statement we could find on its own site dates from December 2023 and is self-flagged as potentially out of date. Check directly before relying on it.

Trading actively rather than investing?

If your interest is leveraged FX and index positions rather than an ISA, Pepperstone offers MT4, MT5, cTrader and TradingView with published dated average spreads and a transparent commission schedule.

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Pepperstone Limited, authorised and regulated by the FCA, firm reference number 684312

CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 72.9% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading spread bets and CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Table 5 — Fractional share availability

Table 5 — Fractional share availability
Platform	Fractional shares
Trading 212	Yes — “most instruments available on the Invest accounts and ISAs can be traded fractionally”
eToro	Yes — minimum trade $10
AJ Bell	No — “you will need to buy whole shares”
Hargreaves Lansdown	not published as a current position

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Best Trading Signal — editorial & analysis team

We review brokers on licensing, cost and withdrawals — and state the cons, not just the pros. How our signals are produced · Risk Warning and Disclosure · Last updated 12 September 2026

Frequently asked questions

For dealing, Trading 212 — free commission, no platform fee and a 0.15% conversion fee. For a large fund portfolio, AJ Bell can be cheaper because it charges nothing on fund holdings above £500,000. For frequent share dealing on a big portfolio, Hargreaves Lansdown’s £12.50 monthly cap plus its £3.95 frequent-dealer rate is competitive despite the higher headline percentage.

Match it to your holding period. Buying shares or funds to hold for years belongs on an investing platform inside an ISA or SIPP, where the tax wrapper is worth more than any fee difference. Trading positions over days or weeks belongs on a trading platform. Holding a long-term position on a CFD account is the expensive mistake, because overnight financing accrues daily.

All the major ones. The distinction worth knowing is who runs it. Trading 212, Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell, IG and CMC run theirs in-house. eToro’s three ISAs all run on Moneyfarm’s platform, meaning a different FCA firm, a separate FSCS claim, and holdings sold to cash on a transfer in.

Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell, Trading 212 and IG. eToro and CMC Markets do not. Note that IG’s SIPP is administered by a third party, Options Pensions, at £205 a year — disclosed on IG’s own charges page but easy to miss when comparing headline platform fees.

On £100,000 of shares, Hargreaves Lansdown’s 0.45% would be £450 uncapped but is capped at £12.50 a month, so £150. AJ Bell’s 0.25% capped at £3.50 a month is £42 on a dealing account or ISA, rising to £120 in a SIPP. Trading 212 charges nothing. The caps matter far more than the percentages once a portfolio is substantial.

Some do, and the terms vary sharply. eToro pays 2.75% to 3.55% AER on USD balances. AJ Bell pays 1.75% in an ISA and 2.05% in a SIPP but nothing above £2,000 in a dealing account. Trading 212 publishes no rate on its website. Cash earning interest is often held in money market funds rather than as a deposit, which places it outside FSCS deposit protection.

On Trading 212 yes, across Invest accounts and ISAs. On eToro yes, from a $10 minimum. AJ Bell states you must buy whole shares. Fractional shares are useful for regular investing into high-priced US stocks, but check transferability — fractions often cannot be moved to another provider and must be sold first.

Yes, and you can verify each one. Trading 212 UK Ltd is FRN 609146, eToro (UK) Ltd is 583263, IG Markets Ltd is 195355, CMC Markets UK plc is 173730, AJ Bell Management Ltd is 211468. Search each on the FCA Firm Checker and confirm the permission covers the product you are buying — authorisation is activity-specific, not general.

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CFDs, spread bets and forex are complex, leveraged products and carry a high risk of losing money rapidly — our signals are analyst opinions, not guaranteed profits, and past performance is no guarantee of future results.

Last updated 12 September 2026