Truist Bank: Savings, Checking and CDs

Our verdict

A top 10 US bank, Truist Bank offers banking products and services you’d find with any large bank. It has over 2,500 branches across 16 states and over 3,000 ATMs nationwide. You’ll find a variety of accounts, including checking, savings, money market and certificates of deposit (CDs). Overall, its accounts with monthly fees offer multiple ways to waive them and minimum opening deposits range from $25 to $50 for checking and savings and at least $1,000 for CDs depending on the term. But if you’re looking for a bank with high-yield savings products, Truist’s APYs all rest around 0.01%.

Best for: Customers who want a traditional brick-and-mortar bank at the cost of low APYs.

Truist Bank in the news

In 2019, Suntrust and BB&T banks merged to create Truist Financial Corp — one of the largest bank mergers in the last decade. Since the merger, Truist saw an increase in loan originations and deposits. Truist also heavily invested in technology after the merger, moving its banking products on to a digital cloud platform to stay competitive with online banks.

Is Truist Bank right for you?

Truist Bank is worth considering if you want a full-service bank or you’re a student looking for a low-maintenance checking account.

Its checking accounts require monthly maintenance fees, up to $12 per month, but the Truist One Checking account lets you waive it if you’re a student under the age of 25. Other fee-waiving methods involve maintaining a certain balance or opening a Truist credit card or consumer loan.

Truist’s products work best together. For example, with a Truist One Checking account, you’ll earn additional cashback rewards if you have a Truist credit card and the ability to waive its savings account monthly maintenance fee.

How Truist Bank stacks up

Truist Bank has 2,781 locations across 16 states, mainly in the midwest and south, including South Carolina, Florida, Texas and Ohio, and has more than 3,000 ATMs. Comparatively, it has more customer support options than top online banks. Truist Bank offers standard banking services, including two checking accounts, traditional savings, CDs and money market accounts. As a whole, the accounts are solid but nothing particularly special.

Where it shines

Of all the products, one of the best offered is the Truist One Checking account. It has no overdraft fees, and it offers more earning potential with cashback rewards if you have a select Truist credit card.

Another unique feature of the Truist One Checking account is its $100 Negative Balance Buffer, which is an overdraft service similar to Chime’s SpotMe that allows you to overdraft up to $100 with no fees. This program has requirements, such as having a positive account balance and direct depositing at least $100 per month.

Where it falls short

Truist’s traditional savings account has a very poor APY of 0.01% APY — much lower than the national average and the best accounts in the market. We commonly see savings accounts with APYs around 5%, and the national average is 0.45% APY, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).

Truist isn’t a free bank. It charges a monthly maintenance fee on almost all its accounts, with some offering the ability to waive it. While most traditional brick-and-mortar banks are known to have fees, plenty of other banks skip it.

Its checking accounts lack the extra perks we see with other top checking accounts, as they aren’t interest-bearing or offer cashback rewards. Other banks and online banking platforms like SoFi® and Upgrade offer savings accounts of with rates up to 4.60% to 5.21% APY. These options also offer high-yield checking accounts, cashback rewards and no monthly service fees.

Truist Bank checking accounts

Truist has two personal checking options:

1. Truist One Checking requires a $50 opening deposit and a $12 monthly maintenance fee, which can be waived. It offers a $100 Negative Balance Buffer program, no overdraft fees and 10% to 50% more in cashback rewards with select Truist credit cards.
2. Truist Confidence account requires a $25 opening deposit and a $5 monthly maintenance fee, which you can waive, and there are no overdraft fees.

Of the two accounts, the Truist One Checking is the better option. It comes with more perks, but it’s only worth it if you can waive the $12 monthly fee, which you can do in one of five ways:

1. Receive a direct deposit of at least $500 per statement cycle.
2. Maintain a balance of at least $500 in Truist accounts across personal deposits and all investments as reflected on the business day before your statement cycle end date.
3. Have a Truist credit card, mortgage or consumer loan, excluding LightStream.
4. Have a linked Small Business Checking Account.
5. Be a student under the age of 25.

Truist Bank savings accounts

Truist’s personal savings accounts aren’t the best we’ve seen, as they offer very low APYs.

Truist offers two personal savings accounts and one money market account.

1. Truist One Savings requires a $50 opening deposit and $5 monthly maintenance fee and offers an APY of 0.01%. If you withdraw more than six times from the account, there’s a fee of $5 and a $3 paper statement fee. You can link this account to Truist’s personal checking accounts for overdraft protection as well.
2. Truist Confidence Savings requires a $25 opening deposit, has no monthly maintenance fees and offers a 0.01% APY. There’s a $2 paper statement fee that you can avoid if you opt for e-statements, and you can link the Truist Confidence Checking for overdraft protection.
3. Truist One Money Market requires a $50 minimum opening deposit and a $12 monthly maintenance fee, which you can waive. It only earns 0.01% APY, and you can link it to your Truist checking account for overdraft protection. And like most money market accounts, it comes with a debit card.

Waive the $5 monthly service fee for the Truist One Savings account in one of four ways:

1. Maintain a daily balance of at least $300.
2. Schedule a recurring preauthorized internal transfer of $25 or more per statement cycle.
3. Be under 18 years old.
4. Have a Truist checking account.

Truist Bank CDs

Truist CDs are solid, offering APYs up to 5%. But to open a CD, you must visit a branch, and rates vary by state and amount tier.

Truist CD details:

• Terms range 7 days to 60 months
• $2,500 minimum opening deposit for terms from 7 to 31 days
• $1,000 minimum opening deposit for terms from 32 days to 60 months

While rates depend on your amount and state, we saw APYs up to 5% for seven-month terms, which is in line with top competitors.

Other Truist Bank products

Truist also offers a multitude of other accounts:

• Credit cards: Many credit cards to choose from, including the Enjoy Cash, Enjoy Travel, Future, Enjoy Beyond and Enjoy Cash Secured. Cashback rewards are up to 3% on select cards, and rates range from 16.24% to 27.24% APR, depending on the card. A few of the cards also don’t charge an annual fee, such as the Enjoy Cash credit card.
• Truist Simple Business Checking: No monthly maintenance fees, up to 50 free monthly transactions and up to $2,000 in free cash processing per month.
• Truist Dynamic Business Checking: Requires a $20 monthly maintenance fee, which you can waive, up to 500 free transactions and up to $25,000 free cash processing per month. Depending on your deposits, you might also enjoy rewards.
• Truist Community Checking: Requires in-person application, has no monthly maintenance fees, unlimited cash processing and up to 225 free monthly transactions.

Compare Truist accounts with other leading bank accounts

Narrow down other checking, savings and CDs by features, APYs, opening deposits and more. Select Compare on up to four options for a closer comparison.

• Checking
• Savings
• CDs

Truist Bank customer service experience

Truist has garnered quite a bit of customer feedback. On its Better Business Bureau (BBB) profile, it holds the highest rating of A+ and has a 1.09 customer star rating.

Truist has seen a considerable number of BBB complaints — over 4,000 in the last three years. For customer reviews, Truist actively responds to each individual review in attempts to resolve any issues, which is likely what gives it that A+ BBB rating. There aren’t any specific trends to call out in reviews, but many customers cite issues contacting customer service to resolve issues, and many reviews are unique circumstances.

Truist’s Trustpilot profile is unclaimed, but the profile has a poor rating of 1.1 stars out of 5, with over 1,000 reviews. Many customers point out issues with their accounts after the merger in 2019, which is common but still unfortunate for customers whose accounts were managed poorly during the merger.

Overall, Truist actively responds to BBB complaints and reviews, something we don’t see that often. But the majority of its reviews are poor, and while common for banks, Truist has very few positive reviews.