Tuesday, June 7 2022:
Freetrade has launched a brand-new analysis feature for its Plus features. Investors are able to see how analysts rate individual shares, on a scale from favourable to unfavourable. Freetrade says that the data is refreshed daily but some stocks, such as smaller companies, might not have their ratings updated every day as larger companies will have more analysts following their fortunes.
Freetrade is a free trading platform that’s a popular choice for new investors who are looking for an attractive user interface and easy to use platform. Freetrade uses the “freemium” model – which means that it has features that are free for users, but more detail or additional features come at a cost.
Freetrade was the winner of the Finder Customer Satisfaction Awards 2021, getting great feedback from its customers in our survey. You can also get free shares for referring friends. We've named Freetrade as the best trading app for beginners. This was based on our comparison of all the trading apps that we've reviewed on our site against 70 features and fees. You can see all of the other best trading apps in our guide.
We’ve reviewed Freetrade’s features, fees and compiled some pros and cons of Freetrade.
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| Stocks and shares ISA | |
| Lifetime ISA (LISA) | |
| Pension | |
| More Info |
You can invest in 3 account types with Freetrade:
It also has a premium account, Freetrade Plus. This has additional benefits, but comes at an additional cost.
This is Freetrade’s basic account. It doesn’t have a monthly cost, and you can make free instant orders.
People usually choose to go with the general investment account after they have used up their ISA allowance for the year, as you may need to pay capital gains tax on any profits you make. Capital gains tax is payable on gains over the allowance of £12,300 in each tax year.
If you haven’t paid into an ISA in the current financial year (which runs from April to April) then the ISA is a more cost effective option.
The Freetrade stocks and shares ISA is a personal account where you can invest up to a certain amount in each tax year without paying tax on your profits. The allowance for the 2021/2022 tax year is £20,000. This means you can invest £20,000 in the available stocks and ETFs and never pay any tax on the profits you make.
You can open an ISA with the Freetrade app. It costs £3 fee per month (£36 a year). With free trades, plus the FX costs on US trades, it’s a pretty cheap offering compared with Hargreaves Lansdown or other traditional brokers – all of which charge anywhere between £5 and £12 for a trade.
Again, it’s worth remembering Freetrade has a bit of a limited trading universe. It’s not ideal for those who want to hold a variety of things in an ISA (namely, funds and shares from different markets).
On cost it’s tough to beat, especially if you’re looking to invest serious money over the long-term.
You can also transfer your existing ISA into your Freetrade account.
Compare stocks and shares ISAs
Freetrade has recently added a self invested personal pension (SIPP) to its products list. A SIPP is a type of personal pension, with added freedom of what you can invest in.
The Freetrade SIPP costs £9.99 per month (around £120 per year), or £7 per month if you already have Freetrade Plus (which works out at £84 per year, plus the Freetrade Plus fee of £9.99 per month, totalling £203.88 per year).
Here are some of the features of the Freetrade SIPP:
Your money is locked in until you turn 55.
Here’s a quick view of what each Freetrade account has on offer:
| Freetrade general investment account | Freetrade ISA | Freetrade Plus | Freetrade SIPP | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | Free | £3 per month | £9.99 per month | £9.99 per month or £7 per month with Freetrade Plus |
| Tax relief | – up to £20,000 in each tax year | – if you choose to use the ISA. | – up to £40,000 in each tax year | |
| Stocks available | Limited list | Limited list | All stocks | Limited list |
| Stop loss and limit orders | ||||
| Interest on cash | ||||
| Priority customer service |
Compare share dealing accounts
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| Exchanges covered score | ★★★★★ |
| UK - London Stock Exchange | |
| US - NASDAQ | |
| US - New York Stock Exchange | |
| Canada - Toronto Stock Exchange | |
| Japan - Japan Exchange Group | |
| Euronext | |
| Germany - Deutsche Börse | |
| Keep in mind | Capital at risk |
| More Info |
Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Tesco… there’s over 500 UK and US stocks and ETFs on Freetrade, and it’s adding to this each week. You can see Freetrade’s stock list on its website. The table lets you search for stocks and check which ones are tradeable with Freetrade Plus.
There are two types of fees you could encounter with Freetrade. These are well displayed on the website. The first type is basic trading costs – these include fees to buy shares, foreign exchange fees and any platform charges involved. As Freetrade works with a “freemium” model, there’s the opportunity to upgrade your account to get access to other types of product and additional shares, we’ve listed these above under “Compare Freetrade accounts”.
| Fee type | Cost |
|---|---|
| Basic trades | Free |
| Basic account | Free |
| Stocks and Shares ISA | £3 per month |
| FX fee | Spot rate plus 0.45% |
| Outgoing bank transfer | Free |
| Outgoing bank transfer (same day) | £5 |
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| Customer satisfaction rating | ★★★★★ |
| Customer help in app | |
| Customer help via email | |
| Customer help over the phone | |
| Community or forums | |
| More Info |
Freetrade doesn’t offer financial advice or any financial guidance, so you would need to get this help externally if you need it. Its customer service is available over email and in-chat, but not over the phone.
Reviews for Freetrade are generally positive, and it came top in Finder’s 2021 Share Trading Customer Satisfaction survey, carried out in December 2020. In the 2022 survey, 79% of its customers said that they would recommend it to a friend.
Customers of Freetrade said that the app is easy to use and that Freetrade offers good customer service. One user said that it makes buying shares stress free.
Negative reviews mainly focused on the fee structure — customers found that it was expensive for the additional upgrades. Customers also advised that the app could be improved, but this didn’t stop many from saying they would recommend it.
On Trustpilot, Freetrade has 4.1 out of 5 stars and a rating of Great, based on more than 600 reviews.
The Freetrade app also has 4.6 out of 5 stars on Google Play, based on more than 2,000 reviews and 4.7 out of 5 stars in the App Store, based on over 5,000 reviews (updated 16 February 2022).
Freetrade is a trading and investment app that lets you buy individual UK and US stocks, and invest in a range of funds with a variety of ETFs.
With a slick interface and pink colour scheme, it’s aimed at new investors who are used to well-designed apps like Monzo and Starling and want to dip their toes into the choppy waters of investment. As you get more confident with investing, you might prefer to go with a provider more suited to intermediate or expert investors.
Setting up is super easy. You can download the Freetrade app on the App Store and Google Play.
Once you open the app, you’ll need to provide:
Some of our team also had to provide additional info:
Once you’ve done that, you can then choose an account type.
Freetrade’s main features include:
Freetrade Plus is Freetrade’s premium account. It has additional features, including access to the stocks and shares ISA.
Freetrade Plus costs £9.99 per month which works out as just short of £120 per year. It includes the stocks and shares ISA, so you don’t have to pay for both.
Features of Freetrade Plus include:
On top of this all, Freetrade creatively refers to you as a Plustomer. If that doesn’t sell it to you then I don’t know what will.
Freetrade has launched analyst ratings — these show how analysts feel towards stocks, between favourable, neutral and unfavourable. Analysts will constantly research certain stocks in order to determine a current view (a rating) on the company and its share price, stating whether it believes the stock is undervalued (likely to rise in price), overvalued (likely to decrease in price) or just right (like Goldilocks’ porridge).
There are a few different ways this might be presented. Some companies label stocks as “overweight”, “buy”, or “outperform” — these are all positive terms to use about stocks. In contrast, you may hear a stock labelled as “underweight”, sell” or “underperform”, which are all negative terms to use about stocks.
Freetrade’s new analyst ratings tell you how analysts feel about the future prospects of the company in relation to the current stock price.
This really depends on what you want to invest in and how much you want to invest. If you’ve not got much to invest and are alright with not having access to some stocks, a free account or just the ISA is probably fine for you. If you think you can make the most out of all the perks of Freetrade Plus and have a decent amount to invest, then it could be worthwhile.
As boring as it seems, it’s often worthwhile to get out a calculator and work out the costs for exactly what you want to do.
Freetrade is mobile only – which means you can’t access your investments on a desktop device. It has a website, but this is generally for information about the platform. Plus members are currently able to beta test a desktop version, more on this below.
You can get insights about your investments through the app, with Freetrade aiming to give you tools to make well-informed investing choices.
There’s also features on the app to get some investment ideas through the “Discover” tab. Here, Freetrade has divided the stocks, shares and ETFs by popularity and sectors. It also has a list of the newest added stocks.
If you lose track of what you’ve been up to, you can see your activity on the “Activity” tab.
Freetrade Plus members are currently able to test Freetrade desktop, which gets users additional insights and more detailed charts. We’ll add more details as we know it.
Once your account is set up you can use Apple Pay, Google Pay or a bank transfer to fund it.
We did have a mixed bag when it came to depositing money in the app. For some it took about 10 minutes, while others waited for the top-up to come through for 6 or 7 hours.
That is one of our main criticisms of the platform, you can spend a lot of time in limbo wondering when your money will be topped up or when you’ll get your free share.
After you buy your first share, you’ll be able to refer a friend. Send your lucky pal a link, and once they’ve signed up, filled out the W-8BEN form and funded their account, you’ll both get a free share worth between £3 and £200. You can get up to 10 free shares each month.
Freetrade dishes out the free shares on Fridays.
Yes. Freetrade is regulated and authorised by the FCA and covered by the FSCS, so up to £85,000 of your deposits are protected if the company goes bust.
Although as always when you invest, your capital is at risk.
Freetrade makes money in three ways:
Reddit users liked that the Freetrade app is easy to use and, of course, that it’s free to use. They share that it has great customer service, with really quick response rates with its in-app chat feature. The Freetrade team is known to give loads of information about what’s upcoming with the product.
Reddit users were frustrated with the limited list of investments available and that there aren’t any options or leveraged products, but on the whole, they like the app and look forward to what’s coming.
The Freetrade community is a forum for all Freetraders to share investing tips, chat about other startups, the economy and share their ideas on what can help make Freetrade better.
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| Finder rating | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ |
| Customer satisfaction rating | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ |
| Stocks and shares ISA available? | ||
| FSCS protected? | ||
| Costs rating | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ |
| Keep in mind | Capital at risk | 76% of retail CFD accounts lose money |
| More Info | More Info |
Another free trading option is Trading 212 — here’s how it compares to Freetrade on some key features.
We decided that these are both pretty good free-trading options. Trading 212 is more suitable for those with a bit more experience, as it’s a bit more complicated. We’ve compared both platforms in our Freetrade vs Trading 212 article.
Freetrade’s fees are the shining star here. Buying stocks and ETFs for free? Doesn’t get much better than that. No monthly fee or inactivity fee is also great, which stops your portfolio from being slowly eroded over time.
By slashing costs, Freetrade undercuts traditional stockbrokers such as Hargreaves Lansdown, Interactive Investor and AJ Bell. A single trade with Freetrade costs £0. Hargreaves Lansdown charges £11.95, interactive investor charges £7.99 and AJ Bell charges £9.95.
It’s really easy to open a Freetrade account, meaning that you’re quickly ready to go. The app is slick and satisfying to use. However, the graphs are more pretty than helpful, and the app is quite limited. Equally, the app only covers products from the UK and US, so it is a bit limiting. We did have a few problems with the app being laggy when loading money and getting the free referral share.
Overall, Freetrade is a great option if you’re a beginner not looking to invest too much. You can make the most of free trades so your investments aren’t eroded by fees, while having a decent play around and learning the basics.
Get started by visiting Freetrade and opening an account. Still not sure? Compare other share trading platforms with our comparison table.
Our customer satisfaction scores ("Customers say") are based on a survey of 753 customers carried out in December 2021.
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