Best Stocks and Shares ISA Platforms UK 2026: Fees Compared for Every Portfolio Size

Cheapest overall (ETFs only): InvestEngine — genuinely £0 platform fee, £0 dealing on 700+ ETFs. The trade-off: ETFs only, no individual shares, no funds, no Lifetime ISA. Uninvested cash earns nothing — InvestEngine retains all the interest to fund the free service. For a pure ETF portfolio, this is the mathematical winner at every balance.

Best free all-rounder: Freetrade — the Basic plan now includes a free ISA, free SIPP, free Junior ISA, and commission-free dealing on 6,500+ stocks, ETFs, investment trusts, mutual funds, and gilts. The catch: 0.99% FX on non-GBP trades, which adds £49.50 to a £5,000 US share purchase. You're trading the FX cost for zero platform fees — a good deal if you mostly buy UK-listed assets.

Best for DIY stock pickers: AJ Bell — 0.25% platform fee, capped at £3.50/month for shares and ETFs (£42/year maximum). Fund dealing £1.50, shares £5.00 (£3.50 for frequent dealers with 10+ trades the previous month). Which? Recommended Provider eight years running (2019–2026). A £100,000 share portfolio costs just £42/year — effectively 0.04%. No other mainstream platform comes close.

Best for large portfolios (£30k+ in funds): Interactive investor — flat £5.99/month on the Core plan (up to £100,000 portfolio). At £100,000, that is £72/year versus £150 at HL on shares or £350 on funds. One fee covers ISA, SIPP, and GIA together. Above £100,000 you move to Plus at £14.99/month, which drops fund dealing to £1.49 and adds family accounts for up to five members.

Best for passive investors: Vanguard — 0.15% fee capped at £375/year, with a £4/month minimum (£48/year). Below £32,000, the minimum means you pay more than 0.15%. LifeStrategy funds require exactly one decision. 85 Vanguard funds only — but if global equity exposure through a single fund is all you want, more choice just adds noise. Read our Vanguard review for the full breakdown.

Best for premium service: Hargreaves Lansdown — platform fee 0.35%, with share/ETF holdings capped at £12.50/month (£150/year). Fund dealing £1.95, share dealing £6.95. Regular monthly investing by Direct Debit remains free. Over 2 million clients, the UK's most polished app and research library. HL saved clients £190 million through share price improvement in the past year — meaning the actual cost of dealing is often lower than the headline £6.95 suggests. If you value research depth and customer service over pure cost minimisation, HL is still the benchmark.

Best for first-time buyers (LISA): Moneybox — the leading Lifetime ISA provider. Only four platforms offer a stocks & shares LISA: HL, AJ Bell, Nutmeg, and Moneybox. The 25% government bonus on up to £4,000/year makes platform fees almost irrelevant — a free £1,000 bonus dwarfs a £42 annual fee. Read our Lifetime ISA guide before committing — the 25% withdrawal penalty on non-qualifying withdrawals compounds to a 6.25% loss on your own money.

Our overall pick for most investors: AJ Bell. The 0.25% fee with a £3.50/month cap makes it the cheapest mainstream platform for share and ETF investors above £17,000. ISA, LISA, SIPP, Junior ISA, 24 international markets, £1.50 fund dealing, and eight consecutive years of Which? Recommended Provider status. For pure ETF investors, InvestEngine is cheaper but narrower. For set-and-forget passive fund investors, Vanguard is simpler. For large fund portfolios above six figures, interactive investor's flat fee wins.

A 0.20% annual fee gap on a £50,000 portfolio costs £100 a year. Over 20 years at 7% growth, that compounds to roughly £4,400 lost to fees. Platform fees matter more than most investors think — and the difference between cheapest and most expensive on a £50,000 portfolio is about £300/year after the 2026 fee changes.

Here is what each platform actually charges at four portfolio sizes, verified from provider websites as of May 2026:

At £20,000, the free platforms — InvestEngine, Trading 212, and Freetrade — cost nothing in platform fees. AJ Bell charges £42 a year on shares (the £3.50/month cap applies from roughly £17,000 upward). Vanguard's £4/month minimum means £48 regardless of balance. HL charges £50 on shares because its £12.50/month cap doesn't kick in until ~£43,000 — below that, 0.35% is less than the cap.

The picture flips as portfolios grow:

At £100,000, AJ Bell's share/ETF cap of £42 a year makes it the cheapest mainstream option — less than ii's £72. HL's share cap of £150 is a vast improvement from the old 0.45% rate (£450/year pre-2026). But fund fees tell a different story: AJ Bell at 0.25% costs £250 and HL at 0.35% costs £350. Interactive investor's flat £72 wins for fund investors by a mile.

The insight most comparisons miss: your investment type determines your fees as much as your portfolio size. AJ Bell caps shares at £42/year but charges uncapped percentage on funds. HL caps shares at £150/year but has no cap on funds. If you hold a mix — most investors do — calculate both components separately. Our dedicated breakdown in Flat Fee vs Percentage Fee: The Exact Maths walks through the exact arithmetic.

The crossover points tell the story: AJ Bell's cap activates at ~£17,000 — above that, a flat £42/year. HL's share cap kicks in at ~£43,000 — below that, 0.35% is genuinely competitive. Vanguard becomes expensive above £250,000 (0.15% = £375/year). Interactive investor jumps from £72 to £180 above £100,000. These thresholds are where the "cheapest" answer shifts — which is why one-size-fits-all platform recommendations are nonsense.

The UK platform market has seen more fee changes in early 2026 than in the previous two years combined. The dust has settled — here is what stuck.

Hargreaves Lansdown (1 March 2026): Platform fee cut from 0.45% to 0.35%. Share/ETF holdings capped at £12.50/month (£150/year). Fund dealing now costs £1.95 — previously free. Share dealing £6.95 online, regular monthly investing by Direct Debit remains free, telephone dealing £29. The fund dealing fee is the real story: 12 fund trades a year now cost £23.40 where they cost nothing before. Junior ISA is completely free — no account charge or dealing fees.

Interactive investor (1 February 2026): Entirely new pricing. Three plans — Core £5.99/month, Plus £14.99/month, Premium £39.99/month. One fee covers ISA, SIPP, and GIA. Core is limited to £100,000 portfolios with £3.99 per trade for funds, UK/US shares, and ETFs. Plus gets £1.49 fund dealing, one free monthly trade, and family accounts. Premium gets free fund dealing, £2.99 UK/US share trades, two free monthly trades, and 0.25% FX (versus 0.75% on Core).

Freetrade (January 2026): ISA, SIPP, and Junior ISA now free on the Basic plan — previously the ISA alone cost £5.99/month. Commission-free dealing unchanged across 6,500+ investments. Mutual funds and gilts added to all plans. FX: 0.99% on Basic, 0.59% on Standard (£5.99/month), 0.39% on Plus (£11.99/month). Cash interest: 1% AER on Basic (up to £1,000), 2.5% on Standard (up to £2,000), 3.5% on Plus (up to £3,000).

AJ Bell: No changes in 2026 — and none needed. 0.25% platform fee with share/ETF cap of £3.50/month. Funds: 0.25% on first £250,000, 0.10% on next £250,000, nothing above £500,000. Fund dealing £1.50, shares £5.00 (£3.50 for frequent dealers). Covers exit fees up to £500 for transfers of £20,000+.

Vanguard: £4/month minimum for self-managed accounts under £32,000. Above £32,000, 0.15% applies, capped at £375/year. ETF trading £7.50 per deal via quote-and-deal service — not a platform for frequent traders.

The net effect: the gap between premium and budget platforms has narrowed but not disappeared. HL at 0.35% with caps is no longer double the price of mid-range for most share portfolios. But the free platforms — InvestEngine, Freetrade, and Trading 212 — remain structurally cheaper for investors who accept their trade-offs. The 2026 question is not "which is cheapest" but "cheapest for what".

The cheapest platform is irrelevant if it does not offer the account type or investment you need.

Widest range: Interactive investor leads with 40,000+ investments across 17 exchanges. Hargreaves Lansdown has comprehensive UK and international coverage with IPO access and 500+ discounted funds. AJ Bell covers 24 markets with 4,000+ funds and ETFs.

Narrowest range: Vanguard offers only ~85 Vanguard funds — no third-party funds, no individual shares. InvestEngine is ETFs only (700+). Moneybox offers a handful of risk-rated portfolios.

For most index investors, range barely matters. A Vanguard LifeStrategy 80% gives global diversification in one fund. But if you want UK or US individual shares, sector ETFs, investment trusts, or individual gilts — Vanguard and InvestEngine are non-starters. Our Index Funds and ETFs guide explains the building blocks.

SIPP availability: Freetrade now offers a free SIPP on the Basic plan. InvestEngine's SIPP is also free. AJ Bell charges 0.25% (capped at £10/month). HL charges 0.35% (capped at £200/year). Interactive investor bundles SIPP into the monthly fee at no extra cost. Trading 212 has no SIPP — a deal-breaker for one-platform retirement and non-retirement investing.

Junior ISA: Freetrade now includes a free JISA on all plans. HL's JISA is completely free with no account or dealing charges. Interactive investor includes JISA on Plus and Premium plans. AJ Bell offers JISA at 0.25%. The Junior ISA strategy guide explains why the £9,000 annual allowance can produce £200,000+ by age 18.

Lifetime ISA: Only Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell, Nutmeg, and Moneybox offer a stocks & shares LISA. Under 40 and saving for a first home? Your choice is four providers. The 25% government bonus makes this the single most valuable account type for eligible savers. Our LISA vs Help to Buy ISA guide helps you choose.

Flexible ISA rules: Some platforms offer flexible ISAs that let you withdraw and replace money in the same tax year without burning allowance — Freetrade and Bestinvest both do. AJ Bell and Nutmeg do not. If you might dip into your ISA before April, this feature matters more than a few basis points of platform fees.

Headline platform fees get all the attention. The real cost differences live in the fine print.

Foreign exchange fees destroy returns for anyone buying US or international shares. Trading 212 charges 0.15% — best in market. Interactive investor charges 0.75% on Core, dropping to 0.25% on Premium. AJ Bell charges 0.75%. Freetrade Basic charges 0.99%. On a £5,000 US share purchase, Trading 212 costs £7.50, Freetrade Basic costs £49.50, and AJ Bell costs £37.50. One trade eats a year's platform fee savings. FX is the single most under-discussed cost in UK platform investing — and it is invisible until you check your contract note.

Cash interest: With the Bank of England base rate at 3.75% (unchanged since 18 December 2025), uninvested cash should earn meaningful returns — if your platform passes them on. Trading 212 pays interest on cash in multiple currencies. Freetrade pays 1% AER on Basic (up to £1,000), 2.5% on Standard (up to £2,000), 3.5% on Plus (up to £3,000). InvestEngine pays nothing — retaining all cash interest is literally how the free service is funded. HL retains a significant share of client cash yield. Interactive investor pays interest on GBP, EUR, and USD balances.

Fund dealing fees: HL's new £1.95 per fund trade matters for active fund investors. Regular monthly investing by Direct Debit remains free. AJ Bell charges £1.50 per fund deal. Interactive investor Core charges £3.99; Plus charges £1.49; Premium is free. Twelve fund switches a year cost anywhere from £0 (ii Premium) to £47.88 (ii Core).

Exit fees: Most platforms charge nothing to leave. Freetrade charges £17 per US holding on transfer out. Vanguard, Fidelity, and iWeb charge nothing. AJ Bell covers up to £500 of exit fees for transfers in of £20,000+. Our ISA transfers guide covers the mechanics — transferring in is usually free, transferring out sometimes isn't.

Share lending: Trading 212 lends your shares by default — you keep 50% of the revenue. You can opt out but it is on by default. No other major UK platform does this on ISA accounts. The shares are collateralised, so the risk is low, but many investors prefer not to have their ISA holdings loaned to short sellers without active consent.

Platform choice changes as your portfolio grows. Here is the clearest map we can draw at May 2026 prices.

Under £5,000: InvestEngine (free ETFs), Freetrade (free ISA, SIPP, and JISA with wider range), or Moneybox (for LISA or guided investing). Avoid flat-fee platforms — £5.99/month eats 1.4% of a £5,000 portfolio. Avoid Vanguard: the £4/month minimum means £48/year on £5,000, which is 0.96% — worse than every other option at this size.

£5,000 to £17,000: AJ Bell at 0.25% costs £12.50–£42.50/year — competitive against free platforms once you factor in AJ Bell's broader range (LISA, SIPP, individual shares, 4,000+ funds). Fidelity at 0.35% is pricier but has strong fund research. Vanguard at £48/year only makes sense near the top of this range.

£17,000 to £100,000: AJ Bell's share/ETF cap of £42/year activates above ~£17,000. At £50,000 you pay 0.08% effective. At £100,000 just 0.04%. Interactive investor Core at £72/year is the best fund-investor option at this size — cheaper than AJ Bell's 0.25% from about £29,000 upward. iWeb is worth a mention: zero annual fee with £5 per deal, though the platform feels dated.

£100,000 to £250,000: AJ Bell at £42/year for shares remains cheapest. Interactive investor moves to Plus at £14.99/month (£180/year) — still cheaper than HL's £350 on funds. Vanguard 0.15% is £150–£375. HL's share cap of £150 makes it competitive for large share portfolios but still 3.5× AJ Bell.

£250,000+: HL's uncapped fund fee (0.35% = £875+/year) becomes punitive. AJ Bell funds tier down: 0.25% on first £250k, 0.10% on next £250k, zero above £500k — a £500k fund portfolio costs just £375/year at AJ Bell versus £1,750 at HL. Interactive investor Plus at £180/year or Premium at £480/year are the cheapest for seven-figure portfolios. InvestEngine at £0 remains unbeatable for ETF-only investors regardless of size.

A common mistake: comparing platforms at your current portfolio rather than where you'll be in five years. A £15,000 portfolio today, growing at 7% real returns with annual contributions, hits £30,000 in roughly a decade. The right answer today might be Freetrade; the right answer in five years might be AJ Bell. Switching is free at most providers, but it costs time and mental overhead. Picking a platform that scales with you is worth a small premium today.

A fair proportion of readers landing on this page haven't decided whether to open a stocks & shares ISA at all. The honest answer depends on your horizon — and the maths has shifted since late 2025.

With the Bank of England base rate at 3.75% and gilt yields climbing to 4.82% (April 2026, up from 4.70% in March), the bond market is telling you something the cash ISA comparison tables aren't: inflation expectations are drifting up while base rate cuts keep getting pushed further out. The best easy-access cash ISAs still pay around 4.6%, but that spread over the base rate will compress if the Bank of England cuts — and markets are now pricing fewer cuts through 2026 than they were in March.

Over one to three years, cash often beats a stocks & shares ISA comfortably. Equity markets do not cooperate with short timeframes, and the sequence-of-returns risk is real.

Over 5+ years, the balance flips decisively. UK equity returns have averaged roughly 7% nominal per year over the long run. The gap between a stocks & shares ISA compounding at 7% and a cash ISA compounding at 4% on a £20,000 deposit is, over 20 years, roughly £77,000 versus £44,000 — £33,000 of additional wealth from the same allowance.

The tension: cash returns are visible and guaranteed; equity returns require sitting through periods where your portfolio is down 20–40% with no guarantee of recovery on any particular timeline. If that makes you queasy, cash is the correct answer regardless of the maths.

With gilt yields at 4.82% and the base rate still at 3.75%, the opportunity cost of holding cash rather than investing for the long term is now higher than at any point since the rate-cutting cycle began. You can split your £20,000 allowance between cash and stocks & shares ISAs in the same tax year — £10,000 in each is a perfectly reasonable position if you are uncertain. Our full comparison: Stocks & Shares ISA vs Cash ISA.

The 2026/27 tax year opened on 6 April with a fresh £20,000 ISA allowance. Since April 2024, you can split contributions across multiple ISAs of the same type — use InvestEngine for cheap ETF access and AJ Bell for individual shares in the same tax year.

Three reasons to act early:

Time in market beats timing the market. A £20,000 lump sum invested on 6 April growing at 7% nominal generates roughly £1,400 more than the same amount invested 11 months later. That is the cost of procrastination — and it compounds every year.

Rate cuts are coming — but slower than expected. Markets now price fewer cuts through 2026 than they did in March, but the direction is clear. When the base rate falls, cash ISA rates will follow. If you are deciding between cash and stocks & shares, the window for locking in high cash returns is closing quarter by quarter. Our cash ISA rates comparison tracks the best current deals.

Platform switching is free. If you are overpaying on platform fees, transfer now. Most platforms charge nothing to leave, and AJ Bell covers up to £500 of exit fees for transfers above £20,000. An ISA transfer preserves your tax-free wrapper — you lose nothing except the old fee structure. Our ISA transfers guide has the mechanics.

The difference between the cheapest and most expensive platform on a £50,000 portfolio is roughly £300/year after the 2026 fee changes. Over 20 years at 7% growth, that compounds into over £13,000. Choose the right platform from the verdicts above, fund it early, and let compound growth do the work.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. You should seek independent financial advice before making any investment decisions. Platform fees and features can change — always verify current terms on the provider's website. All platforms listed are authorised by the FCA and covered by the FSCS up to £85,000 per person for investment claims.