What's up you guys, sasha here now, if you're picking a new bank to go and open a new account with, or maybe you already have accounts with, both starling and monzo and others as well and you're, trying to decide which one should be your main one which One should you go and entrust your salary to which one should you put all your efforts into actually making use of i'm gon na go and compare the two directly. I'm gon na tell you exactly what i think about each where one is better than the other, which one i would pick if it was me and at the end of the video i will cover some important recent changes that both of these companies have had to Their current accounts there's been a lot of talk about them and i wanted to make sure that i cover them in as much detail as possible in this video i'll. Tell you how that changes, whether you should go for one or the other, there's some really important things about the performance of these two banks and the performance of them is quite different, and it's just important to be aware of exactly how that might impact your choice. So stick around for that, but anyway, let's dive right in first.

Let's talk about the apps, because that is the way you're gon na be interacting with this bank as there's no branches as there's no real other way of communicating with them and both are not great. On actually offering you a communication channel that reaches an actual human being you're gon na be mostly using the app in order to interact with the bank and on that front monster probably has the upper hand the monzo app is cleaner. It is easier to navigate. It is simpler to use the colors are just a little bit easier on the eye.

I still think some parts of the styling app are just less than intuitive the way i have to swipe up to access some of the functionality. That is not very obvious. The way you have to go and navigate through several menus to go and find some key parts of the app, i think those things could have been made a little bit easier. Now.

The truth is the vast majority of the functionality is available on both apps. You can do all the same stuff for 95 percent of whatever it is that you want to do on either app and both of them work pretty well. Both them work better than most high street banks, and both of them are relatively easy to navigate. So i'm comparing two very, very good apps here, don't take what i'm saying as one is really great and one is really bad.

I'm comparing two really good abs and i'm saying that one might be slightly better than the other in one way or another. Now two really quick things that i really like about the monzo app. The first is the limit screen. Now you probably won't be using this very often, but it is just so useful to be able to go and see exactly what the limit is for different types of transactions.

Now, styling don't really offer that at all styling just have a legal section where you can go and look at the various terms, conditions and tables, and it's just very clunky and cumbersome. I couldn't see how i could get the same list in any way on the styling app, so i quite like what monzo have done there. It is very, very easy to see. The other feature that i like about monzo is their spending report.

It is very clear: it is very easy to use and styling do offer a similar feature, but it is just not quite as intuitive. It is not quite as easy to use and it's not quite as easy to find within the app. So on that one again, monzo offer a better feature when styling do something very similar, but styling also have a few features where they offer something that monzo doesn't one thing that i really like is their card spending controls. Now, if you look at the styling app, you can control every single transaction type by turning it off or on you can control your online spending.

You can control your card present authorizations. You can control spending based on where your phone is in terms of its location. To make sure that your card only works at the same place where you are with your phone monster, don't offer you that whole massive myriad of things. In fact, when you look at the monzo app, your two options are to limit gambling and to limit the mag stripe on this.

One styling definitely have an upper hand. It is so so easy to use, and it is a great feature if you just want to avoid the risk of fraud or avoid your card being misused in some way. You can go and turn things off and on, as you please another feature i really like about styling some people probably actually really hate. This feature is the security element.

Now, whenever you go and leave the app when you go back in it asks for your fingerprint again in order to get you access to the information within the app and that's something that monzo doesn't do. You only have to do once and then, as long as there's a short time frame between you, leaving the app and going back in, you can still access everything within the app. The reason i like it is it's a great fraud prevention measure and it's also great for people not being able to go and look at stuff that they shouldn't be looking at if something just picks up your phone after you put it down with monzo they'll, be Able to go and look at your transactions they'll be able to do stuff with the app they'll be able to do whatever they want, because you have authorized it a minute or two ago with styling. You can't do that with styling every single time you go back into the app they'll, want you to go and authorize it.

So i think, that's actually a very useful feature, even if it's annoying, if you're jumping between windows, because you're trying to pick up a bank account to make a payment, it might be a bit annoying, because every time you go back into pacers, you have to go And use your thumbprint, but i actually think that's a useful and a very good feature. Another feature that i like about styling, but actually isn't that useful right now is their marketplace now monzo keep talking about building a marketplace, but there really isn't one there. Yet they have a few partners that they try to sell you products from, but then don't offer the same marketplace. That styling is offering and styling is continuously offering more and more products and more and more services that integrate seamlessly with styling.

But the truth is for the average consumer, the majority of these products are not very useful and i think most people will not actually use that feature at all, at least for the foreseeable future. So, although i kind of like it, i think it's not particularly relevant for this comparison so on the upfront. Monzo is a winner, in my opinion, let's now talk about some interesting banking features, basic banking options that you would expect from a current account. Now, what do you do with the current account? You pay money into it.

You then go and withdraw money out of it, and a lot of people still go and do this with cash or checks or other ways, and this is where the two banks become really quite different. If you want to deposit cash with styling, you can do so very easily. You can go and use any post office branch. You can bring your card, you can bring the cash you want to deposit and you can deposit up to 20 000 pounds per transaction with monzo.

The situation is quite different. You can deposit up to 300 pounds max per day or 1 000 pounds max per month, and you can't do it very easily. You have to find these pay point locations by using the app and finding the location of pay point in some random shop. You then have to go, make your way to the shop and you will then have to pay one pound per deposit.

So, if somebody's giving you a christmas present with 20 pounds inside and you don't want to spend it, but you want to put it into your current account - you'll have to pay one pound for the privilege of being able to do so. It's not a lot, but it's just very, very frustrating, because there is no option at all for you to be able to deposit money for free. So if you have cash and monso, is your only bank account you can't go and put that money into your bank? Account without having to pay for the privilege, which basically makes it a major disadvantage versus pretty much every single other bank in the uk with checks. Styling is also on top up to 500 pounds.

You can go and take a picture of the check and it will automatically be credited to your bank account and that happens quite quickly over 500 pounds. You can go and send it to styling and i've done that and it took a few days. But it wasn't very long with monzo. The process is the same.

It is exactly the same as we're starting you just go and use the free post feature both do exactly the same thing. So in the envelope you write, free, post, styling or free post monzo and put the check in and that's all you have to do. No stamps required no address, no anything it will get there, but with monzo. The process can take as long as three weeks because of how long the internal process takes that's what their own website states and i haven't actually gone and deposited the check with monzo, but the fact that they actively stated and set.

That expectation probably means that. That's how long it takes - and i think that's quite a long time for you to be able to go and wait for the money from your check to arrive in your bank account on this. One styling clearly wins because from the majority of checks for low amounts, it will be within your account in a matter of hours. Now the next one is one of my favorite features of a bank account and actually both monzo and styling have it, and that is they both allow you to go and smash the like button for the youtube algorithm.

It is so so important for a young channel like mine to go and be able to reach more people more quickly. In fact, i am just one day away from my six month anniversary of running this channel yeah, it's been a long time. Six months feels a lot longer than that. Please go and smash that like button, so that this video can go and reach more people so that my channel can grow its audience, and i can show this information to more people to improve their understanding financial products.

Please go ahead and do it if you haven't done so already. Thank you so much. Let's move on to the next feature. The next feature is relatively minor.

It is about making payments, and most people won't even really appreciate this, and actually i don't know which one is better, but the two banks do it quite differently. So with monzo, whenever you make a transaction online, what will happen is you'll, get a text notification and an app notification at the same time with a unique code that you can then use to authorize that transaction, and that is how most other banks do it as Well and it's quite a seamless process and most people are used to it and most people don't have any problem with it, but what styling do is they give you a code within the app? So, whenever you log into the app there's a little code presented to you, that is generated by the app and you can use that code to make the payment now, on the one hand, that is slightly more cumbersome than the equivalent solution from monzo. So just getting a notification quickly on your phone at the top of the screen when you're, making an online payment and then being able to type that in is easy. But starling have a major advantage in cases where you don't have phone reception.

Let's say you're, making a purchase underground somewhere like say in a bar or something like that, let's say go and make a purchase on an airplane. I don't know anywhere where you don't have phone reception anywhere, where you don't have the ability to connect your phone to an online or wi-fi signal, or something like that within the styling. App you'll still be able to make that transaction you'll still be able to authorize it, because the app generates that code without having to connect to the internet. That code is independent of your transaction, and that is a tiny little thing, but i can guarantee you that the one time this happens to you that time, you're somewhere in the middle of nowhere, you don't have the signal but you're, wanting to go and make a Purchase online, it will be quite annoying when you can't go and authorize it with monzo, but you will be able to do it with styling and quickly.

Let's cover saving spots. This is the one feature that a lot of people who like monzo say, is their favorite feature and monzo have done extremely well. With that feature, you can go and allocate your money to various different pots and there's two types of pots: there's the savings pot and the regular spending transaction pots, and you can then go and set specific transactions to go and take money from those individual pots. So it's easier for you to manage your budget.

You can go and assign money to a particular pot say for your rent or for food spent and whenever you're spending money on that particular type of thing, the money will automatically come out of that particular pot. And you will know exactly how much money you have left for the month say or you can go and make provisions for the next month by putting money in that particular pot ahead of time. That feature is very, very well done by monzo and a lot of people love it and that's why they hold a monzo account now styling do something relatively similar, but their feature that does this today is really quite poor. It just is nowhere near as useful.

You can't make money come out of those parts, it's just a relatively weird way of taking money from your account and putting it somewhere else, without being able to do anything with it other than add a photo next to it, it's generally very, very underdeveloped, but there Are strong rumors that in the next month or two starling will also release their own version of pots, which is going to be as good as monzo's if you believe the rumors we'll have to wait and see on that now, let's talk about the recent changes to These current accounts, both banks, have sent out an email within a few days of each other to every single customer, announcing some changes now for the majority of this, the changes are relatively small, but they probably do signify quite a big shift in how the two banks Think about their customers and exactly what it means about. What's happening behind the scenes now, monzo have introduced two new charges. The first of them is the five pounds you have to pay to replace your card. Now you have to pay that for every single time you go and replace your card, except for when you're a victim of fraud, or you had the card stolen if you've lost it.

If the card's worn - and you can't use it very well or see the numbers on it or any other reason, if you're broken accidentally, you will have to pay that fee without fail. That's quite frustrating the second fee they've introduced this for withdrawing cash in europe. So if you go on holiday to europe and you then go and withdraw money from a cash machine abroad previously that was completely free. Now you get an allocation of 250 pounds that is free and any money that you would draw above.

That will incur a three percent charge, but you can avoid both of these fees. If you make monza your primary bank account and the way you do, that is by making one direct debit come out of your bank account per month and pay at least 500 pounds per month into it. What that then gives you is you're allowed to do. Two free card replacements per year and the three percent thing doesn't apply.

Now i go into a lot of detail about these changes in a separate video that i've made about monzo, you will see the link up there and you'll see the link in the description below. If you want to go and watch that, there's a lot more that i cover in that video about why these changes are important, i'm not going to go into that detail now, but that's something that has come out now. A few days later, stalin went and sent an email which, on the surface, sounded incredibly similar and when i released that video, the styling email came out a few hours after i posted the video about monzo and they do the following. They do five pounds per card replacement, but everybody gets one replacement per year free and i think that's a massive massive difference in that you can go and make a replacement they're, basically saying if you abuse the system by doing two or more replacements per year, then They'll begin charging you a fee, and i think this won't affect the vast majority of people, so i'm kind of a lot happier with it.

It seems like a tiny little technical change, but what they're basically saying is they are happy to replace your card unless you want to go and replace it every few months and then you'll have to go and pay for the privilege with monzo. If you want to replace the card for any reason that isn't related to it being stolen or fraud, you will have to pay no matter what, unless it's, your primary bank account another charge they introduced in that email is 20 pounds to make chaps payments. Now most people will never ever do chaps payments from their bank account, but the reason a charge exists is because it actually costs the bank quite a big amount of money to make those payments. Those payments only exist for very large transactions that need to be cleared within the same day, and most people will never ever in their lifetime, go and make one of these or maybe once, but even then you probably can do it by other means.

If it's not quite as urgent or if it doesn't have to go through the chaps payment rails, even if you're making a very large purchase, you don't have to use chaps in order to move a large amount of money. So, anyway, you have to go and pay 20 pounds now, if you want to use that service, but again, i don't think that will actually affect anybody. They've also now introduced a two pound fee for having an additional account on top of your existing bank account. So if you want to have a second bank account, for whatever reason, let's say you want to have two or three different accounts which you use for different purposes or if you want to open a new product called styling kite which is dedicated for children.

It is a restricted bank account specifically targeted at children, and it has specific features for that particular reason and again in order to open one of them. You'll have paid two pounds per month as well, and if you want to open a connected card that also comes with a two pound fee connected card is a card that you can go and give to somebody else that you can go and put money onto so That they can go and buy things for you or on your behalf or whatever the card is in their name, it's again a different product that is linked to your current account. Now. The big difference here in my mind to what monzo have done is these are fundamentally new products.

They're, releasing they're offering you increased functionality, they're telling you you can now do more with your card and in exchange you have to pay a small fee. You can go and open a second account. Previously, you can do that. You can go and open an account for your kids.

Previously, you couldn't do that, and the fee is somewhat reasonable, now think about monzo in terms of what they've been doing recently, both with a monzo plus account that they've opened a few months ago and with the new charges that they've introduced is they're actually taking stuff. That they previously offered you for free as part of their bank account and they're sort of reneging on it and they're going back on it. They used it to attract you in the first place. They used it for millions of people to go and open the account and now they're saying well, you've had it for free, but now we're going to take it away and give it back to you, but in exchange for money now you can't do those things anymore.

You're gon na have to pay for them, and that's a big big difference. Introducing new things that provide incremental value and charging for them is a very different thing to taking things that you previously did give to people that entice them to switch to you, then taking them away from people and making them pay money for them instead. Now here is a really important thing that i alluded to at the beginning of the video, and that is the financial performance of the two banks. Monzo have recently announced that the bank is in trouble.

They didn't quite announce it in that way, but they published their annual report and if you look deep enough in that report, that is exactly what it says. It says that the bank has a high risk of not being able to survive the next year or two, and that certainly puts a lot of doubt on whether the bank is going to be around long enough to make it a long-term investment from their customers. We're starting the picture is very different. They have made some moves, especially in working with businesses, especially in the lending department.

The monzo have not done, and that is proving to work much much better. Now a really important point to note if you have a monzo account if you're an existing monster customer or even if you're, considering switching to monzo, don't make this. The only thing you consider when making your choice, your money is protected by fscs, with both banks and the fscs protection is pretty good. If something were to happen to monster tomorrow, in most cases, you will get access to your money within hours.

That is how the fscs protection works in the worst case scenario, according to the fscs themselves, you'd have to wait as long as two weeks to be able to get your money back from the bank, and that is pretty good, so the risk of anything major happening As long as you're, not holding more than 85 000 pounds in that bank, account are pretty low, so if you like monzo for the features and for the app benefits and for some of those pots or whatever it is, and you want to continue using it. I am not in any way advocating the ego and switch you should go and make your own choice. I'm just telling you my own personal opinion, but on the balance of what i've just said on the balance of the various banking features and the benefits and the pros and cons of both banks, i generally do prefer styling. I would say if i had to recommend and bank to a friend if a friend was saying i don't know anything about these two, which one should i go and open an account with to make my main account for the future.

I would tell them to pick styling, that's the one i use i'm not being paid to do this review, i'm not being paid by styling in any way whatsoever, not even any commissions, so this is purely just based on my personal opinion, i find the value that The bank account offers far greater. I personally have a starting bank account and a monzo bank account, but i think i'm only gon na stick with styling in the long run, because i like that current account better. If you prefer one or the other, please go and tell me exactly why below and exactly why you want to stick with one or the other. I'd be really interested to hear your thoughts.

If you did enjoy this video - and you want to watch more videos about personal finance, about personal finance products, about making more of your money go and make sure you subscribe to this channel go make sure you hit the bell. So you get notifications every single time. One of my videos comes out. Thank you.

So much for watching and i'll see you guys later time will tell it's. Gon na take cause. We've been through hell.