🏦 Open a bank account

The most important thing! You’ll be bleeding money 💸 until you get a bank account.

I split banks into two: Fun 🎉 and Serious 👔.

• 🎉 Fun banks are app-only. Easy to open, lots of perks and cool cards.
• 👔 Serious banks have branches, so you can talk to humans. They do mortgages and the boring long-term stuff.

I like having my salary paid into a serious bank, then moving it to a fun bank. Open a fun bank first so you can get paid. Then try for a serious one.

🎉 Fun banks

Monzo

Monzo is a neo-bank. Everything happens in the app, the card looks cool, and the app feels trendy ✨.

There’s a free tier. Their £9 Perks tier adds some nice benefits:

• 🥐 A free Greggs treat every month. Greggs is a bakery: get a coffee, or their most famous product, a sausage roll.
• 🚗 Uber One: no delivery fees, plus discounts and credits on Uber.
• 🚆 A Railcard: cheaper trains (not the Tube).
• 🎬 Vue Cinema: one free ticket a month and 10% off food.
• 📺 YouTube Premium Lite: no ads on YouTube.

There’s also Max at £19, but I don’t think it adds as much.

Use our link above to get between £10 and £50 when you open an account 🎁.

Revolut

Revolut is another neo-bank, with investing and savings accounts. Their Premium plan includes subscriptions such as:

• 🤖 ChatGPT Go
• 🔒 NordVPN
• 💪 Freeletics
• 🦉 Duolingo
• 🧘 Headspace
• 💻 Lovable
• ❤️ Tinder (so you meet new people)
• 🧺 Laundryheap
• 🚗 Uber One
• …and more

👔 Serious banks

My two picks: Barclays and HSBC. Which one depends on how much you earn. Both give perks if your salary is paid into them. You can move the money anywhere afterwards.

Barclays

If you earn more than £75,000 a year, Barclays offers Premier Banking.

• 💰 Savings plans
• ☎️ 24/7 human support
• 📺 Apple TV

There’s also the separate Avios Rewards add-on. It costs £12 a month and gives you 1,500 Avios a month ✈️. Every 12 months you also choose a reward: 7,000 Avios or a Cabin Upgrade Voucher.

If you’re not from the UK, you probably fly home to see friends and family. With the upgrade voucher, you can buy a British Airways Premium Economy ticket and upgrade it to Business 🛋️.

HSBC

If you earn more than £100,000 a year, HSBC’s Premier Bank Account has better benefits:

• 🧳 Travel insurance
• 🩺 Digital GP appointments
• …among others

🔁 Switching banks

You can move your main bank account easily with the Current Account Switch Service. It moves your balance, salary and direct debits for you. Banks often pay you to switch 💷. Check each bank’s current switching offer.

⚠️ Warning

Always keep your main account somewhere you can talk to people. If you lose access to your card or account, you don’t want to deal with a chatbot in a moment of stress 😰.