eToro Review UK 2026 – Pros & Cons (Personally Tested)

eToro is a good fit if you want to buy shares and ETFs (exchange traded funds, which hold lots of investments in one) without paying commission, and you like the idea of seeing what other investors do. As of 29 October 2026, UK customers pay 0% commission on real shares and ETFs, the Stocks and Shares ISA has no dealing or custody fee, and eligible new Cash ISA customers can get 4.94% AER (variable) for the first 12 months. The catch is currency: swapping pounds into dollars costs 0.75% on trades (0.70% inside the ISA), and the app also sells much riskier products like CFDs and crypto.

I’ve used eToro since December 2019 and rated it 4.8 out of 5, the highest score we have on Up the Gains. eToro is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), and investments are covered by the FSCS (the UK’s compensation scheme if a financial firm fails) up to £85,000. Crypto isn’t covered. And this is eToro’s own warning on CFDs, word for word from its website today:

“CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 55% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work, and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.”

Best for copy trading

eToro

4 on Trustpilot

Social investing app with copy trading

What I like

• 0% commission on stocks
• Low minimum investment
• Copy other investors

Watch out for

• FX fee on non-GBP assets
• Limited research tools
• No SIPP

$50

minimum

~£40

Free

platform fee

Free

trading fee

0% commission on stocks

Visit eToro (opens in a new tab)

Affiliate link. Capital at risk.

eToro review: my verdict at a glance

For me, eToro is a fantastic place to learn how to trade and invest in the stock market. I’ve used many investing apps and, for me personally, it’s one of the best out there.

Is eToro good for beginners? Who it suits (and who it doesn’t)

I think eToro is an excellent choice for beginners. The app is fast and visual, there’s a free eToro Academy, and every account comes with a $100,000 virtual (practice) portfolio.

eToro suits you if

• You want to buy individual shares and ETFs without paying commission.
• You learn by watching others: the social feed shows what other investors buy and why, and CopyTrader lets you copy them automatically.
• You want a Cash ISA and a Stocks and Shares ISA in the same app as your trading account.

Look elsewhere if

• You want a pension in the same app: eToro has no SIPP (a personal pension you run yourself).
• You mostly buy US shares and want the lowest currency fee: Trading 212 charges 0.15%.
• You want a Junior ISA or Lifetime ISA.
• You know you’d be tempted to trade too often.

eToro fees (checked 29 October 2026)

eToro doesn’t charge commission on real shares and ETFs for UK customers. You pay through currency conversion, crypto, CFDs and some withdrawals:

eToro Club members (the tiers are based on your balance) get money off conversion fees: 20% for Silver and Gold, 40% for Platinum and Platinum+, and 80% for Diamond. Recurring investments don’t pay a conversion fee on the deposit that funds them.

What eToro’s fees cost in pounds

• Buying £1,000 of US shares from your GBP account costs £7.50 to convert (0.75%), and converting back when you sell costs about the same again.
• The same £1,000 inside the ISA costs £7.00 (0.70%). At Trading 212 the conversion would be £1.50 (0.15%).
• Buying £1,000 of Bitcoin costs £10 (1%), and another 1% of the value when you sell.
• Withdrawing from the USD account costs $5 each time, so it adds up if you withdraw small amounts often. Withdrawals from the GBP account are free.

Buying UK shares with pounds from your GBP account means no conversion at all.

eToro ISA review: Stocks and Shares ISA and Cash ISA

eToro’s ISAs run through a partnership with Moneyfarm, a separate FCA-regulated investment firm, and you manage them inside the eToro app. There are three: a Stocks and Shares ISA, a Cash ISA and a Managed ISA (Moneyfarm picks and runs the investments for an extra fee). You can put up to £20,000 a year across all your ISAs in the 2026/27 tax year.

Stocks and Shares ISA

Since 29 July 2026 it’s been genuinely low cost: 0% commission to buy or sell and no annual custody fee, with a 0.70% currency charge on non-GBP assets. That takes one of my old criticisms of eToro off the table. eToro says you can pick from over 1,000 stocks, ETFs, bonds and mutual funds, and the ISA is flexible, so you can take money out and put it back in the same tax year without using more allowance.

One gotcha: if you transfer a Stocks and Shares ISA in, eToro says the investments are sold and moved across as cash, so you’re out of the market while it happens. Our guide to transferring an ISA explains how transfers work.

Cash ISA

eToro’s Cash ISA page today shows:

The small print matters. You need at least £500 to open it (or £5,000 to transfer in), and to keep the boosted rate you can make no more than three withdrawals in 12 months. eToro says the extra 1% boost is paid after 12 months. As a rough guide, £10,000 at 4.94% would earn about £494 in a year if the rate didn’t change.

It also isn’t a bank account. The money sits in a qualifying money market fund (a low-risk fund that holds cash-like investments), so it’s covered by the FSCS investment limit of £85,000, not the £120,000 limit for bank savings. More on how this type of account works in how a cash ISA works.

The 28 October 2026 Budget scrapped the planned cut to the cash ISA limit, so the full £20,000 can still go into a cash ISA from April 2027 (see our 2027 ISA changes guide).

Investing outside an ISA

eToro’s main account is a normal taxable account. Gains above the £3,000 capital gains tax allowance are taxed at 18% or 24%, and dividends above the £500 allowance are taxed too, so it’s worth tracking your gains even on a fairly modest portfolio. Our general investment account vs stocks and shares ISA guide compares the two.

What you can invest in on eToro

When you invest, your capital is at risk.

eToro says it has over 7,000 tradeable assets. Here’s what’s on offer for UK customers:

Real shares or CFDs? If you buy without leverage, you normally own the real share. If you short-sell (bet on a price falling) or use leverage, you’re trading a CFD. eToro also says that, because of product restrictions, some non-leveraged buys are carried out as CFDs, and any CFD trade is labelled “CFD” on the trade screen before you confirm, so it’s worth checking.

Copy trading and social investing on eToro

One of the coolest features of eToro is social investing: a feed, a bit like Twitter, where investors post about what they hold and the more experienced ones write in-depth pieces. CopyTrader goes further and buys and sells exactly as the investor you’ve copied does, in proportion to what you put in. eToro’s terms today:

• The minimum to copy one investor is $200, and each copied position must be at least $1.
• There’s no extra charge for copying; you pay the normal spreads and fees on the trades.
• You can try it in the $100,000 demo account first.

The social feed lets me soak up knowledge from my favourite investors through their posts and deep dives. Popular Investors earn money from eToro when people copy them, so they have a reason to do well. But their past results don’t guarantee future ones, and if they make a big loss, so do you.

Read nextMoneyfarm Review – Is It Any Good?

CFDs, leverage and crypto: read this before you trade

What a CFD is

A CFD (contract for difference) is a bet on an asset’s price rather than owning it. You can go “short” (profit if the price falls) and use leverage. 55% of eToro’s retail CFD accounts lose money, so treat this part of the app with real caution.

How leverage works

Leverage means you put down a deposit and eToro lends you the rest. At 5 times leverage, £50 opens a £250 position. If the share rises 10%, you make £25: a 50% return on your £50. If it falls 10%, you lose £25: half your money. FCA rules cap leverage for ordinary customers at between 30:1 and 2:1 depending on the asset and stop you losing more than the money in your CFD account. Overnight fees apply for every night a leveraged position stays open.

Crypto risk

Crypto prices can swing very sharply, and you could lose everything you put in. eToro’s own small print says that with its crypto service “you will not benefit from the protections available to clients receiving MiFID regulated investment services, such as access to… the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) and the Financial Ombudsman Service”. In plain English: no compensation if something goes wrong, and no free complaints service. UK customers can buy real crypto but can’t trade crypto CFDs, which the FCA banned for ordinary customers in January 2021.

My gripe: it’s almost too easy

Whilst this doesn’t affect me, it’s effortless to make a trade on eToro. There’s almost an element of gamification to it, which can lead people to trade way more than they should because it feels fantastic. As we know, that doesn’t usually end well. The academy and demo account are there to practise on first.

Is eToro safe? FSCS protection and regulation

eToro is listed on the Nasdaq (ticker ETOR) and regulated in the UK. Where your money sits depends on what you hold:

• The eToro platform: eToro (UK) Ltd is authorised and regulated by the FCA (firm reference number 583263). Client money is kept in segregated accounts, separate from eToro’s own money, with banks including J.P. Morgan, Deutsche Bank and Coutts.
• Investments and cash in your eToro account: if eToro (UK) Ltd failed and there was a shortfall in the assets or money it holds for you, the FSCS could pay up to £85,000.
• ISAs: run by Moneyfarm (MFM Investment Ltd, FCA number 629539), a separate firm with its own £85,000 FSCS limit. Moneyfarm uses custodians (firms that hold the investments for you) including Barclays and Saxo Capital Markets UK.
• Cash ISA: held in a money market fund, so it falls under the £85,000 investment limit, not the £120,000 limit for bank deposits.
• GBP account: provided by eToro Money UK Ltd. eToro describes local currency account money as safeguarded (kept separate from company money), which isn’t the same as FSCS deposit protection.
• Crypto and CFDs: crypto has no FSCS or Financial Ombudsman cover. The FSCS never covers losses from prices falling, on CFDs or anything else.

You can check any firm with the FSCS protection checker.

How eToro works: opening an account and using the app

Opening an account is quick, usually around 5 minutes. You give your details and answer a short questionnaire on your investing knowledge and attitude to risk. To be fully verified you’ll need:

• Proof of identity (passport or driving licence)
• Proof of address (a bank statement or utility bill)
• Your tax identification number (your National Insurance number in the UK)

Verification usually takes roughly 24 hours. eToro says the minimum first deposit depends on your country (from $10 to $10,000 worldwide; you’ll see the UK figure at sign-up), later deposits must be at least $50, and unverified accounts are capped at $2,250 of deposits.

GBP account or USD account?

eToro used to run everything in dollars. UK customers now get a GBP account too, so you can pay in, hold and withdraw pounds without conversion, and only pay the 0.75% fee when you buy something priced in another currency.

My experience of the app

Having been an eToro user since December 2019, I have to say the platform is excellent. I’ve seen two significant overhauls of the app, each making it more intuitive.

• I’m a big fan of the portfolio overview, where I can see exactly how my holdings are performing in a visual list.
• The desktop version adds chart tools like RSI and trading volume, and lets you layer assets on one chart to compare a whole sector.
• Each asset has financial reports, analyst research, price targets, news and its own social feed.
• The watchlist is handy as I wait for specific prices to be hit before buying.

Deposits and withdrawals

You can pay in by debit card, bank transfer or through eToro Money. PayPal isn’t available for eToro UK customers. For withdrawals, I’ve received money the next day, but usually it’s 2 to 3 days. GBP withdrawals are free; USD withdrawals cost $5.

eToro reviews: what real users say

On Trustpilot, eToro scores 4.0 out of 5 (“Great”) from 32,276 reviews: 66% five star, 20% one star (checked 29 October 2026). Solid for a trading platform but not the best: Trading 212 sits at 4.6.

From what I’ve seen, most of the lower-scoring reviews centre on withdrawal timing and ID verification rather than the trading experience itself, which lines up with what I’ve found using the platform day to day. Customer service was eToro’s lowest score in my rating, even though it was still 4.5 out of 5.

eToro vs Trading 212 vs Freetrade

Each provider’s own figures, checked 29 October 2026:

eToro vs Trading 212

Both of these investing apps are fantastic options for beginners. Where they differ, and where eToro just edges it for me, is social investing and copy trading. Trading 212 doesn’t offer this, but it does have a fantastic Pies feature that you can automatically invest into each month, a much lower currency fee and a pension. Full breakdown in eToro vs Trading 212 and my Trading 212 review.

eToro vs Freetrade

Freetrade keeps things simpler and includes a Stocks and Shares ISA, pension and Junior ISA on its free plan, but charges a higher currency fee and has no copy trading or real crypto. See eToro vs Freetrade and the Freetrade review.

eToro vs Vanguard

Vanguard sells its own funds for an account fee, with no individual shares or crypto. More in investing with Vanguard.

My podcast episode with eToro

On The Money Gains Podcast we welcomed Sam North, who at the time was Head of Training and Market Analysis at eToro. We spoke about how to trade and invest on eToro, the app itself and its new features.

How I tested eToro

I’ve held an eToro account since December 2019 and use it almost every day. I scored it with our six pillar method, which rates suitability for beginners, useful features, user experience, customer service, price and fees, and customer feedback. eToro scored 4.8 out of 5 overall: 5 out of 5 for useful features and user experience, and its lowest score, 4.5, for customer service.

Every fee, rate and product on this page was re-checked on eToro’s own website on 29 October 2026, along with the FSCS and gov.uk rules. If you sign up through our links we may earn a commission. That never changes the score.

Final verdict: is eToro worth it?

For beginners and hands-on investors who want commission-free shares and ETFs, a fee-free Stocks and Shares ISA and social features, yes. It’s cheapest if you mostly invest in pounds; if most of your money goes into US shares, the 0.75% currency fee adds up and a platform like Trading 212 costs less. It’s not the place for a pension, and the CFD and crypto side carries real risk.

I’m a big fan of eToro and I think it will stay one of the most popular investing apps. What I’d still like to see: a broader selection of ETFs, a way to see the holdings inside an ETF without using a search engine, and more news partners, like the Financial Times or Wall Street Journal, so you could use eToro as a one-stop shop without paying for other news apps.

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