Crypto neobanks reviewed

• US regulators reopened the door to bank crypto services in 2025, and SoFi Bank and PNC have since launched crypto trading.
• Most UK banks we checked cap payments to exchanges at £1,000 a day or per payment, and Starling blocks them.
• Crypto held in a bank app is not covered by FDIC or FSCS deposit insurance.

Lists of crypto friendly banks usually mix two different things. One is whether your bank lets you send money to a crypto exchange at all. The other is whether the bank, or the app you bank with, can hold crypto for you. We call the second kind a crypto neobank: an app-based bank or e-money account that also lets you buy, hold or send crypto.

Fewer than the headlines suggest, although US regulators reopened the door in 2025. The OCC dropped its requirement for national banks to get supervisory sign-off before crypto activities on 7 March 2025, the FDIC ended its prior-notification rule on 28 March 2025, and the Federal Reserve withdrew its crypto supervisory letters on 24 April 2025. Two launches followed:

• SoFi Bank started crypto trading for consumers on 11 November 2025, paid straight from SoFi checking or savings accounts.
• PNC added spot bitcoin trading for eligible Private Bank clients on 9 December 2025, built on Coinbase's infrastructure.

Brokerages are moving faster than banks: Charles Schwab began a phased rollout of spot bitcoin and ether trading in 2026, charging 75 basis points a trade, though not in New York or Louisiana, and the crypto is not FDIC insured.

Large card issuers stay cautious. Chase's cardmember agreement treats crypto purchases as cash-like transactions billed as cash advances, at $10 or 5%, whichever is greater, in the agreement we checked. JPMorganChase and Coinbase announced a partnership on 30 July 2025 to let Chase cards fund Coinbase accounts; we have not been able to confirm that any of the announced features is live.

Most of the UK banks we checked allow payments to crypto exchanges but cap them, and Starling does not allow them at all. These were the published rules on 16 October 2026:

Chase UK's capped transfers are new: from 16 October 2023 until at least early October 2026 it blocked crypto payments outright. NatWest says it does not limit payments coming back from exchanges, and Santander says it does not restrict incoming payments from Binance.

• Which company runs the crypto service. It is often not the bank. Revolut became a full UK bank in March 2026 and is moving customers to Revolut Bank UK Ltd in stages, but its UK crypto service runs through Revolut Ltd, an FCA-authorised e-money institution whose crypto business is registered with the FCA for anti-money-laundering purposes only.
• What protection applies. Cash deposits at a bank are insured, by the FDIC in the US and by the FSCS in the UK (up to £120,000 since 1 December 2025). Crypto is not insured, and neither is e-money, such as a Revolut balance that has not yet moved to Revolut Bank UK Ltd. The FDIC says that holds even when you buy crypto through an insured bank, and the FCA says crypto held with Revolut is not covered by the FSCS or the Financial Ombudsman.
• Whether you can withdraw coins to your own wallet, or only sell them back to the app.
• The full cost of a trade: the fee and the spread on each buy and sell.

We weigh crypto and banking equally, because a crypto neobank has to be good at both. Our neobank scoring methodology gives 25% to crypto features, 25% to everyday banking features, 20% to fees, 15% to the range of coins and 15% to trust and compliance. Only neobanks with a full review get a score; the others listed on this page are still on our review desk. For app picks by country, see our guides to the best crypto neobanks in the United States and the United Kingdom.

• Revolut review: our full review of Revolut's crypto fees, safety and Revolut X.
• Country guides: United States, United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.
• Which Canadian banks allow cryptocurrency?: bank-by-bank policies in Canada.
• Crypto cards and crypto on-ramps: other ways to move between money and crypto.