Detailed comparison of all fees, features, and suitability — updated for 2026.
ING is the better choice for Full-Service Bank Customers, while Trade Republic wins for Beginners. Which one suits you depends on your strategy — the detailed comparison below shows every difference.
| Metric | ING | Trade Republic | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Order fee per trade | 9.90 € | 1.00 € | 8.90 € cheaper at Trade Republic |
| 10y savings plan cost @ €100/month | 1.188 € | 0 € | 1.188 € cheaper at Trade Republic |
| Interest on €10,000 cash (1 year) | — | 3.25 % = 325 € | +325 € more at Trade Republic / year |
| Free ETF savings plans | 0 | 2.200 | +2.200 more at Trade Republic |
| Available exchanges | 5 | 1 | +4 more at ING |
| BMInsider rating | 3.5/5 | 4.3/5 | +0.8 at Trade Republic |
All fees, products, and platform features compared side-by-side. The "Winner" column shows which broker leads in each category.
| Feature | ING | Trade Republic | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fees & Costs | |||
| Order Fee | 4.90€ + 0.25% (min 9.90€) | 1€ per Order | Trade Republic |
| ETF Savings Plan Fee | 1.75% | 0€ | Trade Republic |
| Account Fee | 0€/Year | 0€/Year | Tie |
| Minimum Deposit | 0€ | 0€ | Tie |
| Interest on Cash | 0% | 3.25% | Trade Republic |
| Product Range | |||
| Stocks | Tie | ||
| ETFs | Tie | ||
| Crypto | Trade Republic | ||
| Options | Tie | ||
| CFDs | Tie | ||
| Fractional Shares | Trade Republic | ||
| Number of Exchanges | Xetra, Frankfurt, Direkthandel | LS Exchange | ING |
| Platform & Tools | |||
| Mobile App | Tie | ||
| Desktop Platform | Tie | ||
| Demo Account | Tie | ||
| Security & Regulation | |||
| Regulated by | BaFin | BaFin | Tie |
| Deposit Protection | 100.000€ | 100.000€ | Tie |
| Founded | 1991 | 2015 | Tie |
| Overall Rating | |||
| Rating | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ | Trade Republic |
Depending on your strategy and experience, one broker fits better. Here's how to decide:
Low barriers, simple app, demo account and no hidden costs — perfect to get started.
More about Trade Republic →Low per-order fees, many trading venues and derivatives access — important if you trade regularly.
More about Trade Republic →Free savings plans, interest on cash and no custody fee — what matters when you buy & hold.
More about Trade Republic →ING offers securities trading as part of its full banking service. For customers who want checking and brokerage under one roof.
Particularly suitable for: Full-Service Bank Customers, Casual Investors, Savings Plan.
Trade Republic is a German neo-broker with extremely low fees (€1 per trade) and free ETF savings plans. Ideal for beginners and savings plan investors.
Particularly suitable for: Beginners, Savings Plan Investors, Mobile-First.
ING (formerly ING-DiBa) is one of the largest German direct banks, with 9 million customers and a 30-year track record. The depot is a free side-feature of the broader bank: Girokonto, Tagesgeld, Extra-Konto, mortgages, savings plans — all at one BaFin-regulated bank, with phone support in German and a heavy desktop interface. Trade Republic is the 2015-vintage Berlin neo-broker: €1 flat orders, 3.25 % cash interest, mobile-only, single venue (LS Exchange), and no Girokonto in the traditional sense.
The migration question for an existing ING customer is rarely "should I leave ING entirely" — it is "should I keep my Girokonto + Extra-Konto at ING but move my actual investing to Trade Republic?" The answer is almost always yes, for reasons of pure economics laid out below.
You want a Girokonto + depot at the same bank. ING is a real Direktbank — Girokonto with up to 4 % interest on the Extra-Konto promo (now 1.5 % standard), German IBAN, full SEPA support, Visa Debit, ATM access at all DKB/ING branches. Trade Republic offers a Visa Debit but is not a current account in the traditional sense. For someone who wants paycheck → savings → investment under one roof, ING remains coherent.
You value German telephone support 24/7. ING runs a German call centre with experienced staff; you can reach them about depot questions, technical issues, or wire transfers. Trade Republic is chat-only with no phone support — a structural problem when something goes wrong on a 6-figure position.
You trade larger volumes occasionally and want German Regional-Börsen access. ING routes to Xetra, Frankfurt and Direkthandel (BNP Paribas, UBS Quotrix). Trade Republic only has LS Exchange — for a €20 k order in a non-DAX-40 stock, the Xetra-vs-LS spread can be 0.10–0.30 %, equivalent to €20–€60 per trade.
You already use ING for your Girokonto. The path-of-least-resistance argument is real — ING's depot is "free" in the sense that it is a bolted-on feature of the bank you already use. The €9.90 per order matters less if you only place 4–6 orders per year and the operational simplicity of one bank is worth something subjectively.
Order fees are a different magnitude. ING charges 4.90 € + 0.25 % with a 9.90 € minimum — meaning every order under ~2 000 € costs 9.90 €. Trade Republic charges €1 flat. For a €500 trade, that is 9.90 € vs €1 — almost 10× the cost. Over 4 manual orders per month, the gap is 4 × (9.90 - 1) = 35.60 € per month, or 427 € per year saved on TR for the same trading activity.
You hold idle cash. Trade Republic pays 3.25 % p.a. on EUR cash up to €50 k. ING pays 0 % on the depot Verrechnungskonto. The Extra-Konto exists separately, currently around 1.50–1.75 % standard (promotional rates higher), but requires moving cash between accounts. On a €15 k buffer, the differential vs ING Verrechnung is ~487 €/year for free at TR, or roughly 250 €/year vs ING Extra.
You want fee-free ETF savings plans on hundreds of ETFs from €1. Trade Republic offers €0 savings plans on >2 000 ETFs from €1 minimum. ING savings plans cost 1.75 % per execution — meaning a €100 monthly buy costs €1.75 in commission, or 1.75 % drag. For a 3-fund Bogleheads setup over 10 years, the cost gap is around 600–800 € in favor of TR.
You want native crypto, fractional shares, or Visa Debit cashback. Trade Republic offers all three — ~50 cryptos, fractional shares from €1, 1 % cashback Visa Debit. ING offers none of these in the depot.
You are mobile-first. ING's mobile app is functional but designed around the Girokonto, not investing. Trade Republic is investing-first; the order flow, watchlists, and portfolio analytics are noticeably better.
Germany — both steuereinfach. ING and Trade Republic both withhold 25 % KESt + 5.5 % Soli (= 26.375 % effective) plus optional Kirchensteuer at source. Both apply the Sparerpauschbetrag automatically once Freistellungsauftrag is filed. Loss carry-forward is per-broker — if you split assets between both, you will need to manually file a Verlustbescheinigung at year-end if you want to combine.
Austria — neither is austriakonform. Both ING and Trade Republic require self-reporting via Anlage E1kv on FinanzOnline for Austrian residents. KESt at 27.5 % must be tracked manually. Both issue annual Erträgnisaufstellungen, but neither hand off automatic withholding to the Austrian tax authority. For Austrian investors, neither broker offers an operational advantage on this dimension.
Vorabpauschale 2026: ING applies the Vorabpauschale automatically on January 2 by debiting the Verrechnungskonto. Trade Republic does the same. Both expect ~0.5–1 % of accumulating ETF position value in cash at year-end.
Quellensteuer on US dividends: Both file W-8BEN; the standard 15 % US withholding is creditable against German KESt automatically.
Reporting niceness: ING issues a paper-style Steuerbescheinigung that traditional Steuerberater prefer; Trade Republic issues PDFs in a more compact format. For complex returns (Anlage KAP-INV with split foreign components), ING documents are easier to hand off to an older Steuerberater workflow. Younger digital-first Steuerberater handle TR PDFs without complaint.
Profile: 1 monthly ETF savings plan at €100, 4 manual one-off purchases per year at €500 each, average €5 000 idle cash buffer.
| Item | ING | Trade Republic |
|---|---|---|
| 120× savings plan execution (1.75 %) | €210 | €0 |
| 40× manual orders (€9.90 min) | €396 | €40 (€1 each) |
| Venue fees (40× ~€2) | €80 | €0 (LS in price) |
| Depot fee | €0 | €0 |
| Cash interest (€5 k × 10 y × rate) | +€875 (1.75 % Extra-Konto) | +€1 625 (3.25 %) |
| Net 10-year cost | −€189 | −€1 585 |
The €1 396 difference is significant — 14 % of the original capital — and almost entirely explained by ING's higher commission structure plus its decision to leave 0 % on the Verrechnungskonto.
Note: this comparison assumes the user actively moves cash to ING's Extra-Konto for the 1.75 % rate. If the user just leaves cash in the depot Verrechnungskonto, ING pays 0 % and the gap widens by another €875 — total €2 271 in favor of TR.
The ING case becomes competitive only if the user values bundled banking enough to pay the 14 %-of-capital opportunity cost over 10 years for the operational simplicity. Most users in our experience do not, once they see the math.
Pick: Trade Republic. €0 savings plan, €1 manual orders, 3.25 % cash. ING would charge ~€100/year in savings-plan + manual fees alone, eating ~10 % of contributions at this level. There is no economic argument for ING at this size.
Pick: Keep ING for the bank, move investing to Trade Republic. ING's Girokonto, Extra-Konto, and credit card are competitive — keep them. ING's depot is not. Open Trade Republic for the depot side; transfer existing securities free of charge (Depotwechsel-Service). Most ING customers running this dual setup save 200–400 €/year while losing nothing on the banking side.
Pick: Trade Republic for cost, or upgrade to Scalable PRIME+ / IBKR for execution. ING is structurally not designed for active trading — €9.90 per order is too expensive at any scale. Trade Republic at €1 flat is competitive on cost; for execution quality on €5 k+ orders, Scalable's Xetra access or IBKR's Smart-Routing wins outright.
Pick: Trade Republic primary, ING secondary. Use TR for active investing, savings plan, and cash buffer (3.25 %). Use ING Extra-Konto for emergency reserves above €50 k where TR's interest cap kicks in. Two-broker setup is operationally trivial in 2026 with FinTec apps aggregating across both.
Answers to the most common questions about ING vs Trade Republic.
For order fees, Trade Republic leads at 1€ pro Order, while ING charges 4.90€ + 0.25% (min 9.90€). Note: with CFD brokers, spreads add hidden cost — the lower nominal price isn't always cheaper overall.
ING is regulated by BaFin, Trade Republic by BaFin. Both fall under EU oversight. Deposit protection: ING 100.000€, Trade Republic 100.000€.
For German/Austrian customers, language, BaFin regulation and tax-simple status often matter most. Check the 'Regulated by' and 'Languages' rows — DACH-focused brokers usually have the edge.
Trade Republic offers free ETF savings plans from 1€. If a savings plan matters to you, that's a clear edge.
Both are covered under their home regulator's deposit protection. ING: 100.000€, Trade Republic: 100.000€. Securities are held in segregated accounts and protected in case of broker insolvency.
Trade Republic leads on cash interest at 3.25%. Watch the conditions — some brokers require a paid plan or cap the amount.
Both offer native mobile apps with good app-store ratings. Which is better depends on your needs — try both with a demo account if available.
A second broker makes sense when one offers features the other lacks (e.g. options, crypto, more exchanges). A full switch is only worth it if the cost difference or missing features are significant.
Sign up with the broker that fits your strategy. Both are regulated and offer a demo account to test risk-free.
