Detailed comparison of all fees, features, and suitability — updated for 2026.
Interactive Brokers is the better choice for Professionals, while Trade Republic wins for Beginners. Which one suits you depends on your strategy — the detailed comparison below shows every difference.
| Metric | Interactive Brokers | Trade Republic | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Order fee per trade | 1.00 € | 1.00 € | identical |
| 10y savings plan cost @ €100/month | 120 € | 0 € | 120 € cheaper at Trade Republic |
| Interest on €10,000 cash (1 year) | 4.33 % = 433 € | 3.25 % = 325 € | +108 € more at Interactive Brokers / year |
| Free ETF savings plans | 0 | 2.200 | +2.200 more at Trade Republic |
| Available exchanges | 1 | 1 | identical |
| BMInsider rating | 4.5/5 | 4.3/5 | +0.2 at Interactive Brokers |
All fees, products, and platform features compared side-by-side. The "Winner" column shows which broker leads in each category.
| Feature | Interactive Brokers | Trade Republic | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fees & Costs | |||
| Order Fee | $0.005/Aktie (min $1) or Fixed $1 | 1€ per Order | Tie |
| ETF Savings Plan Fee | - | 0€ | Trade Republic |
| Account Fee | 0€/Year | 0€/Year | Tie |
| Minimum Deposit | 0€ | 0€ | Tie |
| Interest on Cash | bis 4.33% (USD) | 3.25% | Interactive Brokers |
| Product Range | |||
| Stocks | Tie | ||
| ETFs | Tie | ||
| Crypto | Tie | ||
| Options | Interactive Brokers | ||
| CFDs | Tie | ||
| Fractional Shares | Tie | ||
| Number of Exchanges | 150+ Börsen in 33 Ländern | LS Exchange | Tie |
| Platform & Tools | |||
| Mobile App | Tie | ||
| Desktop Platform | Interactive Brokers | ||
| Demo Account | Interactive Brokers | ||
| Security & Regulation | |||
| Regulated by | SEC / FCA / BaFin | BaFin | Tie |
| Deposit Protection | $500.000 (SIPC) | 100.000€ | Tie |
| Founded | 1978 | 2015 | Tie |
| Overall Rating | |||
| Rating | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ | Interactive Brokers |
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 Interactive Brokers →Low per-order fees, many trading venues and derivatives access — important if you trade regularly.
More about Interactive Brokers →Free savings plans, interest on cash and no custody fee — what matters when you buy & hold.
More about Trade Republic →Interactive Brokers is the professional's choice with access to 150+ exchanges, all product classes, and the lowest fees for active traders.
Particularly suitable for: Professionals, Active Traders, International Investors, Options Trading.
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.
This is the comparison that separates serious DIY investors from casual ones. Interactive Brokers (IBKR), founded 1978 in Greenwich, is the global broker of choice for hedge funds, family offices and active retail traders — 150+ exchanges across 33 countries, full options/futures/FX/bonds, Tier-1 prime-broker spreads, and SIPC + segregated-asset protection up to $500 000. Trade Republic, founded 2015 in Berlin, is the consumer-grade neo-broker for German retail savers — €1 flat orders, 3.25 % cash interest, mobile-only, single execution venue (LS Exchange).
The honest framing: these brokers do not really compete. IBKR is professional infrastructure with a steep learning curve and US-tax complexity. Trade Republic is a consumer financial app. The question is rarely "which is better" — it is "does my use case actually need IBKR's depth, or am I paying complexity cost for features I will never use?"
You trade options actively (more than 5 contracts/month). IBKR offers global options markets — US options, Eurex DAX/Bund options, single-stock options on European underlyings, options on futures. Per-contract fees are $0.65 (or $0.15–0.55 on the Tiered plan); the Smart routing finds the best venue automatically. Trade Republic does not support options at all. For anyone running covered calls, cash-secured puts, vertical spreads or even occasional protective puts, this is structural.
You trade futures, FX or bonds. IBKR offers Eurex/CME/CBOE futures, 100+ currency pairs with institutional FX spreads (often <0.5 pip on EUR/USD), and direct access to corporate + government bond markets. Trade Republic offers none of these. For anyone hedging EUR/USD exposure or trading Bund futures around ECB meetings, IBKR is the only realistic German-tax-resident option besides niche specialists.
You trade non-DAX markets — Tokyo, Hong Kong, London AIM, Toronto. IBKR routes to 150+ exchanges. Trade Republic only does LS Exchange — most non-European stocks (TSE, HKEX, ASX) are simply unavailable. For international stock picking beyond US/EU large caps, IBKR is the only retail option.
You hold $50 k–$500 k+ idle cash and want institutional rates. IBKR pays USD interest at the SOFR-based rate (currently ~4.33 % on the first $10 k for retail, ~5 % on tier accounts) and EUR at ~3.5 %. The high-tier rates beat any retail bank including Trade Republic on USD balances. For families running 6-figure cash buffers, the differential is meaningful.
You manage capital across multiple accounts (family office / advisor model). IBKR supports sub-accounts, joint accounts, custodial accounts, trust accounts, and the IBKR Pro / Lite tier. Trade Republic is single-user only — no advisor relationship, no aggregation across family members.
You are a beginner or pure DIY long-term investor. Trade Republic onboards in under an hour, has a clean app, and never once asks you to choose between "Smart routing", "Tiered vs Fixed pricing", "IBKR Pro vs Lite", or to upload an additional W-8BEN form annually. For 90 % of European retail investors building a buy-and-hold portfolio of ETFs and a few large-cap stocks, the IBKR depth is friction without benefit.
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. IBKR has a "Recurring Investment" feature in beta, but it is feature-poor compared to TR's catalog and explicitly priced per-share for non-promoted instruments. For an automated monthly DCA setup, TR is structurally simpler.
You are a German tax resident wanting steuereinfach + automatic Sparerpauschbetrag. Trade Republic withholds 26.375 % KESt + Soli at source automatically and applies the Sparerpauschbetrag without paperwork. IBKR is not a German tax-simple broker — every realized gain, dividend, and interest payment must be self-reported via Anlage KAP, with manual handling of US W-8BEN withholding, foreign tax credits, currency translation, and Vorabpauschale. For anyone who values "set it and forget it" tax handling, TR is the only sensible answer.
You hold idle cash in EUR and want hassle-free interest. Trade Republic pays 3.25 % p.a. on EUR cash up to €50 k, automatically, no minimum, no tier requirements. IBKR pays interest only above $10 k threshold and at variable tiered rates that depend on your account size. For the €5 k–€20 k retail buffer, TR is structurally simpler and competitive.
You want native crypto + Visa Debit in the same account. Trade Republic supports ~50 cryptocurrencies natively and includes a cashback Visa Debit. IBKR offers crypto only via futures or specific ETPs and has no consumer payment card.
Germany — Trade Republic is steuereinfach, IBKR is not. Trade Republic withholds 25 % KESt + 5.5 % Soli (= 26.375 % effective) plus optional Kirchensteuer at source on every realized gain, dividend, and interest payment. IBKR Germany (operated through IBIE — IBKR Ireland) does not automatically withhold German taxes on the trading account. You receive an annual statement (Steuerreport) which lists transactions, dividends, fees, and Vorabpauschale base values — but you must manually file Anlage KAP, claim Sparerpauschbetrag, calculate FX gains/losses on USD positions, and handle US W-8BEN credits. This requires either tax-software like Smartsteuer / WISO Steuer-Sparbuch with Excel imports, or a Steuerberater familiar with international broker statements.
Austria — both are non-austriakonform. Trade Republic and IBKR both require self-reporting via Anlage E1kv. Austrian KESt at 27.5 % applies to capital gains and dividends. Both brokers issue annual statements; IBKR's is more detailed but also more complex.
Vorabpauschale 2026: Trade Republic calculates and debits Vorabpauschale automatically on January 2. IBKR reports the Vorabpauschale base in the year-end statement; you must report it manually in Anlage KAP-INV. The basis on accumulating ETF positions is the same, but the operational handling diverges sharply.
Quellensteuer on US dividends: Trade Republic credits the standard 15 % US withholding against German KESt automatically. IBKR withholds 15 % on US dividends (assuming W-8BEN filed) but does not auto-credit against German KESt — you claim the credit yourself in Anlage KAP. Worth noting: IBKR's W-8BEN handling is generally cleaner than other foreign brokers and avoids the 30 % default withholding for non-US persons.
Currency-gain tracking on USD positions: A practical IBKR pain point. EUR-tax-resident clients holding USD-denominated positions trigger taxable currency gains/losses on every position close, which must be tracked separately from the underlying capital gain. Trade Republic, by virtue of being EUR-only at point-of-trade with internal FX conversion, abstracts this away.
Profile change: this comparison only makes sense at higher capital. Assume a €100 000 portfolio, 8 manual orders/month (€2 000 average), monthly €500 ETF savings plan, and €15 000 average idle cash buffer in EUR.
| Item | Interactive Brokers | Trade Republic |
|---|---|---|
| 120× savings plan execution | ~€100 (per-share min) | €0 |
| 960× manual orders | ~€960 ($1 fixed each) | €960 (€1 each) |
| FX conversion costs (USD positions) | ~€50 (institutional spread) | ~€2 000 (built into LS price) |
| Cash interest (€15k × 10y × rate) | +€4 500 (3.0 % EUR avg) | +€4 875 (3.25 %) |
| Tax-handling cost (Steuerberater) | ~€2 500 (10y × €250) | €0 |
| Net 10-year cost | ~−€890 | ~−€1 915 |
For this profile, Trade Republic still comes out ahead net-net — but only because of the embedded tax-handling cost on IBKR. Strip that out (DIY-tax-fileable user) and IBKR catches up via the FX-spread savings on USD positions. The cost gap is far smaller than the broker-vs-DACH-bank comparisons.
The real economic advantage of IBKR appears at multi-asset complexity: one IBKR account replaces a TR + Eurex-broker + Forex-broker + Treasury-direct + bond-broker stack. For a sophisticated investor who needs all of those, the consolidation alone is worth €1 000–€2 000 per year in operational savings, plus the elimination of multiple cost-basis-tracking spreadsheets.
Pick: Trade Republic. Zero questions. IBKR's Pro features are wasted at this scale, and the tax-handling overhead alone would consume any fee advantage.
Pick: Trade Republic. Steuereinfach, free savings plans, 3.25 % cash, single app. IBKR offers more, but the user does not need more — they need simpler.
Pick: Interactive Brokers. Trade Republic does not support options. Period. For anyone trading more than 5 options contracts per month or any futures, IBKR is the structurally correct answer. Pair with a separate cash-savings account at TR or DKB for emergency reserves.
Pick: Interactive Brokers (with secondary TR for cash). When you need US options, Eurex futures, FX hedging, corporate bonds, and equities under one roof, no other broker available to retail in Germany matches IBKR's breadth. Accept the tax-handling complexity as the price of access.
Pick: Interactive Brokers. Tier 1 spreads, Smart-Routing across multiple venues, real direct-market-access, sub-100-ms execution. Trade Republic's LS-only routing and ~€1 commission may seem cheap, but the spread differential on illiquid orders dwarfs the commission.
Answers to the most common questions about Interactive Brokers vs Trade Republic.
For order fees, Interactive Brokers leads at $0.005/Aktie (min $1) oder Fixed $1, while Trade Republic charges 1€ pro Order. Note: with CFD brokers, spreads add hidden cost — the lower nominal price isn't always cheaper overall.
Interactive Brokers is regulated by SEC / FCA / BaFin, Trade Republic by BaFin. Both fall under EU oversight. Deposit protection: Interactive Brokers $500.000 (SIPC), 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. Interactive Brokers: $500.000 (SIPC), Trade Republic: 100.000€. Securities are held in segregated accounts and protected in case of broker insolvency.
Interactive Brokers leads on cash interest at 4.33%. 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.
