Flatex Review 2026
Flatex is especially popular in Austria as a tax-simple broker with access to many exchanges and derivatives.
Fee Overview
Tradable Products & Features
Pros & Cons
Exchanges
Compare with Other Brokers
CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. A high proportion of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs. Make sure you understand the risks involved and only invest money you can afford to lose.
Verdict: Flatex review
Flatex is a different animal from the neo-broker crowd: an established online broker, founded in 2006 and regulated by both BaFin and Austria's FMA, that aims at investors who want real exchange choice and derivatives rather than the cheapest possible click. Its strongest constituency is in Austria, where it operates as a tax-simple broker that settles local taxes automatically — a genuine administrative relief that app-first rivals do not offer Austrian clients.
The platform's breadth is its core strength. You can route orders to Xetra, Frankfurt, Vienna, NYSE, NASDAQ and further venues, trade options and futures as well as CFDs, and practise everything first in a free demo account — rare in this peer group. Asian markets are accessible too, the custody account costs €0 per year, and deposits carry the usual €100,000 statutory protection. Around 1,500 ETFs are available as savings plans from €25 per instalment.
Costs are where Flatex loses ground badly. Orders run at €5.90 plus exchange fees — roughly six times a Trade Republic trade — and not a single savings plan is free: each execution costs €1.50, which on a €100 monthly plan is a 1.5% drag before the fund's own costs. Cash earns 0% interest, there is no crypto trading at all, no fractional shares, and the interface remains functional rather than pleasant. Our 3.8 rating reflects a capable but expensive package.
How does it compare? For pure German cost-cutting, Trade Republic and Smartbroker+ are simply cheaper on every axis that matters to a buy-and-hold investor. The more interesting fight is with DEGIRO, which offers even more international exchanges at lower order fees — but DEGIRO is explicitly not tax-simple for Austria, which hands Flatex the Austrian market almost by default.
Our recommendation is therefore narrow but firm: Flatex is a good fit for Austrian residents who want automatic tax handling, and for German-speaking investors who need options, futures and genuine multi-exchange routing under one roof. Cost-sensitive ETF savers and anyone who wants interest on idle cash should give it a pass.