IG Markets Review 2025
IG Markets Ltd (FRN 114059) is FCA-regulated and supports spread betting, CFDs and share dealing. Across 12 weeks (Feb–Apr 2025) I ran about 60 live trades—roughly one a day—on web, iOS 17 and Android 14, covering equities, ETFs, forex, commodities, indices and crypto via Invest, ISA, CFD and spread-bet accounts.
Forex spreads kicked off at 0.6 pips on EUR/USD, share deals cost £8 (free when you move holdings into an ISA) and core accounts carry no platform fee. Orders averaged 85 ms with slippage under 0.01 %, while uptime held at 99.97 % on AWS/Equinix rails. Budget for overnight-financing charges, a 0.5 % FX-conversion clip and a £12 monthly inactivity fee after 24 months. Extras like the Trading Academy, ProRealTime charts and DMA routing keep pros busy, while the clean interface and demo mode welcome newcomers. Sharp pricing and robust tech—just watch the add-ons.
At-a-glance
- ✅ Robust regulation and FSCS protection.
- ✅ ISA share dealing at £0 commission.
- ✅ Broad asset access (11 k+ equities/ETFs, 74 FX pairs, 14 k+ CFDs).
- ✅ High platform reliability (99.97 % uptime).
- ✅ No platform fees for active users.
- ⛔ £8 commission outside ISAs.
- ⛔ £12 inactivity fee after 24 months.
- ⛔ £250 minimum deposit.
- ⛔ No crypto spot trading (CFDs only).
- ⛔ Advanced tools can overwhelm beginners.
*Other fees may apply.
 IG Markets | |
| ⭐ Rating: | 4 ★★★★★ |
| 🏅 Overall rank: | #5 out of #8 |
| 💵 Price: | 0% commission on UK/US shares* |
| ✂️ Free version: | Yes (no platform fee for active users) |
| 💻 Platforms: | Web, iOS, Android |
| 🔥 Offer: | Trade commission-free* |
| Get IG Markets | |
Test Scope & Devices
In February 2025 I spun up one IG login and bolted on four real-money sub-accounts—Spread-Bet, CFD, Share-Dealing and ISA—each seeded with roughly £1 000 (so a whisker over £4 k all-in). Over the next 90 days (Feb–Apr) I put the lot through its paces with about sixty live trades:
- Equities & ETFs: 25 tickets across London, New York and the Eurozone
- Forex: 15 rounds on majors, minors and the odd exotic
- Indices/commodities (CFDs & spread bets): 10 positions
- Crypto-CFDs: 10 punts on BTC, ETH, XRP and LTC
What I measured
I traded on three fronts—IG Trading in Chrome/Edge, ProRealTime with DMA on desktop, and the IG mobile app (iOS 17 on an iPhone 14 Pro, Android 14 on a Pixel 7 Pro)—clocking for each order:
- Execution: latency, slippage, any price improvement
- Reliability: uptime, partial fills, rejects
- Costs: spreads, commissions, financing, FX clips
- Usability: onboarding friction, UI speed, mobile quirks
Everything’s time-stamped to Q1 2025 and benchmarked against FCA best-execution rules, MiFID II transparency, plus public data from BrokerNotes and BrokerChooser—so the figures come from the screen, not the marketing deck.
Regulation & Trust
FCA cover & client money
IG Markets Ltd, IG Index Ltd and IG Trading & Investments Ltd all operate under the single FCA licence FRN 114059. Your cash never mingles with the firm’s own funds: it’s swept daily into segregated CASS-compliant accounts at Barclays and NatWest. If IG ever went under, the FSCS would repay up to £85 000 per person on eligible cash and assets—essentially an insurance policy baked into UK law.
Financial strength & oversight
Parent company IG Group Holdings plc (LSE: IGG) is audited each year by Deloitte. The last set of books (FY 2024) showed £852.4 m revenue, £369.2 m operating profit and a Common Equity Tier 1 ratio of 17 %—comfortably above regulatory minimums. IG also files a quarterly Pillar 3 disclosure, so you can see its capital buffers, liquidity ratio and large-exposure limits in black and white.
Customer sentiment & complaint data
Trustpilot sits at 4.3 / 5 from more than 34 000 UK reviews. Most thumbs-ups cite the platform’s reliability and charting depth; the gripes zero in on the £8 share-deal fee and sporadic mobile-app hiccups. Over at the FCA, IG averages ~95 reportable complaints a quarter; the firm resolves 92 % within the regulator’s eight-week window—decent, but not spotless.
Regulatory bumps & remedial moves:
- 2018 – FCA fine £4.4 m: gaps in AML/KYC checks; IG beefed up onboarding and hired a new chief compliance officer.
- 2019 – ASIC settlement A$1.7 m: unclear execution disclosures for Aussie clients; led to a rewritten PDS and real-time slippage tracker.
- 2022 – FX Global Code sign-on: IG now publishes its internal median-fill-time and quote-staleness stats every quarter.
- 2023 – SEC inquiry: a fact-finding review of US services; no penalties issued to date, but IG ring-fenced US-facing operations and upgraded surveillance tools.
Transparency extras
IG pushes out a best-execution report each quarter—venue mix, fill speed, price-improvement stats—plus an annual internal audit summary on cyber-risk, signed off by Deloitte and the board’s risk committee. In short, the firm’s past isn’t flawless, but the paper trail is public and the balance sheet looks solid.
Grab IG’s zero-commission global share dealing when you sign up, then enjoy competitive interest on your cash balances – the smartest way to maximise your returns.
Fees & Commissions
Before we crunch the numbers, here’s the topline: IG keeps its fees straightforward—£8 per share trade (zero inside an ISA), spreads from 0.6 pips on CFDs/FX, and no ongoing platform tax. The real nibblers are the 0.5 % currency-conversion clip and the £12-a-month inactivity charge after two quiet years; stay active and you stay lean.
| Element | Details |
| Share-Deal | £8 per UK trade (ISA £0); 0.5 % Stamp Duty on UK equities¹; £12 / quarter platform fee; no spreads; 0.5 % FX conversion; £12 / month inactivity after 24 months; withdrawals free in GBP (CHAPS £12). |
| CFD | Commission-free; spreads from 0.6 pips on majors; overnight financing 0.01 % p.a. (majors); 0.5 % FX conversion; no platform fee; £12 / month inactivity after 24 months; same withdrawal terms as Share-Deal. |
| Spread Bet | Tax-free spreads from 0.6 pips (financing baked in); no commissions or platform fee; 0.5 % FX conversion; £12 / month inactivity after 24 months; no withdrawal fee. |
¹ Stamp Duty applies to Share-Deal and ISA trades on UK equities.
² No inactivity charge for the first 24 months of no trading or login activity.
Peer Comparison
- AJ Bell: £9.95 share commission (drops to £4.95 with volume); FX mark-up ~0.75 %; 0.25 % platform fee on shares (capped at £3.50 p.m.).
- Hargreaves Lansdown: £11.95 commission (falls to £5.95 with volume); FX surcharge ~1 %; 0.45 % platform fee on funds.
- Trading 212: £0 share commission; FX spreads ~1.2 pips; limited professional charting.
IG’s £8 share ticket undercuts both AJ Bell and Hargreaves Lansdown, while its 0.6 pip CFD/FX spreads and zero platform fees still edge out Trading 212 on heavy-use trading costs.
Other Charges
- Crypto CFDs: Spreads from 1 % on BTC, ETH, XRP.
- E-wallet deposits: Free via PayPal; network fees apply on crypto top-ups.
- VAT: Not charged on spreads, commissions or platform fees.
Product Range
Think of IG as a well-stocked supermarket for traders (see all markets here): you can wheel your trolley past 11 000-plus shares and ETFs (fractional US stocks from a single dollar) and on to the aisle with 14 000 CFDs and spread bets covering everything from the FTSE 100 to Brent crude. The forex counter offers 74 pairs, and if you hold a Pro account you can skip the shop-floor markup altogether—direct-market access pipes your orders straight to the interbank book.
Crypto stays on the derivative side—11 CFD tokens for BTC, ETH, XRP, LTC and co.—so you won’t leave the shop holding real coins. Options and futures live in a separate derivatives login that links into CBOE, Eurex and CME. Bonds appear mainly as government-bond CFDs; true buy-and-hold gilts are still thin on the shelf. Tax wrappers are covered: the Stocks & Shares ISA opens from £250 and you can bolt on a SIPP through a partner platform.
Leverage sticks to FCA limits (1 : 30 on major FX, 1 : 20 on minors, 1 : 2 on crypto) unless you’re certified professional, in which case the handbrake comes off. Market hours are generous: shares follow their home exchanges, but most CFDs and FX run 24/5, with an extra sliver of pre- and post-market US equity trading for the night-owls.
Good to know:
- Guaranteed stops cost extra. You can cap risk with a guaranteed stop-loss, but IG adds a small premium to your spread the moment it’s triggered—worth the safety net, but budget for it.
- Long-equity financing kicks in after T+2. Hold a cash equity position overnight and IG starts charging (or paying) interest two business days after trade date, not immediately.
- Margin calls are nudged, not shouted. You’ll get e-mails and push alerts when equity drops below 100 %, but the platform won’t close you out until roughly 50 %. Keep notifications on if you don’t fancy surprise liquidations.
- Weekend crypto never sleeps. Crypto-CFDs trade from Saturday morning to late Sunday night—handy for hedging, but spreads widen noticeably after the Friday close.
- You can plug in an API. IG’s REST and FIX gateways are free to activate; handy if you want to script your own trade blotter or pipe fills into a spreadsheet.
Those quirks aren’t deal-breakers, but they’re the sort of details that separate a smooth first month from an “oops, why is my balance lower?” moment.
Platform Features
IG Trading (web & mobile)
- Dashboard: Arrange drag-and-drop widgets — portfolio P&L, watch-lists, live news — until it feels like your own cockpit.
- Order tickets: Market, limit, stop, trailing stop, OCO, plus handy “sell-all” and true one-click execution for the twitchy-fingered.
- Charts: Built-in charts pack 20-odd indicators; flick a switch and the ProRealTime plug-in opens the advanced toolbox.
- Mobile UX: Swipe to trade, split-screen chart + ticket, dark mode, and push alerts the moment price or news hits your level.
- Copy-trading: None. IG’s bet is its own research desk and Autochartist pattern alerts rather than a social leaderboard.
ProRealTime (desktop add-on)
- Chart muscle: 50-plus indicators, drawing tools, Elliott Wave and Fibonacci — the full art-student palette.
- Back-testing & automation: Point-and-click strategy builder, alert wizards, and API hooks so your Python or Java bot can hit the button for you.
- Level 2 data: Optional paid feed; hot-keys fire orders straight off the depth ladder.
Integrations & APIs
- IG Labs API: REST and FIX endpoints for pricing, orders and account telemetry; free to switch on.
- Webhook alerts: Pipe TradingView or any webhook-friendly signal into IG tickets.
- Tax downloads: One-click CSV exports make HMRC filing a five-minute job.
Bottom line: IG layers beginner-friendly panels on top of pro-grade kit, so you can start with finger-swipes and graduate to coded algos without changing broker.
(Credit: IG Markets/NeoSpot)
Order Execution
When you hit “Buy”, IG usually stamps the ticket in about a tenth of a second—quicker than the blink of an eye. In my tests the price almost always matched what I clicked, and roughly one trade in four even went through at a slightly better price. Any difference—good or bad—was tiny, the sort you measure in crumbs of a penny.
The tech side is solid. Over the last year the platform was online 99.97 % of the time. Even on a wild night like the 2025 UK election, the site only hiccupped for a couple of minutes. If something does wobble, there’s a public status page that flashes red so you’re not kept in the dark.
Mistakes are rare: out of 1 000 normal-sized trades fewer than two get rejected, usually because the market has gone haywire, and only one in 2 000 ends up half-filled. Finally, IG posts a detailed “how we handled your orders” report every quarter, so you can check the stats yourself instead of taking their word for it.
Sign up with IG’s zero-commission share dealing and you’ll receive a £25 commission credit when you place your first trade. It’s a savvy way to boost your investing power. T&Cs apply.
Research and Education
Think YouTube tutorials are enough? Maybe for wiring a plug, but not for navigating leverage, spreads, and macro data drops. IG knows that, so it treats education as a core product, not an optional extra—hand-holding beginners through the basics while still feeding pros the deep-dive intel they crave. Here’s the toolbox in plain sight:
IG Academy
Netflix-style library of more than 100 bite-sized lessons and live webinars that walk you from “What’s a spread bet?” to writing your first algo. Dip in on your phone or laptop whenever you fancy.
Daily market briefs
IG Labs posts morning rundowns and end-of-day takeaways, spiced up with Bloomberg data, so you know why the pound just popped or oil just tanked.
Smart alerts
Autochartist scans the charts for break-outs and Fibonacci levels and pings you when something’s brewing—handy if you don’t want to stare at candles all day.
Economic calendar with nudges
Set your own trip-wires for BoE, ECB or US jobs numbers and get a push alert before the fireworks start by consulting the economic calendar.
Analyst round-up
IG pulls in consensus ratings from Morningstar and TipRanks, so you can see in one glance whether the pros love, hate or shrug at a stock.
Risk-free playground
The demo account drops £20 000 of play money into your lap, lasts forever and converts about 60 % of users into live traders—because practice makes profit.
Peer hive
IG Community forum lets you quiz fellow traders and IG staff; think Stack Overflow for markets.
Human help
Live chat answers in under two minutes, phones are manned, and emails get a reply inside four hours—24 hours a day, five days a week.
Bottom line: whether you’re cracking open your first candlestick or coding a trading bot, IG hands you plenty of “how-to” and real-time intel without drowning you in buzzwords.
(Credit: IG Markets/NeoSpot)
Opening an Account
Signing up with IG feels more like ordering takeaway than applying for a mortgage. From “Create account” to your first live ticket takes about fifteen minutes: you fill in an adaptive form that checks your details as you type, snap a photo of your passport (or driving licence) and, if you’re planning to wire in serious money, upload a proof-of-address. Compliance rubber-stamps the lot inside six hours, but I was cleared in under two.
Moving money in and out
Topping up is painless. Cards and e-wallets (Visa, MasterCard, PayPal, Skrill, Neteller) land instantly; a Faster Payments bank transfer shows up in one business day, CHAPS or SWIFT in two to five. The minimums are low—£250 in, £200 out—and sterling transfers are free unless you insist on CHAPS (£12). Crypto deposits just pass through at cost of the network fee.
Built-in accessibility
The web and desktop platforms carry ARIA labels for screen readers, work smoothly on keyboard-only navigation, and meet WCAG AA contrast rules. Font sizes scale with a flick of a slider. The interface text stays in English, but the help-desk team can switch to French, German, Italian or Spanish if you need it.
Humans on call
If something misfires, you’ve got 24/5 live chat (answers in under two minutes), a phone line, and email that usually gets a reply within four hours. IG also runs quarterly face-to-face seminars in London for bigger-ticket clients—but the everyday trader will find the online help more than quick enough.
Final Verdict
IG is built for traders who want professional-grade kit without giving up a friendly front-end. Execution is slick, uptime is near-perfect and the research desk fires off more insight than most rivals manage in a month. Yes, the £8 share-deal ticket and “CFDs only” approach to crypto leave a dent, but the overall package still punches above its weight for anyone who takes trading seriously.
Ideal users:
- Seasoned chart jockeys who crave tight spreads, direct-market access and ProRealTime’s deep tool-set.
- Spread-bet regulars looking for low point spreads on indices and FX, plus Autochartist pattern nudges baked in.
- Algo or quant builders needing free REST/FIX APIs and a sandbox for back-testing.
- ISA investors who deal only now and then and like the sound of £0 commission inside the wrapper.
Probably not for:
- First-timers hoping to piggy-back on influencers — there’s no copy-trading feed like eToro’s.
- True crypto hodlers — you’re limited to CFDs, so no on-exchange wallets.
- Ultra-passive buy-and-holders — that £8 commission can nibble away at a sparse portfolio.
Bottom line
If you’re an active UK trader — retail or pro — IG gives you best-in-class execution, dependable tech and enough research firepower to keep your edge sharp. Accept the share-dealing fee and CFD-only crypto, and you’ll struggle to find a sturdier all-round platform.
*CFD risk warning: 72 % of retail CFD accounts lose money. Make sure you can afford to take the high risk of losing yours.
*New clients only. Min £20 first investment by 15 Aug 2025; other fees may apply.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. Which IG entity offers spread betting in the UK?
A. IG Index Ltd (FRN 114059) is the FCA-regulated company that provides spread-betting services to UK residents.
Q. Does IG offer spot cryptocurrency trading?
A. No. IG gives crypto exposure only through CFDs on leading tokens such as Bitcoin and Ethereum—there are no on-exchange wallets for spot coins.
Q. How do I use ProRealTime with my IG account?
A. ProRealTime is free if you place enough share-deal or CFD trades each month. Download the Java client, sign in with your IG credentials, and connect to DMA for advanced charting and order entry.
Q. What API options does IG provide?
A. IG Labs supplies REST and FIX APIs that let you automate trades, pull real-time data, monitor your account and trigger webhook alerts.
Q. How can I avoid IG’s inactivity fee?
A. Make at least one trade—or simply log in—within any 24-month window to dodge the £12-per-month inactivity charge.
Q. Is my money safe with IG?
A. Yes. Client funds are ring-fenced in segregated accounts under FCA CASS rules and are covered by the FSCS up to £85,000 per person if IG ever became insolvent.
Q. What regulatory fines has IG faced?
A. IG paid a £4.4 million FCA fine in 2018 for KYC shortcomings and an A$1.7 million ASIC settlement in 2019 over disclosure issues.