The cheapest bank accounts in South Africa: Absa vs Capitec vs FNB vs Nedbank vs Standard Bank

The Solidarity Research Institute has published its 2025 Banking Charges report, weighing up South Africa’s big banks and showing how they compare in terms of banking fees.

The report looks at South Africa’s five ‘legacy’ banks, which target entry, mid, and top-level banking clients: Capitec, Absa, Nedbank, Standard Bank, and FNB.

It also includes an online transaction assessment which throws in digital banks TymeBank and Bank Zero.

Discovery has been excluded from the comparison because it focuses on behavioural systems that can’t be accounted for in a direct comparison like this.

In essence, following certain banking behaviours with Discovery can negate a lot of banking fees – but this is highly personalised.

Solidarity’s comparison takes a more forward approach, looking at four different transaction profiles representing different markets.

The 12-transaction and 17-transaction comparisons reflect simpler banking behaviour most exhibited by low-income and entry-level banking accounts.

The 25-transaction comparison reflects mid-market accounts (formerly known as “gold” level accounts, and the 30-transaction comparison reflects top-level or “premium” bank accounts.

Across each profile, there are different ‘winners’ in terms of affordability.

• Entry-level: Absa Transact
• Mid-level: Capitec
• Top-level: Nedbank Migoals Premium

For entry-level accounts, Solidarity’s analysis shows that Absa’s Transact account is now definitively the cheapest low-transaction account among the legacy banks.

This is a title that was previously held by Capitec Bank thanks to its interest earned on values in the main account. This often negated the monthly fee and even some transaction fees.

While Capitec’s accounts still earn interest, the bank has made significant changes to these in 2025, setting it at a flat rate across all value ranges.

Because other banks now offer similar benefits, and almost all banks offer linked savings accounts, Solidarity has now excluded this from the comparison.

Because of this, and because Absa has stopped automatically moving customers to the Flexi account when they pass a certain earnings threshold, the Absa Transact account is now comfortably the cheapest.

12-transaction accounts

17-transaction accounts

For the mid-level accounts, Capitec emerged as the most affordable by R2.50.

Capitec had previously only played in the entry-level space, but it has quickly become a popular option for middle-income earners.

This includes the group’s play in rewards programmes which are popular among this level’s banking clients.

However, SRI noted that, at R2.50 or R3.50 more, the Nedbank and FNB accounts offer more in terms of value-adds, which would make spending the extra money slightly more cost-effective, depending on what benefits customers seek.

25-transaction accounts

At the top-level, Nedbank’s Migoals Premium emerged as the most affordable account.

SRI noted that cost is likely not a major factor at this level of banking, as most intensive bankers will be looking more at value-adds, which the big banks are happy to cater to.

Costs in this segment are relatively uniform, with banks looking to differentiate through perks, bonuses and rewards.

30-transaction accounts

If online banking is all a customer needs without the bells and whistles, online-only bank accounts are even more affordable that entry-level offerings, with TymeBank by far the cheapest.

Both TymeBank and Bank Zero zero-rate a host of fees, but the former gets the edge with its PayShap transactions coming at no cost.

SRI said that if branches are not a necessity, then online banking is the clear winner when it comes to affordability, with the banking charges self-explanatory as to why.

14 online transaction accounts