Trading 212 SIPP: how it works, and what it cannot do yet

Trading 212 got FCA approval for its SIPP in February 2026, six years after it first told its community forum it wanted to build one. Since 24 June it has been open to anyone in the UK. If you are still waiting for an invite, stop waiting. There is no list any more, and you open it from the app.

It is a self-invested personal pension priced like the T212 ISA: no account fee, no dealing commission, and 0.15% when a trade needs a currency conversion. I have one, and moved an old Aviva workplace pension into it. The product details below were checked against Trading 212's own help centre and terms on 26 September 2026. The product has changed a lot since launch, and plenty of what is written about it online, some of it on this site, describes the version from the spring.

The fee comparison against HL and AJ Bell is in our Trading 212 SIPP review.

Who can open one

You need to be 18 or over and under 75, live in the UK and have a National Insurance number. Crown servants posted abroad, and their spouses, also qualify. US persons cannot open one.

The SIPP is a separate account inside the same app as your ISA and Invest accounts. If you later leave the UK, Trading 212's help centre says you will not be able to make further deposits or place trades, so the account stays as it is.

What it costs

Trading 212's fees page is blunt about it: "The only fee Trading 212 can charge your Invest, ISAs, and SIPP is the FX Fee." That fee is 0.15%, and it only applies when a trade needs converting between currencies. Dividends are converted without it.

The SIPP terms add one more. Card, Apple Pay and Google Pay deposits are free up to £2,000 in total and cost 0.7% after that, while bank transfer is always free. Stamp duty on UK shares, the PTM levy, US regulatory fees and French financial transaction tax are passed through, as they are at every broker.

The scheme is run by Platform One, which does not charge you either. Its terms say Trading 212 pays it under a separate commercial agreement. They also reserve the right to start charging members directly on 30 days' notice if that agreement ever ends. Platform One says it does not expect that to happen, but it does mean the SIPP's zero price rests on a contract you are not a party to.

Paying in, and where the tax relief lands

The minimum deposit is £1, in sterling only. You can pay by bank transfer, card, Apple Pay, Google Pay or Instant Bank Transfer, and set up a recurring deposit by card or Instant Bank Transfer. Cash can be moved into the SIPP from your other T212 accounts, and it counts as a contribution when it lands. It cannot be moved back.

Basic-rate relief is claimed for you. Pay in £800 and Trading 212 claims £200 from HMRC, which usually appears within six to eleven weeks. Until it does, your SIPP holds £800.

Higher and additional-rate relief does not work that way. You claim the extra through your Self Assessment return, or by contacting HMRC if you do not file one. Trading 212 is explicit about where the money goes: "This extra relief will not be paid into your Trading 212 SIPP." It comes back to you as a tax refund or a change to your tax code, and if you want it in the pension you have to pay it in again yourself.

The annual allowance is £60,000 across every pension you have, and relief is capped at your earnings for the year. Trading 212 cannot see what goes into your workplace scheme, so keeping the total under the allowance is your job. If you have no earnings, you can still pay in £2,880 and have it topped up to £3,600.

It will not take money from your employer

Trading 212's help centre says: "We don't currently facilitate employer contributions or other contribution types (such as third-party payments)."

So the T212 SIPP cannot replace your workplace pension. Your employer's contribution, and anything you pay through salary sacrifice, has to keep going into the workplace scheme. Opt out of that to pay into a SIPP and you lose your employer's share, which in an auto-enrolment scheme is by law at least 3% of qualifying earnings. No fee saving comes close.

For most people in work, the T212 SIPP sits beside the workplace pension. Your own extra contributions go there, and so can old pots from previous jobs.

Moving an old pension in

Trading 212 accepts most defined contribution pensions, including old workplace pots, as long as nothing has been taken from them yet. Partial transfers are fine. It refuses:

• final salary and other defined benefit pensions
• anything carrying safeguarded benefits, such as a guaranteed annuity rate or a Guaranteed Minimum Pension
• pensions set up before 6 April 2006
• pensions already in drawdown, inherited pensions, and QROPS

A transfer can arrive as cash, or in specie for holdings Trading 212 offers. Most workplace funds do not exist on T212, so in practice an old workplace pot arrives as cash. Trading 212 uses Origo where the other provider supports it and charges nothing to receive the money, though your old provider may charge to release it. Trading 212 quotes two to eight weeks for cash and four to twelve for in specie, and your money is out of the market for part of a cash transfer.

Transferring also loses any protected pension age. If your old scheme lets you draw earlier than the normal minimum age, find out what that is worth before you move it.

Each provider has its own catches, and we have written up four of them: Aviva, Nest, Aegon and Scottish Widows, plus a general workplace pension checklist.

What you can hold

Stocks and ETFs, from what Trading 212 calls "major global exchanges". It does not publish a list, so if you own anything outside the UK and US, search for it before you transfer. Fractional shares work in the SIPP. So do Pies and AutoInvest, and a Pie can reinvest its dividends automatically.

Investment trusts and bonds are unclear, because Trading 212's own SIPP page contradicts itself. Its FAQ says the SIPP includes "investment trusts, and government and corporate bonds". Its comparison table, on the same page, says "Stocks and ETFs only". If you are buying the SIPP for gilts or a particular investment trust, check the instrument in the app first.

What you definitely cannot hold: ETNs, which rules out crypto products, and ordinary unit trusts and OEICs. There is no managed or advised option.

Uninvested cash earns interest by default, paid daily. On 26 September the rate on sterling was 3.8% AER. It moves, so check the live figure.

Dividends inside the SIPP

Dividends and interest inside a pension are not taxed in the UK. You pay income tax later, when money comes out.

US dividends are where a SIPP pulls ahead of an ISA. Trading 212 applies a 0% withholding rate to eligible US dividends in the SIPP, because the UK and US tax treaty exempts pension schemes. The same shares in an ISA lose 15% before the dividend reaches you, and an ISA cannot reclaim it. Some US securities fall outside the exemption, and it only covers shares you hold directly. A US fund domiciled in Ireland still pays 15% inside the fund. Our guide to SIPP dividend tax goes through the detail.

Getting money out

You can take money from 55, rising to 57 on 6 April 2028.

Trading 212 offers the uncrystallised funds pension lump sum, or UFPLS. You ask its support team for a withdrawal, and each lump sum comes out 25% tax-free with the other 75% taxed as income through PAYE.

There is no flexi-access drawdown. You cannot take your 25% tax-free cash in one go and leave the rest invested, because every withdrawal is a mix of the two. Nor can you set up a regular income. Each withdrawal is its own request.

Taking a UFPLS also triggers the money purchase annual allowance. From then on, contributions to any of your defined contribution pensions get relief on only £10,000 a year, which matters if you are still working and paying in.

Trading 212 has not published a date for drawdown. If you want it, you can transfer out to a provider that offers it, and Trading 212 charges nothing to let you go. Plan the move a year or two before you need the income.

Who runs it, and who to talk to

The provider is Trading 212 UK Ltd, FCA reference 609146. The scheme itself is operated and administered by Platform One Limited, with Platform One Pension Trustees Limited as trustee. T212's SIPP page says the investments are held with Interactive Brokers.

You nominate beneficiaries in the app, under Beneficiaries in the SIPP account's menu. It takes a minute, so do it when you open the account.

Support is live chat, which T212's SIPP page says is open around the clock, plus email. There is still no phone line, which matters more for a pension than for an ISA. A missing relief payment or a stuck transfer is harder to sort out in a chat window.

ISA or SIPP at Trading 212: a worked example

If you already use the T212 ISA, the obvious question is whether the next few thousand should go into the SIPP instead.

Take two hypothetical people, both 37, each with £4,000 of take-home pay to invest this year. Hannah pays basic-rate tax. Dev pays higher-rate. Both buy the same investments, which grow at 5% a year, and both take the money out at 57 as basic-rate taxpayers. Because it is Trading 212 either way, the fees are identical in both wrappers and drop out of the comparison.

In the ISA, £4,000 grows to £10,613 after twenty years, and all of it is theirs.

In the SIPP, Hannah's £4,000 becomes £5,000 once the basic-rate relief lands. That grows to £13,266. When she takes it out as UFPLS, a quarter, £3,317, is tax-free. The other £9,950 is taxed at 20%, which costs her £1,990. She keeps £11,277, which is £664 more than the ISA.

Dev's SIPP holds exactly what Hannah's does, because the extra relief he claims does not go into it. He gets £1,000 back through Self Assessment. If he puts that into his ISA, it grows to £2,653 on top of the same £11,277 from the SIPP. He ends up with £13,930, which is £3,317 more than the ISA alone.

Dev comes out 31% ahead of the ISA and Hannah 6%. Hannah's edge is small enough to rest on one assumption, that she pays basic rate on the way out, and that can go either way:

• If Hannah's withdrawals land in the higher-rate band, because a large pension, rental income or the State Pension pushes her over £50,270, her £13,266 leaves her £9,287. That is £1,326 less than the ISA would have given her
• If her withdrawals fit inside her personal allowance, she keeps all £13,266

The six-to-eleven-week wait for relief barely moves these numbers. The bigger difference is access: the ISA money can be spent next week, while the SIPP money is locked until 57 and, on Trading 212, only comes out in lump sums.

The example is one year's £4,000, but the shape holds at bigger numbers as long as your contributions stay within the £60,000 allowance and your retirement income stays in the basic-rate band. The larger the pot, the harder that second condition gets. The retirement calculator models your SIPP, ISA and State Pension together, which is the quickest way to see where you are likely to land.

So should you open one?

Yes, if you pay higher-rate tax, pick your own shares or ETFs, and are more than a few years from needing the money. Also yes if you have old workplace pots charging 0.5% or more. Keep your workplace pension going for the employer contribution either way.

Think harder if you are a basic-rate taxpayer who may need the money before 57, because the ISA's flexibility is worth more than a 6% edge. Think harder too if you are close to retirement and want a regular income. Trading 212 can pay you lump sums on request and not much else, so you may end up transferring out just as you start drawing.

Look elsewhere if you want funds, advice or a phone line.

If you do open one, you end up with money in an ISA, a SIPP, probably a workplace pension and perhaps an old pot you have not moved yet. None of them will tell you what the lot pays you in dividends each year.

Frequently asked questions

Is the Trading 212 SIPP open to everyone now?

Yes. The waitlist ended on 24 June 2026, when Trading 212 opened the SIPP to everyone in the UK. You need to be 18 or over, under 75, UK resident and have a National Insurance number. US persons cannot open one.

Does the Trading 212 SIPP have any fees?

Trading 212 says the only fee it can charge the SIPP is 0.15% on currency conversion. There is no account fee, dealing commission or transfer fee. Card, Apple Pay and Google Pay deposits are free up to £2,000 in total and cost 0.7% after that, so bank transfer is the cheaper way to pay in. Stamp duty and other exchange charges apply as they do everywhere.

Can my employer pay into a Trading 212 SIPP?

No. Trading 212 does not accept employer contributions or any other third-party payments. Keep your workplace pension for employer money and use the SIPP for your own contributions and old pots.

Can I take money out of my Trading 212 SIPP?

From 55, rising to 57 on 6 April 2028, you can take lump sums as UFPLS by asking Trading 212's support team. Each one is 25% tax-free and 75% taxed as income. There is no flexi-access drawdown, so you cannot take your tax-free cash up front and leave the rest invested, and there is no regular-income option.

Can I transfer my pension into Trading 212?

If it is an uncrystallised defined contribution pension set up after 6 April 2006, usually yes, in cash or in specie for holdings Trading 212 offers. It will not take final salary pensions, anything with safeguarded benefits or anything already in drawdown. Cash transfers take two to eight weeks and in-specie transfers four to twelve.

Do I pay US withholding tax on dividends in the Trading 212 SIPP?

Not on eligible US shares. Trading 212 applies a 0% US withholding rate to eligible US dividends held in the SIPP, against the 15% an ISA pays. Some US securities fall outside that, and a US fund domiciled in Ireland still pays 15% inside the fund.

The takeaway

The Trading 212 SIPP is now a normal product anyone in the UK can open, and for building a pension out of shares and ETFs it costs almost nothing to run.

Before you move anything in, check your plans against what it will not do: take your employer's money, take a final salary pension, or pay you a regular income once you retire.

This is illustrative, not financial advice. Product details were checked against Trading 212's help centre and terms on 26 September 2026 and will change. Pension rules change, personal circumstances matter, and investment returns are uncertain. The right answer for me may not be the right answer for you.