Which Is Better for multi-currency businesses?
The decision comes down to two questions. Are you a sole trader? And do you pay international suppliers in bulk every month?
If you’re a sole trader, Airwallex is off the table. That isn’t a nuance, it’s a hard eligibility cut. Your real choices are Equals Money, Wise, or Revolut Pro, since Revolut’s main Business account is limited-company and LLP only.
I’d choose Airwallex if you run a registered LTD paying overseas suppliers in several currencies each month. Push past £10,000 in monthly deposits and the fee disappears, and you can fire off fifty supplier payments in one CSV upload. Equals Money has nothing like it.
I’d choose Equals Money if your main need is team expense card spend across currencies. Pre-load the EUR wallet before your team flies to Berlin and every coffee, taxi, and dinner runs at 0% FX.
The catch is the empty wallet. Get caught short and every transaction costs you 1.5%. Airwallex takes a predictable 0.5% on major currencies, every time. Equals Money’s 0% only works if you plan ahead.
Airwallex vs Equals Money Fees and Charges
Airwallex Explore costs £19 a month, or nothing if you’re turning over £10,000+ in deposits or holding that much in your wallet. Grow is £49 a month with no waiver. Sit below the deposit threshold and that £19 is dead money each month.
Equals Money Business is £25 a month, or £250 if you pay annually. Business Plus is £35 a month. Neither tier waives the fee, but committing for a year saves you roughly two months’ cost.
The Business tier covers 20 physical cards and 50 virtual cards, and you can add as many platform users as you like. If half your team only needs dashboard access, they don’t cost you a penny extra. For larger teams, that adds up.
Watch the card issuance fee on Equals Money: £10 per physical card, one off, which stings if you’re kitting out a sales team. Airwallex doesn’t charge for card issuance.
Every Equals Money ATM withdrawal, at home or abroad, costs £1.50. We verified both fee structures from provider pricing pages in May 2026.
| Cost | Airwallex Explore | Airwallex Grow | Equals Money Business | Equals Money Plus |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly fee | £19 (free with £10k+ monthly deposits) | £49 (no waiver) | £25 (£250/yr annually) | £35 (£350/yr annually) |
| Physical cards included | Up to 10 free | Up to 50 free | Up to 20 (+ £10 issuance each) | Up to 50 (+ £10 issuance each) |
| Virtual cards | Yes | Yes | Up to 50 | Up to 100 |
| FX rate | 0.5% markup (major currencies) | 0.5% markup (major currencies) | 0% if wallet pre-loaded; 1.5% if not | 0% if wallet pre-loaded; 1.5% if not |
| International transfers | Free (local rails); £10–£20 (SWIFT) | Free (local rails); £10–£20 (SWIFT) | Internal wallet transfers free; no SWIFT payout | Internal wallet transfers free; no SWIFT payout |
| ATM withdrawals | Not applicable | Not applicable | £1.50 per withdrawal | £1.50 per withdrawal |
| Sole trader eligible | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| FSCS protection | No (e-money safeguarding) | No (e-money safeguarding) | No (e-money safeguarding) | No (e-money safeguarding) |
| Fees verified from provider pricing pages, May 2026. | ||||
Airwallex vs Equals Money Features and Tools
If your accountant runs Sage, QuickBooks, or NetSuite, I’d pick Airwallex. It feeds directly into all three, hourly for Sage and real-time for the rest. No CSV exports, no manual reconciliation.
Equals Money connects to Xero through Open Banking and that’s it. No native QuickBooks. No Sage. G2 reviewers flag this as a monthly headache. If your accountant runs Sage, they’ll be hand-exporting transactions every month-end, and you’ll feel that in their bill.
Airwallex expense management goes further. Your team photographs receipts, transactions match automatically, and you set multi-step approvals and custom spend rules.
Equals Money keeps it simpler: per-card limits, ATM blocking, category tracking. Plenty for a small team that doesn’t need approval chains, thin if you do.
Airwallex Core gives your developers an API to embed payment flows, mint cards in code, and automate treasury from your own software.
Equals Money has no developer capability. For custom workflows or programmatic card issuance, I’d go with Airwallex of these two.
Airwallex vs Equals Money International Payments
I’d lean to Airwallex if you pay multiple international suppliers. It applies a flat 0.5% markup on major currencies (USD, EUR, GBP, AUD, SGD, HKD, CNY, CAD, CHF, NZD, JPY) and 1.0% on everything else.
Local transfers to 120+ countries are free. SWIFT costs £10–£20 where local rails don’t exist. We verified both rate structures from provider pages in May 2026.
Equals Money holds up to 38 currencies, but the FX is conditional. Spend from a pre-loaded wallet and you pay 0%, no markup. Spend in a currency your wallet doesn’t hold, or when it’s empty, and the 1.5% penalty applies.
Airwallex batch payments push 50+ supplier payments through one CSV upload. Equals Money processes each one individually; there’s no batch payout capability.
Airwallex vs Equals Money Customer Reviews and Reputation
The support gap is the clearest difference here. Equals Money sits at 4.6 on Trustpilot from 500+ reviews, rated “Excellent”. Reviewers name specific agents and describe problems resolved in hours, not days.
Airwallex sits at 3.7 from roughly 2,300 reviews, rated “Average”. The praise clusters around real multi-currency savings and a clean interface.
The complaints land somewhere more uncomfortable: AML triggers freezing payments with little explanation, and escalations crawl when your account’s already locked.
For Equals Money, the recurring complaint is the missing QuickBooks integration, which turns month-end into a slog if your books aren’t in Xero. We checked both Trustpilot profiles in May 2026 and found the support gap consistent across review periods, not a one-off spike.
I wouldn’t underestimate this. When a payment gets flagged or a card blocks at the till, you don’t want a tiered ticketing system.
Equals Money picks up. Airwallex at the Explore tier doesn’t always. If you’ve got a supplier waiting on an email, that gap matters.
Airwallex vs Equals Money for Sole Traders and Freelancers
Sole traders can’t open an Airwallex account. The platform restricts onboarding to UK-registered Limited Companies and LLPs. A sole trader UTR is not sufficient; you need a Companies House number. We confirmed this against Airwallex’s onboarding requirements in May 2026.
Equals Money accepts sole traders and freelancers with no company registration requirement. Standard FCA KYC identity checks apply, but there’s no Companies House number needed.
Take a sole-trader designer billing a Paris agency £3,000 a month in EUR. She loads the EUR wallet when the invoice lands, then spends at 0% FX on Adobe, materials, and a French printer. That works on Equals Money. It’s unavailable on Airwallex.
Freelancers on project work who need physical cards for travel across currencies also benefit. The £25 Business tier covers 20 physical cards and 50 virtual cards, more than most sole traders need, and available from day one without a credit check.
Downsides of Airwallex and Equals Money
Airwallex: the £19/month fee is dead cost below £10,000 in monthly activity. Support for Explore customers isn’t prioritised, so compliance freezes and escalations take longer than they should at this price point.
The sole trader exclusion removes a large share of the UK self-employed market from the platform entirely.
Equals Money: the 1.5% out-of-wallet fee traps businesses with unpredictable travel spend. Ad-hoc currency purchases without pre-loaded wallets cost more than Airwallex’s flat 0.5% markup.
No native Sage or QuickBooks integration is a real accounting gap. And Equals Money doesn’t process card payments from customers; it’s purely a spend tool, not a payment gateway.
Both platforms: no FSCS protection, no overdraft, no branch access, no cheque handling. Neither works as a standalone primary business current account if you need traditional banking infrastructure.
Alternatives to Airwallex and Equals Money
If neither fits, three alternatives cover the gaps between them:
Wise Business, mid-market exchange rate with a small transparent per-transfer fee. No monthly subscription. Accepts sole traders. A strong alternative if you want predictable FX costs without a monthly fee and do low-to-medium volumes of international payments.
Revolut Business, £10/month Basic plan with 25+ currency wallets, team expense cards, and Xero/QuickBooks/FreeAgent integrations. Covers most SME use cases that Equals Money targets, with broader accounting software support.
Tide, free UK current account with built-in invoicing and basic expense management. No international focus, but useful as a primary UK account alongside a specialist FX platform like Airwallex or Wise.
Final Verdict: Airwallex or Equals Money?
I’d pick Airwallex for UK LTDs with regular international payouts. I’d pick Equals Money if you’re a sole trader (Airwallex won’t accept you) or a team managing predictable multi-currency expense card spend.
Airwallex is the one to back if you run a UK LTD or LLP, regularly pay multiple international suppliers, or need Sage, QuickBooks, or NetSuite integration.
The £10k deposit threshold that waives the £19/month fee is reachable for most businesses with active international operations. We’d run the numbers before assuming it isn’t.
Equals Money is the answer for sole traders and freelancers, since Airwallex won’t onboard you. It also fits if your multi-currency need is team expense card spend in predictable currencies.
Load wallets before spend happens and the 0% FX rate is competitive. The £25/month Business tier gives 20 physical and 50 virtual cards from day one, with the better customer support record of the two.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can sole traders use Airwallex?
No. Airwallex restricts UK applications to registered Limited Companies (LTDs) and Limited Liability Partnerships (LLPs). You must have a Companies House registration number to apply. Sole traders and freelancers are not eligible. If you’re a sole trader needing a multi-currency account, Equals Money, Wise Business, and Revolut Pro accept sole trader applications (Revolut’s main Business account is limited-company and LLP only).
Is Equals Money FSCS protected?
No. Equals Money is an FCA-regulated Electronic Money Institution (EMI), not a licensed bank. Your funds are protected by statutory safeguarding, held in segregated accounts at FCA-approved credit institutions and ring-fenced from Equals Money’s own capital, but they’re not covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). The same applies to Airwallex. For FSCS-covered business banking, you need a licensed bank such as Starling, Monzo, or a high-street provider.
What happens if I spend in a currency I haven’t loaded on Equals Money?
Equals Money charges a 1.5% conversion fee when you spend in a currency that your wallet doesn’t hold, or when the relevant wallet has insufficient funds. The 0% FX rate applies only when you’ve pre-loaded the specific currency wallet with enough balance to cover the transaction. For predictable spend, a known invoice in EUR or a booked hotel, load the wallet first and the cost is zero. For ad-hoc or unplanned spend, budget for the 1.5% conversion.
Does Airwallex support batch payments to multiple suppliers?
Yes. Airwallex supports CSV batch upload to process multiple international payments in a single batch. This is particularly useful for agencies paying freelancers across currencies, marketplaces distributing seller payouts, or any business with regular AP runs to multiple international payees. Equals Money has no equivalent batch payout capability.
Which has better customer support: Airwallex or Equals Money?
Equals Money is rated significantly higher on Trustpilot: 4.6 out of 5 (“Excellent”) from over 500 reviews, with reviewers frequently praising named support agents and fast resolution. Airwallex scores 3.7 (“Average”) from around 2,300 reviews, with complaints centred on compliance-triggered freezes and slow escalation support for Explore tier customers. If customer service quality is a priority, Equals Money has the stronger track record.
How we reviewed Airwallex vs Equals Money
Ranking criteria. We compared Airwallex and Equals Money on pricing, fees, feature set, eligibility, and contract terms. We also verified regulatory status and deposit protection where applicable.
Data sources. Every provider’s pricing page, terms, and product docs were checked directly in May 2026. No comparison sites, no press releases, no affiliate material. FCA register cross-checked for regulatory status.
Update cadence. We re-verify every provider on this page at least monthly, and whenever a provider changes pricing, eligibility, or terms. The verification date on the page reflects the most recent full review. Some links on this page are affiliate links, see our editorial policy.
Related Pages
Comparing more multi-currency or international business accounts? We have more comparisons and roundups below.
- Revolut vs Airwallex, Revolut Business compared to Airwallex head-to-head
- Best international business accounts, accounts built for cross-border trading
- Airwallex Business Account Review, full review of Airwallex UK features, pricing, and verdict
- Best business bank accounts, full comparison of leading UK providers