Which Is Better for UK sole traders and small limited companies choosing between free domestic banking and multi-currency fintech?
If you are a UK sole trader, Mettle is the account you can be sure of. It accepts sole traders and states it plainly, where Revolut cannot tell you either way: its Help Centre lists sole traders under unsupported business types, while its Revolut Bank UK Business Terms, effective 28 April 2026, include new sole traders among those who can open a Business Account.
We read both sources directly and could not reconcile them. The dates do not settle it either, because the Terms carry an effective date and the Help Centre page carries none. Limited companies, LLPs and partnerships are eligible whichever page governs, so this uncertainty only bites if you have never incorporated.
Nothing on the pricing page flags any of this. A sole trader can read three tiers, weigh £10 a month against Mettle’s nothing, settle on a plan, and still not know whether the application will clear. The only way to find out is to start the sign-up and read the eligibility Revolut shows you.
Revolut Pro, a separate account inside the personal Revolut app with no subscription fee, is where Revolut points unincorporated individuals. We would not call it a business current account, and it is not the product this page prices.
Work out what you are, then compare fees. If you have never incorporated, the £10 and the £35 are figures you may never be quoted, and no amount of feature depth changes that.
If you run a small limited company with one or two owners and bill in sterling, Mettle wins on cost: free, NatWest-backed, with FreeAgent bundled. Revolut Basic charges £10/month for the same domestic job, and there is no feature on it you would actually miss.
If you need 25+ multi-currency wallets, team cards with spend controls, or API access for programmatic payments, choose Revolut Business. Grow, at £35/month billed monthly (£30/month if paid annually), is the entry point for international invoicing.
A sole trader sending five UK invoices a month should start with Mettle, because the £120 a year Revolut Basic costs buys nothing a domestic invoicing business uses.
If your structure is a partnership, LLP, charity, or limited company with 3+ owners, Mettle excludes you outright. Revolut Business accepts broader structures, including LLPs and partnerships, but its own terms exclude charities.
Revolut vs Mettle Fees and Charges
You pay nothing for Mettle on the monthly fee, nothing on UK Faster Payments in or out, and FreeAgent accounting software comes bundled free provided you make at least one transaction per month.
Revolut Basic is £10/month flat, with no annual option. Grow is £35/month billed monthly, or £30/month if paid annually. Scale is £125/month billed monthly, or £90/month if paid annually. Pay monthly on Grow and you pay £60 a year more than the annual rate, so the lower figure is the one you only get by committing twelve months up front.
On cash deposits, neither account offers a free UK cash channel. For a market trader banking Saturday takings on Monday morning, Mettle takes cash only through the Post Office, at £2.75 a deposit, and Revolut Business does not accept cash deposits at all.
ATM withdrawals cost on both sides, though the shape of the charge differs. Mettle takes a flat £1 every time you draw cash at a UK machine, whatever the amount. Revolut Business charges 2% on every withdrawal, with no fee-free allowance.
The crossover sits at £50. Below it, 2% costs you less than a flat pound; above it, Mettle is cheaper, and on a £300 withdrawal Revolut charges £6 where Mettle charges £1.
The daily limits (£3,000 Basic, £5,000 Grow, £10,000 Scale) cap how much you can take out, and paying for a higher tier raises the ceiling without making any of it free. The 2% applies at every tier.
For card spending overseas, Revolut charges near-interbank FX within plan allowance, 0.6% over it. Mettle charges no non-sterling transaction fee on card spending abroad and converts at the Mastercard exchange rate.
For FX beyond your Revolut plan’s allowance, pair either account with Wise Business, whose conversion fee starts from 0.24% on the mid-market rate. Above the allowance that undercuts Revolut’s 0.6% and Mettle’s 1.5%.
| Cost | Mettle | Revolut Basic | Revolut Grow | Revolut Scale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UK sole traders | Accepted | Unclear² | Unclear² | Unclear² |
| Monthly fee | £0 | £10 | £35 billed monthly (£30 if paid annually) | £125 billed monthly (£90 if paid annually) |
| UK transfers | Free | Free within allowance | Free within allowance | Free within allowance |
| Included FX allowance | N/A (GBP-only) | £1,000 | £15,000 | £60,000 |
| ATM withdrawal fee | £1 flat (UK) | 2% flat, every withdrawal | 2% flat, every withdrawal | 2% flat, every withdrawal |
| FreeAgent included | Yes (1+ tx/month) | Integration only | Integration only | Integration only |
| Business API | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| FSCS protection | Yes, for the NatWest bank account | Usually yes for new accounts¹ | Usually yes for new accounts¹ | Usually yes for new accounts¹ |
| Representative costs verified from provider websites, October 2026. ¹Revolut Bank UK Ltd launched as a fully authorised UK bank on 11 March 2026 (FRN 981170); some new signups may still be onboarded to the older e-money entity temporarily during the phased rollout. ²Revolut Business accepts limited companies, LLPs and partnerships. On sole traders its Help Centre and its Business Terms (effective 28 April 2026) contradict each other, so a sole trader learns the answer at sign-up. Revolut Pro, a separate no-subscription account in the personal Revolut app, is where Revolut points unincorporated individuals. | ||||
Revolut vs Mettle Features and Tools
You get FreeAgent included free with Mettle, worth £228 a year at FreeAgent’s sole-trader list price of £19 a month before VAT, or £396 for a limited company. We rate this the stronger Making Tax Digital (MTD) setup of the two for a UK sole trader, and NatWest’s ownership of FreeAgent gives the integration real depth.
When your team needs cards with spend controls, Revolut Business has a per-employee card programme and Mettle has none.
Both do invoicing, which is worth saying because Mettle is often listed as lacking it. We checked both. Mettle’s sits inside the bundled FreeAgent subscription, so the invoice and the bookkeeping entry are the same record rather than two jobs.
Revolut Business also supports invoice creation, recurring invoices, and automatic reminders on every plan. Bank transfer needs no setup; card or Apple Pay/Google Pay/Revolut Pay payment needs a separate Merchant account first.
For payment infrastructure, Revolut offers a published Business API on the Grow and Scale plans (not Basic) for programmatic supplier payments, batch processing, and ledger sync. Mettle doesn’t offer a public business API at any tier.
You get crypto access at Revolut Business on paid tiers, with no equivalent at Mettle. For businesses that need crypto rails, Revolut is the only option of the two.
Revolut vs Mettle International Payments
Mettle is a GBP-only account, so you cannot hold foreign currency in it at all. An inbound international payment of £10 or more costs £4, plus 1.5% if Mettle converts it into GBP, which on a £2,000 euro invoice is £34 before you see the money.
When you convert £50,000 in EUR a month, Revolut Scale’s £60,000 included FX allowance covers it at near-interbank rates. Grow’s allowance is only £15,000, so on Grow, £35,000 of that volume would sit above the allowance at a 0.6% markup.
Mettle has no equivalent of that allowance, so paying more gets you nothing: every inbound foreign-currency payment carries the same 1.5% conversion fee whatever the volume. It cannot send payments abroad at all yet, which rules it out as a single account for anyone paying overseas suppliers.
For receiving foreign currency, Revolut Business provides local multi-currency wallets across 25+ currencies. Mettle has no native multi-currency support.
For sustained cross-border FX, pair either account with Wise Business, whose conversion fee starts from 0.24% on the mid-market rate, against Revolut’s 0.6% once you pass your plan’s allowance and Mettle’s 1.5% on every inbound conversion. At that point the current account is no longer the thing deciding your FX cost.
Revolut vs Mettle Customer Reviews and Reputation
The two sit at very different scales. Revolut’s UK customer base runs into the millions across personal and business accounts, while Mettle serves a narrower base of sole traders and small limited companies.
Mettle’s Trustpilot page scored 4.6 from about 6,500 reviews when we read it on 16 October 2026. The reviews it showed mostly praise how easy the app is and the support, while the low scores describe businesses turned away at the checks and an account suspended pending closure. Who gets in is a real limit as well: Mettle takes sole traders and limited companies with no more than two people with significant control, and only one owner can access the account.
Revolut’s Trustpilot page (4.7 from more than 473,000 reviews) covers the whole company and showed no business reviews when we read it, so its praise for the exchange rates and the app says more about the personal account. The risk that matters for a business is in Revolut’s own terms: an account opened before 28 April 2026 can be suspended immediately if Revolut reasonably believes its restrictions were broken. If payroll leaves that account on a Friday, that is a review you cannot hurry.
Revolut offers 24/7 in-app chat to business customers. Mettle answers in-app messages, email and phone from 8am to 8pm on weekdays and 9am to 5pm at weekends and on bank holidays, so it is not a 24/7 service. If a payment fails at nine on a Sunday evening, Revolut will answer and Mettle will not open again until Monday morning.
Revolut vs Mettle for Free Banking with FreeAgent vs Multi-Currency and Team Cards
For free PRA-licensed UK banking with FreeAgent included, Mettle wins outright. For a sole trader it is also the only one of the two that will tell you where you stand before you apply, which on this comparison counts for more than the price gap.
Eligibility cuts both ways here. Mettle shuts out the structures Revolut accepts, and Revolut cannot give a sole trader a straight answer, so your entity type decides which of the two comparisons below you are actually in.
When you’re a partnership, LLP or Ltd with 3+ owners, Mettle excludes you and Revolut Business accepts you, subject to compliance checks. A charity is excluded by both.
You can’t hold foreign currency at Mettle. If you receive in EUR, USD, or any non-GBP currency, Revolut Business is the only real choice of the two.
If you run a team that needs expense cards with per-employee spend controls, that infrastructure sits on Revolut’s paid tiers and Mettle has no equivalent at any price. A Mettle account with one authorised user cannot be made to do it, so this is a reason to switch rather than a feature to miss.
Downsides of Revolut and Mettle
- Mettle: hard eligibility wall. Sole traders and limited companies with up to 2 owners only, and only 1 can access the account. Partnerships, LLPs, charities, Community Interest Companies (CICs), and Ltds with 3+ owners are locked out entirely.
- Mettle: GBP-only. No multi-currency wallets, no foreign-currency invoicing. An inbound international payment of £10 or more costs £4, plus 1.5% if Mettle converts it into GBP.
- Mettle: no team cards, no API, no crypto. The whole positioning is simple free GBP banking, not a full fintech platform.
- Revolut: no cash, no cheques, no overdraft. There is no UK cash-deposit channel, no Post Office and no PayPoint, and cheques are not accepted either. Revolut’s own workaround for a cheque is to ask the payer to send a bank transfer instead. There is no business overdraft or credit facility to fall back on.
- Revolut: compliance-freeze risk. Flagged transactions can lock the account for a day or more while support catches up, which means wages or a supplier payment waiting on a review you cannot hurry.
- Revolut: ATM fee. A flat 2% on every withdrawal, at any tier, with no fee-free allowance.
- Both: no free UK cash channel. Mettle takes cash only through the Post Office, at £2.75 a deposit. Revolut Business does not accept cash deposits.
Alternatives to Revolut and Mettle
If you need more than either account offers, such as more owners than Mettle allows, interest on a cash balance or heavy FX volume, these accounts are built for it.
- Starling Business, free PRA-licensed banking with broader eligibility, LLPs accepted, but no current applications for business overdrafts or loans. Pick this if Mettle’s two-owner ceiling rules you out and you still want a free FSCS-protected account.
- Allica Business Rewards, a full PRA bank paying cashback and interest on deposits, up to 1.5% cashback and 4.08% AER for £50k+ deposit businesses. Pick this if you want your balance to earn while it sits.
- Wise Business, conversion fees from 0.24% on the mid-market rate. Pick this if your FX volume is what actually drives the decision, not the current account itself.
- Equals Money, 38 multi-currency IBANs with industry-specific support. It is an FCA e-money institution rather than an FSCS bank, so your money is safeguarded rather than protected to £120,000. Pick this if currency breadth matters to you more than deposit protection does.
Final Verdict: Revolut or Mettle?
If you are a UK sole trader, take Mettle. It accepts you and says so, while Revolut’s own pages disagree on whether it will, and no amount of FX wallet depth is worth an application you cannot call either way.
If you run a small limited company with one or two owners, Mettle wins on the money. Comparing the two on published pricing, we put it ahead of Revolut for the smallest UK businesses: £0/month against £10, FreeAgent included rather than connected, and NatWest’s licence behind the deposits.
Choose Revolut Business if you need 25+ multi-currency wallets, team card programmes, API access, or you operate as an LLP, partnership, or larger limited company. Grow, at £35/month billed monthly (£30/month if paid annually), is the value pick once you need any of that.
If everything you invoice and pay is in sterling and one person runs the account, Mettle costs you nothing and does the job. The moment a second currency or a second cardholder appears, Mettle has no answer and Revolut does.
Either way, once your FX runs beyond your Revolut plan’s allowance, pair the account with Wise Business, whose conversion fee starts from 0.24%.
Who Should Choose Mettle?
- You’re a UK sole trader. Mettle accepts you and says so, while Revolut’s own pages disagree on whether it will. Full PRA-licensed banking, FSCS to £120,000, FreeAgent bundled free, and no need to test an application to find out where you stand.
- You’re a small Ltd with 1-2 owners. Same free account, and the £10/month on Revolut Basic buys nothing a sterling-only business draws on.
- You want the simplest free UK banking. £0/month, £0 UK transfers. Revolut Basic costs £10/month for the same domestic use case.
- You never invoice or get paid in a foreign currency. Mettle’s GBP-only design is not a gap if your business never touches non-GBP money.
Who Should Choose Revolut?
- You’re incorporated. Everything below assumes a limited company, LLP or partnership, all of which Revolut accepts. A sole trader will not learn the answer from Revolut’s published material, because the Help Centre and the Business Terms say different things, and the eligibility shown during sign-up is the first place the two are reconciled.
- You trade in more than one currency. 25+ currency wallets and near-interbank FX inside plan allowances. Mettle can’t hold or receive foreign currency at all.
- You run a team that needs expense cards. Per-employee spend controls on paid tiers. Mettle has no multi-user team card programme.
- Your structure is a partnership, LLP, or Ltd with 3+ owners. Mettle excludes all of these outright, and Revolut accepts them. Neither takes a charity.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Mettle FSCS-protected?
Yes. Mettle is owned by National Westminster Bank plc (FRN 121878), a full PRA-licensed UK bank with direct FSCS deposit protection to £120,000 per eligible depositor. That covers the Mettle bank account. Mettle’s own fee document also names a Mettle e-money account provided by Prepay Technologies, which FSCS does not cover, so check which of the two you hold.
Is Revolut Business FSCS-protected?
Usually, for new accounts, though not unconditionally. Revolut Bank UK Ltd launched as a fully authorised UK bank on 11 March 2026, when the PRA lifted the mobilisation restrictions on the licence it had held since July 2024. New applicants are usually onboarded directly to Revolut Bank UK Ltd, with FSCS protection up to £120,000 per eligible depositor, the same statutory cover as Mettle. But Revolut is phasing that rollout, so some new signups may still land on the older Revolut Ltd e-money entity temporarily. It is worth checking your account terms to confirm which entity holds your money.
Can a UK sole trader open a Revolut Business account?
Revolut’s own material does not agree with itself, so we cannot give you a straight yes or no. Its Help Centre lists “Freelancer or soletrader” under unsupported business types. Its Revolut Bank UK Business Terms, effective 28 April 2026, list “new sole traders” among those who can open a Business Account. We read both directly and found no definitive answer in Revolut’s current published material. The dates do not settle it: the Terms carry an effective date, the Help Centre page carries none. Limited companies, LLPs and partnerships are eligible, and that is not in dispute. Check the eligibility shown during sign-up rather than relying on either page. Revolut Pro, inside the personal Revolut app with no subscription fee, is where Revolut points unincorporated individuals, though it is not a business current account. Mettle, by contrast, is built for sole traders and accepts them directly.
Does Mettle accept partnerships, LLPs, or charities?
No. Mettle accepts sole traders and limited companies with up to 2 owners (only 1 can access the account). Partnerships, LLPs, charities, Community Interest Companies (CICs), and Ltds with 3+ owners are not supported. For partnerships, LLPs and larger companies, Revolut Business, Starling Business or Allica Business Rewards are the alternatives. Revolut’s own terms exclude charities, so a charity needs a different provider.
How much does Mettle cost?
£0/month. Mettle has no monthly account fee, no charges for UK transfers, and FreeAgent accounting software is included free (worth £228 a year at FreeAgent’s sole-trader list price before VAT, or £396 for a limited company) provided you make at least one transaction per month.
How much does Revolut Business cost?
Revolut Business runs three priced tiers plus custom Enterprise: Basic is £10/month flat. Grow is £35/month billed monthly, or £30/month if you pay annually. Scale is £125/month billed monthly, or £90/month if you pay annually. International transfers cost £5 each on Basic, with 5 free on Grow and 25 free on Scale per month.
Can I hold foreign currency with Mettle?
No. Mettle is a GBP-only account. An inbound international payment of £10 or more costs £4, plus 1.5% if Mettle converts it into GBP. For multi-currency wallets, Revolut Business or Wise Business are the alternatives.
Does Mettle offer team card programmes or API access?
No. Mettle’s positioning is simple free GBP banking for sole traders and small limited companies, not a full fintech platform. For per-employee team cards with spend controls, choose Revolut Business; for a Business API, Revolut also wins in this matchup; it’s available on the Grow and Scale plans.
Can you use both Revolut and Mettle at the same time?
Yes. There’s no restriction on holding accounts with both providers. A common setup is Mettle as the free primary UK account with FreeAgent, with Revolut alongside for international payments and multi-currency spending once the business needs it.
How we reviewed Revolut vs Mettle
Ranking criteria. We compared Revolut and Mettle 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 October 2026. No comparison sites, no press releases, no affiliate material. Each firm’s reference number was taken from its own terms and fee documents.
Update cadence. We re-verify every provider on this page regularly, 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.