Founded in 2002 in Poland, XTB now serves more than 935,000 clients. The forex and CFD broker combines a heavily regulated trading environment with an extensive selection of 5,600+ assets and a commitment to trader satisfaction, featuring an intuitive in-house platform with superb tools to support aspiring traders.
Founded in 1974, IG is part of IG Group Holdings Plc, a publicly traded (LSE: IGG) brokerage. The brand offers spread betting, CFD and forex trading across an almost unrivalled selection of 17,000+ markets, with a range of user-friendly platforms and investing apps. For 50 years, IG has maintained its position as an industry leader, excelling in all key areas for traders.
77% of retail accounts lose money.
71% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading spread bets and CFDs with this provider.
Pros
With over 5,600 instruments across forex, stocks, indices, ETFs, commodities, and cryptocurrencies, including CFDs, share dealing and more recently Investment Plans, XTB caters to both short-term traders and longer-term investors.
The xStation platform continues to impress with its user-friendly interface and intuitive features, including customizable news feeds, sentiment heatmaps, and trader calculator, reducing the learning curve for newer traders.
With an excellent range of educational materials, including training videos and articles integrated into the platform, XTB supports traders at all levels.
XTB has boosted its interest rate on all uninvested balances (up to 5.2%) while competitors like eToro only offer up to 5% on balances of $50K+.
Opening an XTB account is a hassle-free, entirely online process that takes just a few minutes, making the entry into trading smooth for new traders.
First-class 24/5 customer support is available, including a friendly live chat with response times of under two minutes during testing.
XTB offers fast withdrawals with same-day payments if requested before 1 pm, ensuring traders have quick access to their funds.
IG is amongst the best in terms of its range of instruments, which includes stocks, forex, indices, commodities, and cryptocurrencies, providing ample diversification opportunities
The proprietary web-based platform continues to caters to traders of all levels, with advanced charting tools and real-time market data useful for trading
The IG app offers a superb mobile trading experience with a clean design that helped it secure Runner Up at our Best Trading App award
As a well-established broker, IG operates under strict regulatory guidelines in multiple jurisdictions, maintaining a high level of trust
IG offers an extensive collection of professional and engaging educational resources, including webinars, articles, and analysis
The ProRealTime advanced charting platform is free as long as certain modest monthly trading activity requirements are met
Cons
XTB does not offer a raw spread account, which is becoming increasingly common among competitors like Pepperstone, and may disappoint traders looking for the tightest spreads.
The demo account expires after just four weeks, a serious limitation for traders who wish to thoroughly test the xStation platform and practice short-term strategies before committing real funds.
XTB discontinued support for MT4, limiting traders to its proprietary platform, xStation, potentially deterring advanced traders familiar with the MetaTrader suite.
Trading fees are competitive with average spreads of around 1 pip on the EUR/USD but still trail the cheapest brokers like IC Markets, plus there's an inactivity fee after 12 months.
The research tools at XTB are good but could be great if they went beyond in-house features with access to leading third-party tools such as Autochartist, Trading Central and TipRanks.
Not being able to adjust the default leverage level of XTB products is frustrating, as manual adjustment can significantly mitigate trade risk, especially in forex and CFD trading.
Beginners might find IG’s fee structure complex, with various fees for different types of trades or services, potentially leading to confusion or unexpected charges
While there is negative balance protection in the UK and EU, there is no account protection or guaranteed stop losses for US clients
IG has discontinued its swap-free account, reducing its appeal to Islamic traders
Stock and CFD spreads still trail the cheapest brokers like CMC Markets based on tests
IG applies an inactivity fee of $12 per month after 2 years, deterring casual investors
Awards
Best Forex Broker for Beginners 2022
Best Customer Service 2021
Best Forex Broker for Low Costs 2021
Best Mobile App for Investing 2020
#1 EMEA Bloomberg spot for FX accuracy in Q2 of 2020 and Q3 of 2018
Best Polish Forex Broker 2019
Best Execution Broker 2019
Best Customer Service 2022 - Online Money Awards
Best Spread Betting Provider 2022 - Online Money Awards
Best Platform for the Active Trader 2022 - ADVFN International Financial Awards
Best Multi Platform Provider 2022 - ADVFN International Financial Awards
Best Finance App 2022 - ADVFN International Financial Awards
Year after year XTB’s app stands out for its slick design and uncluttered interface that we love. It’s quick, responsive and packed with useful features, notably integrated sentiment data, market news, economic calendars and education. The user-friendly order panel underneath the trading chart also makes placing trades, including adding take profit and stop loss levels, really straightforward.
IG offers a superb all-round trading app. One of the pioneers of mobile trading, the application has been developed and refined over many years, meaning it is now among the best trading apps. Quick response, user-friendly layout, access to full charting and a stable and reliable application. It also offers guaranteed stops – an important risk management tool not available on many apps we’ve tested.
iOS App Rating
4.7
4.6
Android App Rating
4.1
4
Margin Trading
Yes
Yes
Margin Rate
4.5%
2.5%
MetaTrader 4
No
Yes
MetaTrader 5
No
No
cTrader
No
No
AlgoTrader
No
No
OmniTrader
No
No
TradingView
No
No
Autochartist
No
Yes
eSignal
No
No
Trading Central
No
Yes
STP Account
Yes
No
ECN Account
No
No
DMA Account
Yes
Yes
MAM Account
No
No
PAMM Account
No
No
LAMM Account
No
No
Demat Account
No
No
AI / Machine Learning
No
No
Robo Advisor
No
Yes
Negative Balance Protection
Yes
Yes
Market Maker
No
Yes
P2P Trading
No
No
Spot Trading
Yes
Yes
Auto Trading
Open API
Expert Advisors (EAs) on MetaTrader, build your own on ProRealTime
Copy Trading
No
No
Social Trading
No
No
Trade Signals
Yes
Yes
VPS Hosting
No
Yes
Tournaments
No
No
Demo Competitions
No
No
Ethical Investing
Yes
Yes
Custodial Account
No
No
Guaranteed Stop Loss
Yes
Yes
Inactivity Fee
$0
$12
Islamic Account
Yes
No
Account Currencies
USD
EUR
GBP
HUF
USD
EUR
GBP
CAD
AUD
JPY
ZAR
SEK
DKK
CHF
HKD
SGD
Commodities
Gold
Oil
Silver
Copper
Cotton
Sugar
Precious Metals
Gasoline
Cocoa
Coffee
Natural Gas
Nickel
Soybeans
Aluminium
Livestock
Corn
Palladium
Platinum
Wheat
Zinc
Gold
Copper
Oil
Palladium
Silver
Sugar
Coffee
Wheat
Natural Gas
Soybeans
Orange Juice
Nickel
Steel
Iron
Precious Metals
Aluminium
Lithium
Cannabis
CFD
XTB offers a huge selection of more than 2,100 CFDs spanning forex, indices, commodities, stocks, ETFs, and cryptos (location-dependant). Leverage up to 1:30 is available in the EU and UK, while global clients and pro traders can access up to 1:500. XTB stands out for its CFD trading resources and tutorials to assist traders in developing short-term trading strategies.
IG offers a huge selection of 17,000+ CFDs, providing more trading opportunities than most CFD brokers. Traders can go long or short on popular markets like stocks, currencies, commodities and cryptos, while custom price alerts and the IG Academy continue to enhance the trading experience.
Leverage
1:30
1:30 (Retail), 1:222 (Pro)
FTSE Spread
1.8
1.0
GBPUSD Spread<
1.4
0.9
Oil Spread
0.03
2.8
Stocks Spread
0.2%
0.02
Forex
XTB provides access to 70+ currency pairs with low spreads averaging around 1 pip on majors. The xStation platform offers an intuitive environment for forex traders with an excellent charting package encompassing 30+ indicators, plus a range of order types, catering to various strategies and risk management techniques.
IG offers an above-average suite of 80+ currency pairs on its proprietary web platform, mobile app or MetaTrader 4, with more advanced charts and forex analysis tools available on the ProRealTime software. Forex spreads are competitive based on tests, starting from 0.1 pips on majors like the EUR/USD.
Assets
70+
80+
GBPUSD Spread
1.4
0.9
EURUSD Spread
1.0
0.8
EURGBP Spread
1.4
0.9
Currency Indices
USD
Cryptocurrency
XTB offers an excellent selection of cryptos with more than 50 digital currencies. Spreads are tight starting from 0.22% on BTC and leverage reaches 1:5. The xStation platform also provides intra-crypto pairs like ETH/BTC and DSH/BTC. With the capability to trade cryptos 24/7, XTB ensures a secure environment with transparent accounts for cryptocurrency trading.
IG's modest selection of 11 crypto CFDs trails top crypto brokers like Vantage which offers 40+ tokens. That said, it stands out with its crypto index, which tracks the value of the top 10 digital currencies by market cap and provides a holistic way to speculate on the value of the crypto market.