Max is Monzo’s most expensive packaged bank account
Monzo recently scrapped its two paid tiers, Monzo Plus and Monzo Premium, but, in their place, it introduced three new ones — Extra, Perks and this one, Max. Max is the most expensive option, costing £17 per month. Here’s everything you get with it.
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What do you get with Monzo Max vs Monzo Perks?
We won’t be reviewing all of the features of Monzo Max in this review, just the ones it’s got in addition to the free Monzo account, Monzo Extra and Monzo Perks. If you want to learn more about what you can do with Monzo, you can check out our in-depth review of the account. Here’s an overview of what you can get.
| Feature | Monzo Free | Monzo Extra | Monzo Perks | Monzo Max |
| Cost: | Free | £3 per month | £7 per month | £17 per month |
| Spending analysis: | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Trends: | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Instant spending notifications: | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Spending categories: | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Pots: | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Monthly spending summary: | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Spend and withdraw abroad for free: | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Savings rate: | 3.6% AER (variable) | 3.6% AER (variable) | 4.10% AER (variable) | 4.10% AER (variable) |
| Fee-free cash withdrawals abroad: | £200 | £200 | £600 | £600 |
| Connect other banks and credit cards: | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Virtual cards: | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Advanced roundups: | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Custom categories: | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Auto-spreadsheet: | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Credit insights: | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Fee-free cash deposits: | ❌ | ❌ | 3 free per month | 3 free per month |
| Discounted investment fees: | ❌ | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Free Railcard: | ❌ | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Free Greggs treat: | ❌ | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Free Vue ticket: | ❌ | ❌ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Worldwide travel insurance: | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✓ |
| Worldwide phone insurance: | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✓ |
| UK and Europe breakdown cover: | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✓ |
Monzo Max benefits
In addition to all of the features of the free Monzo account and the additional features of Monzo Extra and Monzo Perks, you also get worldwide travel insurance, phone insurance and breakdown cover in the UK and Europe. Here’s more detail on what you get with Monzo Max.
Worldwide travel insurance
You get personal multi-trip travel insurance with £50 excess, provided by Zurich. You’re covered by up to £5,000 for cancellations and £10m for medical bills. You also get cover for lost valuables and a car hire excess waiver.
Worldwide phone insurance
This insurance covers your mobile phone and accessories against loss, theft and accidental damage.
Your mobile is covered up to £2,000 and accessories, such as headphones and chargers are covered up to £300. It’s provided by Assurant and there’s a £75 excess. You can only claim twice per year.
UK and Europe breakdown cover
In addition, you get personal breakdown cover. This covers you, not your vehicle, so your family members either need to have you in the car at all times, or have their own policy in place to be covered.
The cover is for UK and Europe and includes at-home assistance, onward travel and vehicle recovery. This is provided by RAC.
Add extra family members
You can add your family to your travel, phone and breakdown cover for £5 per month. If you want this it makes the account £22 a month.
“Family” means your spouse or legal partner and any financially dependent and unmarried (or not living with their partner) children aged 19 years old or under at the start of a trip — or aged 21 years old or under at the start of a trip if still in full time education. Your family needs to be named on the policy.
Burnt coral card
You get a darker version of Monzo’s iconic coral card with this account. If you’re moving to Monzo Max from Monzo Premium, then you can keep your metal card until it expires, but it’ll be replaced with this one after that.
Is Monzo Max better abroad?
Monzo Max is the best of the Monzo accounts to use abroad — you get worldwide travel insurance with it, and you can withdraw up to £600 per month abroad.
However there are other cards that will give you fee-free spending overseas without a monthly charge. And you can likely get cheaper travel insurance — an annual travel insurance policy can cost you half the cost of Monzo Max for the year. We’d also suggest that you look at other travel debit and credit cards that might suit you better.
Customer reviews of Monzo
As Monzo only announced Monzo Max in April, we don’t yet have any customer reviews of the account over at our sister site Smart Money People.
When looking just at Monzo, customers rate the account 4.93/5, with customers raving about the customer service, and finding this to be a great app for digital banking.
Some customers had negative experiences when receiving large sums of money — with a few mentioning that their accounts were closed unexpectedly. We cover this issue further in our full Monzo review.
Is Monzo Max worth it?
Zoe’s analysis
If you were to make use of all the features of the account, you could work out with more in rewards than you spend. Here’s a rough idea:
- A Railcard costs £2.50 per month
- A Greggs sausage roll each week costs about £4.80
- A standard Vue ticket costs between £4.99 and £9.99 (depending on where you live), so we’ll say £7.50 as an average price
- An annual travel policy costs about £8.30 per month
- Breakdown cover is about £3.30 per month
- Mobile phone cover will depend on your device but for the latest Google Pixel it’s about £9 per month
This totals £35.40 per month, so £18.40 more than the Max fee, saving you £220.80 a year.
You also get the additional Monzo Extra features that can help you with budgeting and saving — I really like these, but I wouldn’t have paid for them individually.
So a decent option right? Well, that’s only the case if you need and use all or most of the features. If not, you’re overpaying.
Plus, you might be better off with a different packaged bank account at a different bank, especially if you have a family. The cheapest out there for worldwide family cover is £12.50 a month via Virgin Money. That’s £9.50 less a month than Monzo Max and you get better coverage.
Monzo Max
| Cost: | £17 per month |
| Benefits: | All Monzo Free, Extra and Perks features |
| £600 fee-free cash withdrawals abroad per month | |
| Worldwide travel insurance | |
| UK and EU breakdown cover | |
| Mobile phone insurance | |
| Card colour: | Burnt coral |
| Exclusive savings rate: | 4.1% AER variable |
How does Monzo Max compare with Monzo Premium?
You can’t get Monzo Premium any more, though you can keep it for now if you already have it. This was a previous tier of Monzo that cost £15 per month – and it covered your family without the need for an extra payment.
If you decide to swap from Premium to Max you won’t be able to switch back. You can however keep your metal card until it expires.
Here’s the main differences between Monzo Premium’s extra benefits and Monzo Max’s extra benefits.
| Feature | Monzo Premium | Monzo Max |
| Cost: | £15 per month | £17 per month |
| Card: | White metal card | Burnt coral card |
| Savings rate: | 4.60% AER (variable) | 4.60% AER (variable) |
| Fee-free cash withdrawals abroad: | £600 | £600 |
| Connect other banks and credit cards: | ✓ | ✓ |
| Virtual cards: | ✓ | ✓ |
| Advanced roundups: | ✓ | ✓ |
| Custom categories: | ✓ | ✓ |
| Auto-spreadsheet: | ✓ | ✓ |
| Credit insights: | ✓ | ✓ |
| Free cash deposits: | ✓ 5 fee-free deposits per month | ✓ 3 fee-free deposits per month |
| Discounts and offers: | ✓ | Free weekly Greggs & Vue ticket |
| Free Railcard: | ❌ | ✓ |
| Discounted investment fees: | ❌ | ✓ |
| Worldwide travel insurance: | ✓ For you and anyone travelling with you | ✓ For you only |
| Mobile phone insurance: | ✓ | ✓ |
| Discounted lounge access: | ✓ | ❌ |
| UK and Europe breakdown cover: | ❌ | ✓ |
| Add family: | ❌ | For £5 per month |
You actually get 5 cash deposits for free at post office and paypoint locations with Premium, so the graphic is slightly off.
Readers need to be wary of the exclusions in packaged accounts travel insurance because typically they do not cover pre-existing medical conditions. Worse still, the additional premium to extend cover to pre-existing medical conditions is considerably more than a standalone policy. In short, unless you are young and healthy, you should probably look elsewhere.