Vanguard Stocks & Shares ISA review

Vanguard only sells its own funds, but it’s a great platform for beginners

Vanguard is a well-known funds platform. It only sells its own funds but it offers a Stocks & Shares ISA to invest in, and you can choose between several ready-made portfolios, suitable for beginner investors or choose all your funds yourself. There’s also a fully managed version, which is where a portfolio is created for you. 

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Here at Be Clever With Your Cash, we’re not regulated to give you financial advice. We aim to give you the facts about a provider or investment but it’s up to you to decide if it’s suitable for you. If you’re looking for more personalised guidance, find a financial adviser who can give you specific advice. Remember that your capital is at risk when investing — don’t invest more than you are prepared to lose. 

What is the Vanguard Stocks & Shares ISA?

The Vanguard Stocks & Shares ISA is an account that is available to invest in. This means that you can use your tax-free allowance of £20,000 per year and wouldn’t have to pay any tax on your earnings. 

There’s no additional charge for the ISA, unlike some other investment providers. 

Plus, if you already have any other ISAs with any other providers, you can transfer them into your Vanguard ISA. This can be done without the money counting as a new deposit in this tax year. Any existing investments will be sold before the transfer and then reinvested into the funds you choose with Vanguard. 

Any uninvested cash in your Vanguard ISA gets an interest rate of 2.2% — not great, but it’s better than nothing. 

What you can invest in with Vanguard

Vanguard doesn’t have the same investments as other providers, as it only sells its own funds. It has a pretty wide range, though, with 85 funds available to invest in.

The funds are organised well and it’s really easy to find what you’re looking for. You can filter the funds by the risk profile, the regions they’re invested in and how they’re managed. You can see how many investments are in each fund and a breakdown of how they’re invested. 

This allows you to put together your portfolio with some confidence and lets you choose funds that match how you’d like to invest. 

Some of the funds on offer are the five “LifeStrategy” portfolios and eleven “Target Retirement” funds. 

The ready-made portfolios are designed by experts, so you just need to invest in one of them to get a diversified mix of investments. You can choose which portfolio to choose based on how risky it is. This determines how much equity is in the portfolio.

Equity is another name for company shares and is typically a riskier investment. This means that riskier portfolios will have a higher portion of equity, while those considered low risk will have a larger portion of bonds. 

Here are the portfolios available with Vanguard:

Portfolio name	Risk level
LifeStrategy 20% equity fund	4/7
LifeStrategy 40% equity fund	4/7
LifeStrategy 60% equity fund	4/7
LifeStrategy 80% equity fund	5/7
LifeStrategy 100% equity fund	5/7

Complete beginners can also go for the fully managed option. This is where you answer some questions about how much you want to invest and how you feel about risk and Vanguard will offer you a portfolio that’s got a balance of equity and bonds that suits you. It’s similar to the ready-made portfolios, except it’ll be fully managed and rebalanced to suit you, and may have a slightly different proportion of equities for you. However, it’ll cost you more for this.

Vanguard account fees

Vanguard’s account fees (basically the platform fee) are pretty simple, but they’re slightly different depending on how your portfolio will be managed.

Self-managed portfolios

These are the account fees when you choose your own funds to invest in. They increased in March 2025 to a minimum £4 a month, making it quite expensive for those with less than £32,000 compared to before.

Investment amount	Account fee cost
Up to £32,000	£4 per month
Over £32,000	0.15% per year (max £375)

There are also fund management costs of between 0.06% and 0.79%, depending on which funds you go for.

Fully managed investments

These are the fees you’ll pay if you choose to invest in the managed portfolios. There’s no minimum monthly amount via this route. The management fee was reduced from 0.3% in March 2025.

Type of fee	Cost	What it’s for
Account fee	0.15% per year (max £375)	The cost of using Vanguard’s platform to invest
Fund management cost	0.17% on average	The cost to invest in the funds that make up your portfolio – this varies, which is why it’s not a concrete amount
Management fee	0.2%	The cost of Vanguard managing your investments

Vanguard features for beginner investors

Vanguard offers a good Stocks & Shares ISA for beginner investors as it offers ready-made options and individual funds for choosing your own portfolio, plus fully managed investments for those who want a completely “hands-off” approach.

Even the self-managed portfolios are pretty suited for beginners, as the funds are well-organised with lots of easy-to-understand information about the funds. 

Vanguard also has a great range of investing education guides to explain how it works and how to choose your own funds if this is a route you’d like to go down. 

Is Vanguard safe?

Vanguard is a major fund provider and is FCA-regulated in the UK. Any money you deposit is protected by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS).

This means that if Vanguard (or any of its partners that are holding your money) were to go bust and you lose money as a result, then up to £85,000 is protected.

How to open a Vanguard Stocks & Shares ISA

You can open a Vanguard Stocks & Shares ISA on its website. It has a mobile app, but you can’t open an account with it. 

You start by deciding whether you want to begin with a payment – this can be £500 initially or you can transfer an existing ISA. 

You’ll then choose between self-managed ISAs or managed ISAs.

If you choose the managed option, Vanguard will ask you some questions about how much money you plan to invest, how your finances are and your attitude to risk. It’ll then present you a plan based on your answers.

You’ll need to have ID, your National Insurance Number and a debit card to hand.

If you choose a self-managed ISA, you’ll be directed straight through the sign-up process, and will be able to choose funds once your account is open. 

Pros and cons of Vanguard

Pros

• No extra cost for ISA
• Great platform for beginners
• Offers fully managed and ready-made options
• Has a mobile app

Cons

• Not the cheapest platform
• You can only invest in Vanguard funds

Vanguard reviews

Over on our sister site, Smart Money People, Vanguard customers have rated it 4.53/5. Positive reviewers find the platform really easy to use, they think the customer service is excellent and think it’s cost-effective. 

Negative reviewers aren’t a fan of the recent rise in fees and feel that it takes the customer service team a lot of time to answer basic queries. 

Read customer reviews of Vanguard

Is Vanguard any good?

Zoe’s analysis

Vanguard is a really decent investment provider for those looking for a Stocks & Shares ISA, especially beginners or those not interested in the faff of choosing investments. You only have to go through a small questionnaire to have a portfolio created for you. 

You don’t get to invest in any other types of investments or funds, with only Vanguard’s own funds available. This means that if an investor wants to try buying some shares, they’d need a different provider to do this. 

In terms of cost, it’s certainly not the cheapest one available, especially for the managed ISAs, but it’s not the most expensive either. The new set £4 per month fee for up to £32,000 makes it a pretty expensive option for the self-managed option — there are lots of other platforms for much lower fees that have a wider range of investment options. 

And if you really want Vanguard funds in your Stocks & Shares ISA, you can actually buy many of them on other platforms – which could work out much cheaper.