For what i use my accounts for both Monzo and Starling are perfect.
But for me it’s mainly cosmetic.
The difference between pots and goals is pretty minimal, but the interface between the 2 is miles apart (same with payees)
Monzo requires you to scroll through pots one by one, no custom picture and you can’t easily view them on one page.
The payees page is looking very legacy bank…
Starling at the moment just seems easier to view and use.
I must admit Starling having Fitpay pay to me is a killer nowadays, I’m often out with just my watch, either running, jogging, or just walking, I don’t have to carry my card with me, to be able to go and get a water, or pop and get some shopping for a meal while not having my phone or card is such a great thing.
Are you frequently greeted by broken contactless readers?
Or do I just have really bad luck…
One shop has a broken one, so I just use one of the other two in that shop. I use contactless extensively, and never had a problem with broken contactless readers, apart from the one shop, however they did replace the reader recently, I’ve just not tried it yet.
The Starling forum had loads of really good suggestions for features from users and feedback on existing ones, I don’t think that’s a fair summary. There are far better ways of dealing with public complaints, and they form a relatively small part of this Monzo forum for example. I agree with others that a forum is a fantastic resource for users new and old, and a willingness to listen to users is something which sets Monzo apart.
Apart from that I prefer the Monzo app UI (though obviously some parts could do with improvement), the friendly approach to customer support, and the focus on adding features which their users want and ask for. They are also really pushing for massive growth in user numbers, which, once they start making money per user, will have a big impact on their viability and ability to negotiate with incumbents. I think this is the correct approach rather than the tie-ins with older banks like RBS (the worst possible partner). If Monzo can keep that up, I think they’ll easily surpass other banks in user count and features - 1 million users is getting very close.
For me personally (having used both), my list would be:
Starling
Monzo
I’ve left off features which don’t matter to me - things like Cash for example. Depending on the user/account certain features are really important (cash, international payments etc), and some features are somewhat subjective, so the feature list is bound to vary a lot by user. I think it’s quite hard to compare them objectively, but there are certainly some areas where each is ahead, and I’m glad we’re seeing this competition which pushes both to do better.
For an end user I’d say either are a perfectly serviceable bank account, and both are better than high st banks. I also quite like Tide for the simple UI, though have concerns about their viability.
I orignally came across Monzo in the Starling discussion boards and am fortunate in being able to see both Starling & Monzo side by side and compare the best and worst features of both.
I got my card yesterday and started to transfer money in and also have asked to use CASS to moved my Barclays account to Monzo.
Compared to the usual efforts of the high street banks; as most Monzo/Starling users will know both of them are streets ahead in terms of being transparent, in terms of an app that allows the user to self-service and all of the great stuff like being able to see what you have spent where.
Some of the features I have personally found confusing compared to Starling.
Overdraft
I understand the 50p per day up to £15.50; however I am not sure what constitutes being overdrawn. Let me explain. At Starling if I am £500 overdrawn but have £500 in my goals then technically my balance is £0 so I am not overdrawn and there are no charges.
I think there is a slight difference in Monzo as it appears that the money in my Pots is still shown as my balance although I can’t spend it directly? so in my example above £500 overdrawn with £500 in a pot; am I actually overdrawn and hence charge 50p or still in credit?
Pots (Goals)
In Starling when you transfer money into your goal it vanishes literally; it does not show as your balance and you have to view a completely seperate page. Although as mentioned above it is still considered part of the balance.
Spending Notifications
I bought breakfast in McDonalds today and on my Starling card the alert usually pops up even before the receipt has run out of the machine. Indeed in Matalan the other day the alert came to my watch before the till receipt came out. The alert from McDonalds didn’t arrive so I checked the app; and the transaction showed correctly (rounded up by my pot), as I walked into my office 3 minutes away the notification popped up.
Is there someway to get it faster, I have the notification set to Urgent
Rounding up
Ok, so this was probably my misunderstanding, although I don’t feel the explanation in the app is super clear. I spent £4.09 at McDonalds and it rounding it to £5, and put 91p in my pot. This was not what I expected, it would be great is you could set some limit either nearest £1, 50p, or 10p.
All in all enjoying exploring what Monzo offers; and can see why people want to switch to you
Overdrafts have been discussed at some length and different people have different views - unfair charges because I still have money in pots - move money from your pot and you won’t get charged anything 
as opposed to encouraging you to go overdrawn if you need to use the money you have in a goal for what you had it in the goal for - you still have an overdraft because you’ve been encouraged to use it " with no charge" until you have to pay for what you’re saving for
Pots / Goals when I transfer money from my main feed to a pot it disappears from my balance and goes into my pot balance - cant see the difference ???
Spending notifications mine appear instantly
Rounding up you have the option with IFTTT to set your roundups to 10p, 50p or £1 which you can activate if you want
@simonb maybe merge this Starling thread with Starling Feedback or Starling Head versus Heart rather than starting another “Starling comparison thread” - I know they’ve closed their community but it feels more and more that Monzo is turning into the Starling community forum
On notifications - This could be due to your mobile phone network - If reception is not great then the spending notification will only come through when you’re connected again. This behaviour should be same on Starling.
BTW - Let us know your thought in couple of weeks on this comparison. I closed my Starling account and never really used that much to have a fair view. I could not bring myself to like their UX. Monzo has much better UX IMO.
Instant notifications are not always instant, doesn’t matter which card or bank you use, you are relying on your phone the wifi network the mobile network etc, so there may be times it appears a few minutes later.
I’ve noticed over the months with a few banks and cards there is sometimes a delay. Generally though they are instant.
For me the biggest thing now is Monzo having the forum, I also prefer the Monzo app.
Monzo have made massive leaps and bounds in recent months, more so that I had been aware of.
In some ways I’m actually glad Starling shut the forum down because it was the final push to make me reconsider Monzo again and I’m very pleased I did!
@anon95680666 thanks for taking the time to feedback.
Overdrafts - yeah to me this sounds more and more like the big banks, “I don’t care you’ve got £50k in your savings you’ve gone £20 overdrawn and so I’m going to hit you with £7.50 charge plus interest”. I now understand how it works.
Pots/Goals - Sorry I didn’t make my example clear. In Monzo if I have £50 in my ‘current’ account and £50 in a Pot it shows at the top of the screen that I have £100, can’t argue with that accounting. In Starling it will show I have just £50, with the other £50 being in effect hidden. From a behavioural point of view this is very different.
Spending notifications - perhaps a career in IT support beckons? it works for me. I did a comparison at lunch time, I bought two items from Sainsburys, one I paid contactless with Starling, the other with Monzo, the Starling one flashed up straight away, the Monzo one as I left the shop. My point was ‘have I done something wrong that makes them slower than I expect’
Rounding up - Thanks for the heads up, although it seems strange I have to resort to a third party to achieve something that could be done natively.
I really apologise if you felt this was a Starling is great Monzo is not discussion, it wasn’t; I genuinely wanted to understand how stuff works, and I’m sorry this upset you.
@SC95 - Re The UI I suppose what I can say is I prefer that when I open Starling I see the balance and the circle with todays’ spending.
On Monzo it seems to open a straight list of what I have spent with the balance at the top. Horses for courses I think.
On Monzo certain things are really easy to navigate e.g. to get my account number used to take a few attempts until Starling changed their UI, in Monzo it’s there front and centre. I like the budgeting feature although not sure what it thinks I will have £26 left at the end of the month when I haven’t told it anything about my income or expenses.
It’s interesting for me because things like freeze your card or see your PIN are more hidden in Starling, but front and centre in Monzo, for me these things are not very important as they are not used often but other people may use them a lot
Both are on the “card screen” no scrolling required on either. I’d say they are even
At least on the iOS app, the balance shown at top of the Home screen is the amount you have available to spend, and so doesn’t include money that’s in Pots.
This is a bit odd. Surely overdraft fees should be accrued when the bank is actually lending money. Why should I be charged a fee for a lending product, if the bank has my money on deposit?
the bank is lending you money, you have £0 in your current account, the bank has no access to your pots , if you don’t want to be charged fees for money that you are using that isn’t yours put some money back into your current account from your pot
I’m not sure what this means. Does it mean the money isn’t in my bank account?
Maybe I’m misunderstanding. Are Pots separate bank accounts? Or just Monzo-invented structures for managing my money within one account?
Somewhere here there’s a thread with almost a 1000 replies on what you just said. 
with arguments from both sides.
I think we should keep this thread on topic 
I don’t think Monzo can access your pots to settle bills that are due from your current account spending