Hargreaves Lansdown fund investing is expensive, but worth it

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Hargreaves Lansdown Fund Investing

In this review we take a look at if Hargreaves Lansdown is good for fund investing, and how they rate for coverage, pricing and added value.

Hargreaves Lansdown Fund Investing Review: Expensive but lots of added value
Good Money Guide Recommended 2025

Account: Hargreaves Lansdown Fund Investing

Description: Hargreaves Lansdown lets you invest in over 4,040 funds or choose from HL funds picked by a team of in-house investment experts that manage a range of Multi-Manager funds (fund-of-funds) and HL Select range of equity funds.
Capital at risk.

Is Hargreaves Lansdown good for funds?

Fund investing is where Hargreaves Lansdown gets very expensive. There is no charge for buying and selling funds on Hargreaves Lansdown. Fund accounts are charged at 0.45% for the first Β£250,000. Then 0.25% up to Β£1m, 0.1% up to Β£2m. There is no charge above Β£2m.

This is quite high compared to AJ Bell’s scaled fund fees starting at 0.25% and Interactive Investors’ flat account fee of Β£11.99.

However, because of it’s size, Hargreaves Lansdown is able to negotiate Fund discounts where they say their clients save an average of 17% on the ongoing charges figure (OCF), which is the fee charged by the fund manager as opposed to your broker.

OCF fees are rarely capped, so having a discount on the fund charge is even more valuable for people holding large sums in funds.

Hargreaves does have a pretty good research offering for funds alongside their excellent market data portal. HL, as well as offering access to more funds compared to other fund platforms, currently have 72 funds on the Wealth Shortlist for which they provide full research and recommendations. In addition, HL provides research updates on 32 Open-Ended Funds, 38 Investment Trusts, 15 ETFs.

One thing they are particularly good at is flagging funds that are underperforming so investors can switch out of them. This is particularly helpful as in a recent update the also flagged four of their own funds, including; HL Global Bond Fund, HL Emerging Markets Fund, HL Multi-Manager UK Growth Fund and HL Select UK Income Fund and include notes on what they are going to do to improve performance.

Pros

  • Over 4,040 funds
  • Excellent fund research
  • No charge for buying or selling funds

Cons

  • 0.45% account fee* is relatively high
  • Pricing
    (3.5)
  • Market Access
    (5)
  • Online Platform
    (5)
  • Customer Service
    (5)
  • Research & Analysis
    (5)
Overall
4.7
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