Metro Bank

Metro Bank was set up for people who wanted a more visibly convenient branch bank, with long opening hours, dog-friendly branches, and the promise of a retail experience that felt less old-fashioned. By our assessment, its strength was always the branch side: the stores were designed to be easy to walk into, and the brand made a point of treating the high street as a service space rather than a relic. The downside is that branch theatre does not replace the harder parts of banking, so accounts, cards, lending, and digital tools still have to do the real work. In practice Metro Bank feels more like a physical service brand than a classic bank, which is why it stood out against the usual UK incumbents. Metro Bank sits in the challenger-bank lane, but with shops instead of a pure app story. Its country is the United Kingdom.