What’s the Best Simple High-Interest Checking Account?

We spend a good couple hours each month keeping the Best Checking and Savings Rates Page up to date, so I was surprised when I didn’t have a quick answer to a basic question from reader Mathias:

What is the best interest rate on a checking account without any hoops involved to get the rate? I want an account where I can set my payroll and direct debits without having to think about how much balance it needs to have at any given time.

When looking through the list on our Best Rates page, all of them are saving or money market accounts – only the complicated high interest accounts are checking accounts.

All, that is, except one: the Memory Bank 1.6% APY checking account. (Direct Link)

The accounts without hoops are almost all savings or money market accounts: with checking accounts the banks feel they are offering a service without having to offer a decent interest rate. Only the Memory Bank checking offers a reasonable interest rate on a simple, no-frills checking account.

To be clear, there are numerous high-interest checking options available, such as Consumer’s Credit Union 4.59% account on up to $20,000, Heritage Bank 3.33% account on up to $25,000, and many more. If you rarely have more than $25,000 in your checking account at any time, it’s probably worth just making Consumer’s or Heritage your regular checking account and going through the hoops for the significant extra interest earnings.

However, if you aren’t willing to deal with hoops or if your regular checking account fluctuates to numbers much higher than $25,000 (and you want to stick with just one checking account), the Memory Bank account is a solid option.

Another option is to open a no-interest checking account at the same bank as your high-yield savings account and simply transfer out any funds you aren’t currently using into the savings with the instant transfer option. A tried-and-true example would be the Discover Bank checking which is known as a solid online checking account (even offering 1% back on debit transactions), and they also typically offer a competitive savings rate (currently, 1.75%).

Ultimately, many people just want the convenience of a competitive interest rate on their checking account without having to deal with hoops or transfers, and the Memory Bank is the best option. This is especially true for those whose checking accounts fluctuate a lot due to MS or whatever, and want to earn interest for the time their float is sitting doing nothing.

I don’t know much about the actual Memory Bank checking product – do they have online bill pay? is their online login functional? etc. – maybe someone who’s used it can chime in on this.

Follow-up Post: What’s the Best High-Yield APY Checking Account Option?
    Chuck
  • On July 23, 2018, 13:15

View Comments (63)

  • Hey @will / @chucksithe - I was searching this site for your recommended high-interest checking account, and I found this post. I recommend updating/republishing this post to recommend SoFi Money instead of Memory Bank.

    The rate (after the recent fed rate cut) at SoFi Money is 2.00% (down from 2.25%), while the rate at Memory Bank is now 1.4% (down from 1.6%).

    Additionally, SoFi Money refunds all ATM fees, while Memory Bank has 92,000 surcharge-free ATMs that you'll have to hunt around to find.

    Neither Sofi Money nor Memory Bank appear to have any requirements, minimum balances to avoid fees, etc, so it seems to be an apples-to-apples comparison: 2% vs 1.4% and all ATM fees refunded vs. a subset of fee-free ATMs.

  • They do offer $500 in credit card funding. I was able to get discover to go through

  • I came here to recommend Memory. Ya, it's great. It became my everyday checking account. I love that I can park cash there and not have to worry about jumping through rewards checking hoops. Also love that I've only had to contact their support once -- to have my transfer limits increased (which they did to $20k/month). Seems like every other checking account I've had all sorts of issues I needed to contact them about -- Memory "Just Works".

    Hope they keep bumping that rate with the market so I stay there for years.

  • why is memory bank 1.6 being the golden choice here? if this article was actually written on 7/23, isnt ally and discover both higher (around 1.75-1.85 currently) and they are both no fees at all..am i missing something?

    • So savings has a limit of 6 withdrawals a month limit. Money Market accounts offer checks, but keep the 6 withdrawals a month. Checking allows as much as withdrawals as you like (useful for churners and people who have many cards they use and therefore need to withdraw more than 6 times a month).

    • Discover & Ally are those rates on the savings accounts, they don't offer that on the checking account.

  • I believe Memory Bank uses the same backend for bill Pay as Suntrust and some other banks. I don't normally push payments from my bank since Discover stopped paying me to do so, but I did a few when I first opened the checking, and was very comfortable with the interface.

    I opened the checking with $500 of CC funding months ago, and today opened the savings (1.85%) with another $500 of CC funding (instant approval and both accounts show up under my login, but the funding is on hold for 7 days). Not if you would be limited to a combined $500 if both accounts were opened together.

  • Memory Bank only provides 3 free starter paper checks. Beyond that you need to order checks through them or on your own. There is a $2,000 per day (and $6,000 per month) maximum transfer (mobile check deposit, ach withdrawal) limit if initiated through Memory Bank.

      • You should be able to pull from credit card's site, just not push from Memory Bank's site.

        • Yep, I always pull payments from the CC site as they're always credited on the day you specify for payment, even though it takes a day or two to be debited from your bank account. Bill Pay from your bank account can take a couple days to credit to your CC, and the speed of Bill Pay varies between banks, with credit unions usually being the slowest.

          I joined Memory Bank in early May for the bonus and have kept for the simplicity & decent interest on checking. I opened a Discover Savings in March for the bonus, closing it down, their ACH speed is the absolute worst, especially pushing money out, funds taken immediately from the account while it takes 3-5 days to credit to the external account. I fail to understand how folks recommend them - yes, USA reps, but how often do you need to speak to a rep?

          • How fast do ACH pushes hit the account? Comparable to penfed, cash management (where for example the money goes in Thursday evening instead of Friday like most others?)

  • I've used All America/Redneck Bank for a while now. The rate just went up to 2% for the Money Market recently.

  • Chuck, doesn't such a pathetic question drive you to distraction? Too much "bother" to earn 2x more for 5 minutes effort a month? The guy deserves a swift internet kick in the arse for being so lame/lazy

    • I don't think so. It especially matters for heavy MSers who can often have $100k sitting doing nothing for a few days in their checking account - there isn't any high-yield checking account which offers on good rate on balances above ~$25k.

      • how is union bank the money market 1.75%. end at Sep. my mom got the code but I can't use, my code only 1.5% end at Jun.

      • I would like to add that some of us don't frequently make 12 or so transactions to use the debit card EVERY month. I currently have a no interest checking through a local bank that is free and Schwab which is .25%. The benefit of Schwab is for ATM fees being refunded (even internationally, probably the best account for international travelers) and free checks. If one needs checks on the regular, perhaps a bank that provides free checks is better for them, like Schwab and Discover. Just like people who don't like credit cards, might be more comfortable with a 1% debit checking account like Discover if they don't have a big balance or don't want to MS/spend more than they could afford. While this might be better for those of us who like to park our money, and get interest that is good. I thought Memory bank was a money market when the $100 promo was around, so I didn't apply. So I'll wait on this for now, hoping for the bonus again.

      • This. Unless I can open multiple accounts, memory bank is the go to account. Keeps it simple for daily life. Keep the high tielde

  • My only fear of recommending Memorybank is the fear that the rate they are offering is just a teaser, which will eventually be withdrawn once you're fully ensconced in their account.

    I don't know if they have a long track record of providing such competitive rate, until recently they also had monthly hoops to jump through to maintain the rate just like all other high APY checking accounts.

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