Six popular personal pension products - compared

You might need to choose a personal pension product if:

you’re looking to consolidate your existing pensions into a new account
you’re self-employed, or not eligible for a workplace pension, but still want to save for retirement
you’d like to diversify your savings by having a personal account as well as a workplace pension
you’d like to change your current personal pension to get a better deal or find something more suited to your needs

We’ve rounded up the key info about six popular personal pension providers. We’ve divided them into two categories:

Simple: These providers give you limited choice or control over your investments. This might be a better option if you don’t want to do too much pension management, but instead prefer to pick a general direction and then let the pension provider decide exactly where to put your money.

Advanced: These providers usually allow you to get more involved with your investments on a more detailed level, for example buying and selling from individual funds and shares from hundreds of choices. This might be a better option if you’re really interested in investing and know what kind of funds you’d prefer to be in. But be aware that you’ll need to be on top of managing the risk level of your investments over time.

NB: Fees may differ depending on which investment plans or specific funds you pick. We give a sense of rough fees in the table below.

Provider	They say	Fees	Investment options
Pensionbee Simple	Combine, contribute and withdraw online. Take control of your retirement today and join over 538,000 customers using PensionBee.	Annual management fee incl fund management and platform fees 0.5-0.95% Fee reduction for pots over £100k Early exit fee of £480 if you withdraw everything within 12 months.	Select from 9 plans including Tailored (shifts as you age), Fossil-Fuel Free and 4 Plus (high growth strategy).
Moneybox Simple	Track down your old workplace pension pots and combine them into one simple Moneybox Personal Pension.	Platform fee: 0.45% up to £100k, 0.15% above 0.14%-0.58% Annual Fund management costs	4 main plans: ESG, Life Path (shifts as you age), Fidelity Index World Fund and Islamic Global Equity.
Nutmeg Simple	Start or transfer a personal pension in minutes. Choose your investment style and risk profile. Take control of your retirement.	Platform fee: 0.45%-0.75% up to £100k, 0.35% above Fund management: 0.19-0.29%	4 main investment styles: Fully Managed, Smart Alpha (managed by JP Morgan), Socially Responsible and Fixed Allocation (fixed at a certain risk level).
AJ Bell Advanced	An affordable, flexible pension pot.	Platform fees: 0.25% up to £100k, 0.10% up to £1m, 0.05% above Deal charge: £1.50 upwards Fund management: Depends on the fund you choose but typically 0.06% - 1.25%	Thousands of funds, trusts and shares to invest in. Eight ready-made portfolios if you don’t want to micromanage, based on desired risk and growth level.
Hargreaves Lansdown Advanced	We offer the HL SIPP for people who want to take control of their retirement savings. It's low cost, and you can even transfer your old pensions in to make them easier to manage.	Platform fees: 0.45% up to £250k, 0.25% up to £1m, 0.1% up to £2m, 0% above Deal charge: free for funds, £5.95 upwards for shares Fund management: Depends on the fund you choose but typically 0.06% - 1.25%	Thousands of funds, trusts and shares to invest in. Six ready-made portfolios if you don’t want to micromanage, based on desired risk and growth level.
Vanguard Advanced	The Vanguard Personal Pension is a flexible and tax-efficient way to save for your retirement. It's a Self Invested Personal Pension – so you have control over how you want your money to be invested.	Platform fees: 0.15% (capped at £375) Deal charge: free Fund charges: Depends on the fund you choose but typically 0.06% - 0.80%	75 funds to invest in, or pick a Target Retirement Fund, which invests for you depending on your targeted date of retirement.