Monzo’s simple money challenge could save you £667 | Personal Finance | Finance

Rising costs of daily essentials continue to squeeze household budgets, making it harder for people to save for emergencies or future expenses. But one increasingly popular way to boost savings is the 1p Savings Challenge, which is available to anyone, including customers of banks like Monzo.

According to the bank’s statement 1p Savings Challenge blogIt automatically increases daily savings by 1p, starting at 1p on day one, 2p on day two, and gradually increasing until it reaches £3.65 on day 365. Over a year this works out to £667.95.

By late December people could have saved more than £600; This is a figure that many people may find useful to cover holiday expenses such as Christmas dinner and gifts. This challenge is designed to be flexible so that users can pause it whenever they want or withdraw money as needed. Savings are kept in a separate container, helping to reduce the risk of accidental spending.

It’s worth noting: “If you have a free current account, you can only enter our 1p Savings Challenge if you start it before 31 January 2026. After that date, it’s only available to customers with Monzo Extra, Perks or Max.

“If you’re a Monzo Extra, Advantages or Maximum By becoming a member you can unlock new challenge levels save 2x or 4x the amount. You will also be entered into monthly prize draws** worth £100 and earn 5% AER (variable) interest paid monthly on everything you save as part of the challenge.”

Not a Monzo customer?

Martin Lewis’ Money Saving Expert blog suggests trying this method: 1p Savings ChallengeYou’re aiming to save £667.95. You don’t need a Monzo account to do this. MSE suggests a few simple alternatives:

• use a jar or piggy bank and add coins every day
• or transfer small amounts of money regularly to a savings account

He explains: “Manually transfer small amounts or monthly amounts of money to a savings account via online banking if your bank allows it. First you need to check if your bank allows you to transfer small amounts, for example HSBC allows you to save from 1p each day.”

“To do it this way, you have to log into your account every day, which can be quite a hassle. So while this defeats the purpose of being a daily challenge, you can put aside the month’s total all at once if you want.”

It continues: “Alternatively, if you want, you can split this evenly over 12 months and create a standing order. In this case, you’ll need to put aside £55.67 a month (this is a rounded-up figure for 12 equal installments, which means you’ll get an extra 9p during the competition if you use this method; don’t spend it all at once!).”

Starting today, you can do any of the following:

• Add all the money you’ve saved since day 1 at once, or
• Start saving 1p from today.

Either way you’ll still save money and even if you don’t hit £600, every penny counts.

You can read how to complete the challenge You can access it online via MSE’s website here. It has a helpful money chart and explains how people can make money. if it’s thin or flush, adapt to the challenge.