New survey data shows mobile banking is the No. 1 factor that drives mobile banking users to switch their primary bank. The finding comes from Insider Intelligence’s fifth annual US Mobile Banking Emerging Features Benchmark report. In this article, we peel back the numbers and identify the top features that banks can offer to stand out. First, a look at the data:

  • Six in 10 US adults (59.8%) are projected to use smartphones to bank monthly in 2022, according to an exclusive Insider Intelligence forecast.  That’s 157.4 million adults.
  • Fifteen percent of mobile banking users say that they switched their primary bank over the past year. That finding comes from a survey of 2,385 US adults who use mobile banking, which Insider Intelligence fielded in September 2021.
  • The No. 1 pain point that respondents say drove them to switch primary banks is mobile banking. It beat factors including online banking, customer service, ATMs, and fees.
 - Insider Intelligence
Insider Intelligence

Here are the three most in-demand features banks can offer to stand out to prospective switchers, drawn from Insider Intelligence research. 

Note: Data on which banks offer the features below comes from Scientia, which operates the research platform FinTech Insights. Scientia provided information about banks’ feature sets for the study. For more information, see the end of the article.

  1. Social Security number monitoring. By monitoring the dark web for customers’ Social Security numbers, banks can alert users to take protective action if their information is compromised. This is the study’s most in-demand feature, eclipsing 41 other criteria, with 53% of respondents calling it “extremely valuable.” Only four of 23 banks offer the feature.
  2. Digitized direct deposit setup. This feature goes a step beyond printing PDFs by helping customers set up direct deposit with their employers end-to-end via the mobile app. Direct deposit setup is the second-highest in-demand feature in the study, but Citi is the only bank to  offer it. 
  3. Overdraft alerts. US consumers paid a collective $12.4 billion in overdraft fees last year, according to the Financial Health Network. This tool prompts users to act as soon as they dip into an overdraft, which can help them avoid incurring more debt. It is our study’s third-most valued feature and is offered by 16 of 23 banks.

About the Study

Citi offers digitized direct deposit setup - Citi via FinTech Insights by Scientia
Citi offers digitized direct deposit setup Citi via FinTech Insights by Scientia

This article is a teaser of Insider Intelligence’s fifth annual US Mobile Banking Emerging Features Benchmark report. The report stacks up the 23 largest US banks (by assets) according to whether they offer 42 features whose novelty, utility, or rarity will distinguish mobile apps, as validated by a consumer survey. Clients can access the full findings

About FinTech Insights by Scientia

Insider Intelligence partnered with Scientia for data on which banks offered which features. Scientia operates the research platform FinTech Insights, which analyzes over 100 incumbent and entrant providers in the US, UK, and Europe, identifying the features they offer, providing videos of those features at work, and scoring the friction of capabilities.