APIs · head to head
Griffin vs Salt Edge
Griffin
APIs
UK banking-as-a-service from a company that holds its own full banking licence
- From
- £100/month
- Rated
- -
Salt Edge
APIs
Independent open banking aggregator covering Europe by PSD2 API and other markets by direct connection
- From
- On request
- Rated
- -
The short version
- Each has a real cost: Griffin platform banking carries a one-off onboarding fee from 15,000 pounds and a 3,500 pound monthly minimum, which prices out early-stage companies entirely.; Salt Edge coverage outside regulated open banking markets is not all direct bank API, and connections that are not regulated interfaces break when a bank changes its systems, so a headline country count overstates the reliability you will actually experience.
- They diverge on capability: Griffin covers Bank accounts by API, Salt Edge covers Account information.
- Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.
Where they differ
Only the attributes on which Griffin and Salt Edge actually diverge.
Identical on both: free tier (No), user rating (Not yet rated), category (APIs).
What each one covers
Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.
Only in Griffin
- Bank accounts by API
- UK payment rails
- Integrated ledger
- Automated onboarding
- Debit cards
- Interest on balances
Only in Salt Edge
- Account information
- Payment initiation
- Wide country coverage
- Open Banking Gateway
- Categorisation and enrichment
- Consent management
- Partner and white label
- Sandbox
What people use each for
The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.
Griffin
- A wealth platform that must hold client money in a licensed bank rather than an EMI safeguarding accountnot Salt Edge
- A lender wanting UK accounts and payment rails without becoming a bank itselfnot Salt Edge
- A fintech burned by sponsor bank instability that wants the deposit holder and the API provider to be the same entitynot Salt Edge
- A platform needing sub-account ledgering for pooled client funds with a clean audit trailnot Salt Edge
Salt Edge
- A lender operating across several European and non-EU markets that needs one aggregation contract rather than a different provider per countrynot Griffin
- A fintech that wants an aggregator not owned by a card network because its use case competes with card productsnot Griffin
- An accounting or treasury product that needs bank feeds in markets the large aggregators do not servenot Griffin
- A bank that must publish PSD2-compliant APIs and would rather buy the compliance layer than build itnot Griffin
Where each one falls short
Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.
Griffin
- Platform banking carries a one-off onboarding fee from 15,000 pounds and a 3,500 pound monthly minimum, which prices out early-stage companies entirely.
- It is UK-only, so a business with European or US operations needs a second banking provider and a second integration for those entities.
- It is a young bank with a small balance sheet relative to incumbents, and enterprise counterparties still ask hard questions about concentration risk.
- Holding a banking licence means Griffin applies bank-grade due diligence to its own clients, so onboarding is slower and more selective than an EMI-based provider.
- Feature breadth is narrower than long-established providers, particularly in card programme management and in payment types beyond core UK rails.
Salt Edge
- Coverage outside regulated open banking markets is not all direct bank API, and connections that are not regulated interfaces break when a bank changes its systems, so a headline country count overstates the reliability you will actually experience.
- Pricing is not published and is usage-based, so two providers cannot be compared without running both sales processes, and cost grows with the connected user base rather than with revenue.
- Support and engineering are distributed across Eastern Europe and Canada, and buyers in other time zones report slower turnaround on connection-specific breakages than they get from a domestic provider.
- PSD2 consent rules require customers to reauthenticate periodically, and Salt Edge cannot change that, so any product depending on continuous data must design for consent expiry and the drop-off it causes.
- United States coverage is weaker than Plaid or Mastercard Open Banking, so a company with meaningful US volume ends up running two aggregators and normalising between them.
Pricing, plan by plan
Griffin
£100/month- Business Banking$100/month
- From 100 pounds per month
- Interest or commission from around 1.75 percent AER variable
- Operational accounts and UK payment rails
- Platform Banking$3500/month
- One-off onboarding fee from 15,000 pounds
- Minimum monthly spend of 3,500 pounds, drawn down by usage
- Higher committed tiers at 5,000 and 10,000 pounds with discounts
- Enterprise$undefined/month
- Custom pricing
- Bespoke account structures and volumes
- Negotiated interest or commission share
Salt Edge
On request- Salt Edge Open Banking API$undefined/year
- Account information and payment initiation
- Coverage across 50 plus countries
- Consent management and enrichment
Which should you pick?
Choose Griffin if
- You need bank accounts by api.
- You work on Web, REST API.
- You also want uk payment rails.
Choose Salt Edge if
- You need account information.
- You work on Web, API.
- You also want payment initiation.
Questions people ask
- Is Griffin or Salt Edge better?
- Neither clearly leads. Griffin starts at £100/month and Salt Edge at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
- Which is cheaper, Griffin or Salt Edge?
- Griffin starts at £100/month and Salt Edge at On request.
- Does Griffin or Salt Edge run on more platforms?
- Griffin runs on Web, REST API. Salt Edge runs on Web, API.
- What is Griffin best used for?
- Griffin is most often used for a wealth platform that must hold client money in a licensed bank rather than an emi safeguarding account, a lender wanting uk accounts and payment rails without becoming a bank itself, a fintech burned by sponsor bank instability that wants the deposit holder and the api provider to be the same entity, a platform needing sub-account ledgering for pooled client funds with a clean audit trail. Of those, a wealth platform that must hold client money in a licensed bank rather than an emi safeguarding account and a lender wanting uk accounts and payment rails without becoming a bank itself are not what Salt Edge is typically brought in for.
- What can Griffin do that Salt Edge cannot?
- Griffin covers Bank accounts by API, UK payment rails, Integrated ledger, Automated onboarding. Salt Edge covers Account information, Payment initiation, Wide country coverage, Open Banking Gateway.
Answered from the vendors’ own pages
Griffin: Is Griffin actually a bank?
Yes. It received a UK banking licence with restrictions in March 2023 and a full licence in March 2024 after exiting mobilisation.
Salt Edge: Who owns Salt Edge?
It is independently owned, unlike Tink (Visa), Finicity (Mastercard) or Yodlee (Envestnet), which matters if your use case competes with the owner.
Griffin: What does it cost?
Business banking from 100 pounds a month; platform banking from a 15,000 pound onboarding fee plus a 3,500 pound monthly minimum drawn down by usage.
Salt Edge: Is all coverage direct bank API?
No. Inside PSD2 markets connections use regulated APIs; elsewhere coverage relies on direct connections whose reliability depends on the bank not changing its systems. Ask for a per-institution answer.
Griffin: Does it cover Europe?
No. Griffin is a UK bank serving UK accounts and UK payment rails.
Salt Edge: Does it do payments as well as data?
Yes, payment initiation is supported in European markets where PSD2 applies.
Salt Edge: What does it cost?
Not published. Pricing is usage-based and quoted, though the sandbox is free.
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