Nequi,
reviewed.

What Nequi is, in 2026

Nequi is the largest Colombian neobank by user count. Public Bancolombia disclosures and Colombian financial press place the customer figure around 17 million Colombian users — a number that has roughly doubled since the 2020 spin-out and which makes Nequi, by reach, the default digital-banking surface in Colombia. Verify the current customer count against the most recent Bancolombia 20-F (NYSE: CIB) or the Nequi annual disclosure before treating any specific number as load-bearing.

The product launched inside Bancolombia in 2016 as a digital-only account, and ran for the first four years as a Bancolombia subsidiary product riding the parent's banking licence. In 2020 Bancolombia spun Nequi out as Compañía de Financiamiento Nequi S.A. — a Colombian credit institution holding its own SFC-supervised licence. The 2020 transition matters because it changed the legal counterparty for depositors: from Bancolombia (a banco) to Nequi (a compañía de financiamiento). Bancolombia retains majority equity ownership of Nequi after the spin-out — the controlling-shareholder relationship continues even though the licence is now Nequi's own.

The product surface in 2026 is recognisable to anyone who has used a developed-market neobank: a free primary account, a Mastercard débito card, intra-Nequi instant transfers, domestic inter-bank transfers via PSE rails, sub-balances ("Pockets" / "Bolsillos") for goal-based saving, and an SDIC-style — sorry, FOGAFIN-style — protection footprint at the Colombian peso (COP) level. There is no investing layer, no brokerage, no crypto, and no multi-currency surface. The product is consciously focused on Colombian peso primary banking for Colombian residents, and the 17M user count reflects that focus rather than a broader regional ambition.

At-a-glance scorecard

Use Nequi if you are a Colombian resident wanting a digital-first peso account from a Colombian-licensed credit institution with FOGAFIN cover, mass-market distribution, and access to the Bancolombia ATM and acceptance network. The product is free, the app is the most polished in the Colombian neobank set, and the customer base of ~17M means most of your domestic counterparties already have an account — intra-Nequi transfers settle instantly, with zero friction and no fee.

Avoid Nequi if you are not a Colombian resident (the product is Colombian-domiciled and not designed as a cross-border banking surface), if you need a multi-currency or travel-banking product (Nequi is COP-only and the FX product is a standard Mastercard rail without a fee-free travel offer), if you need investing or brokerage features inside the same app (Nequi has no investing layer), or if your typical balance approaches the FOGAFIN ceiling — verify the current ceiling and consider splitting deposits across institutions for the additional FOGAFIN bucket the licence-separation gives you.

The single sentence on safety: Nequi is FOGAFIN-protected at the published Colombian statutory ceiling, but the licence class is compañía de financiamiento — a credit institution that is a tier below the full commercial bank — and the parent-subsidiary structure means Bancolombia owns the equity but Nequi owns the deposit relationship.

Bank structure and deposit protection

Nequi's regulated entity is Compañía de Financiamiento Nequi S.A., a Colombian credit institution operating under SFC supervision. The 2020 spin-out from Bancolombia separated the depositor-of-record relationship from the parent: prior to 2020, Nequi customer balances sat on Bancolombia's balance sheet; after 2020, they sit on Nequi's own. The legal claim in any insolvency scenario runs to Nequi (CFN), not to Bancolombia.

Two licence classes matter in Colombian banking and they are not interchangeable:

• Establecimiento bancario ("commercial bank"). The senior credit-institution class. Full balance-sheet activities — deposits, lending, payments — under SFC supervision and FOGAFIN cover. Bancolombia S.A. is an establecimiento bancario; so is Davivienda, the parent of DaviPlata.
• Compañía de financiamiento ("financing company"). A regulated credit-institution class below the full bank, narrower in permitted activities historically but increasingly used by digital institutions that want their own licence without the full commercial-bank capital and reporting burden. SFC-supervised and FOGAFIN-covered. Nequi operates under this class since 2020.

For a depositor the day-to-day experience is identical: SFC supervision, FOGAFIN protection, the same regulatory floor on transparency and consumer-protection rules. The class distinction matters in two scenarios. First, in resolution: SFC powers and FOGAFIN procedures apply to both classes, but the recovery and resolution playbook for an establecimiento bancario is more developed in practice because it is the class that historically held most of the deposit base. Second, for FOGAFIN aggregation: cover is per depositor per institution, and Nequi (CFN) and Bancolombia (banco) are two separate institutions, which means a depositor with balances at both gets two separate FOGAFIN ceilings rather than one combined.

FOGAFIN — the Fondo de Garantías de Instituciones Financieras — is Colombia's deposit- insurance fund, the equivalent of FDIC in the US, FSCS in the UK, FGC in Brazil, and IPAB in Mexico. The published ceiling has historically been COP 50,000,000 per depositor per institution; FOGAFIN reviews the limit periodically against inflation and the deposit-base distribution, and the figure should be verified against the FOGAFIN published cover before relying on a specific number. As of editorial verification on 29 April 2026, the COP 50,000,000 figure is the most-cited public ceiling.

Fee schedule

The Nequi published fee schedule (the "tarifas" page on nequi.com.co) is the canonical source — fees on a Colombian credit institution are reviewed periodically and the schedule below should be verified against the current tarifas before opening an account.

• Account opening: Free. KYC is in-app via Cédula de Ciudadanía.
• Monthly maintenance: Free.
• Minimum balance: None.
• Intra-Nequi transfers: Free, instant, 24/7. The product's strongest flow — most Colombian counterparties already hold an account.
• PSE inter-bank transfers (out to other Colombian banks): Per PSE's published rate; verify the current per-transfer fee on the tarifas page.
• Mastercard débito issuance and reissue: Card issuance is free; physical card delivery is included. Replacement-card fees and contactless-fee structure should be verified against the current schedule.
• ATM withdrawals (Bancolombia network): Free up to a published monthly allowance, with a per-withdrawal cap. Beyond the free allowance, a per-transaction fee applies. Verify the exact free-withdrawal count and the over-cap fee on the current tarifas page — both have moved historically.
• ATM withdrawals (non-Bancolombia network in Colombia): Higher per-transaction fee than in-network. Verify the schedule.
• International ATM withdrawal and card use: Mastercard network FX applies; Nequi-side margin and the foreign ATM operator's surcharge stack on top. Not optimised for international use.
• FX / multi-currency: No multi-currency feature. The product is COP-only; cross-border card use carries Mastercard's network FX plus any Nequi-side margin (~3% per the public disclosure).

Hands-on notes

These notes reflect editorial product use in early 2026 across a Colombian-resident sign-up cohort.

Sign-up and KYC

Sign-up runs entirely inside the Nequi app on iOS or Android. The flow is name, Cédula de Ciudadanía (Colombian national ID), date of birth, phone-number verification, and a selfie/document liveness check. KYC clears in well under five minutes for a clean Cédula; edge cases (name mismatch on the Cédula, OCR struggling with worn documents) bounce the applicant to a manual-review queue that resolves in 24–48 hours. The product is Cédula-gated — there is no path for a non-Colombian-resident foreigner to open a Nequi account, and that gating is intentional given the COP-only product surface.

First card and intra-Nequi transfers

The Mastercard débito card arrives in five to ten business days from a sign-up in central Bogotá or Medellín; longer for outlying departments. The virtual card is available immediately on activation, which means contactless and online-purchase use can start before the physical card arrives. The intra-Nequi transfer flow is the single best part of the product: select a contact, enter the amount, confirm — settlement is instant, no fee, 24/7. The 17M-customer base means most everyday counterparties (landlord, fellow tenants, freelance payers, local merchants accepting QR) are already on Nequi, and the resulting network effect is the main reason mass-market Colombian users default to it.

Bancolombia interop

Despite the licence separation, the operational interop with Bancolombia is the cleanest of any Colombian neobank. ATM withdrawals at Bancolombia machines work as if they were native; funds transfers between a Bancolombia account and a Nequi account post within seconds; the Bancolombia branch network is, in effect, available as a cash-in / cash-out backstop. This operational integration is the headline benefit of the parent-subsidiary structure even though the legal entities are now separate.

PSE outbound and bill pay

Outbound to non-Bancolombia Colombian banks runs over PSE rails — the standard Colombian inter-bank-transfer rail. PSE transfers settle within minutes during business hours and by next business day overnight. Utility bill pay (servicios públicos) is available in-app for the major Colombian utilities and posts to the biller within 24 hours. The bill-pay coverage is comprehensive enough that most users do not need a separate Bancolombia online- banking session.

Customer support

In-app chat is the primary channel; phone support is available but secondary. First-response times during business hours ran 5–30 minutes in our 2026 testing for routine queries. Disputed-transaction flows are slower — a card chargeback on a foreign-merchant transaction took 11 business days to resolve in our test, with the merchant ultimately refunding through Mastercard's chargeback rather than through Nequi's own dispute desk.

Plan and tier comparison

Nequi runs a deliberately simple product lineup. There is one primary account — the free Nequi Account — and a set of opt-in savings and credit features layered on top. Some product families ("Nequi Plus" or paid tiers in adjacent markets) have been trialled; verify whether a current paid-tier offer is live before treating it as available.

• Nequi (basic, free). The default account. Free to open, free to maintain, no minimum balance. Includes the Mastercard débito card, intra-Nequi instant transfers, PSE outbound, Pockets sub-balances, and the Bancolombia ATM network. This is the product that ~17M Colombians use as either their primary or secondary banking surface.
• Pockets ("Bolsillos") savings. Sub-balances inside the same Nequi account that let you ring-fence money toward a goal — rent, travel, an emergency cushion. Some Pockets variants pay an interest rate; verify the current published yield before treating a specific number as committed. The headline figure has historically sat in the mid-single digits in COP, and the rate is reviewed periodically against Colombia's policy rate.
• CDT-style term deposits. Nequi has expanded into term-deposit ("Certificado de Depósito a Término") products for users wanting a fixed-rate savings vehicle inside the same app. The CDT yield, minimum, and maturity terms are reviewed periodically; verify the current product page before opening.
• Lending products. Small-balance personal-credit ("Préstamo Salud" and similar variants) is offered to qualifying Nequi users, underwritten on the Nequi transactional-data history. The credit decision is automated and the offer surface is gated on usage history — not every user sees a credit offer.

The economic decision for a Colombian resident is straightforward: the basic free account is the default, and the Pockets and CDT layers can be added inside the same app once a primary balance is in place.

Caveats and watchouts

Four things are worth calling out before opening an account, all sourced rather than anecdotal.

The licence-class distinction is real. Nequi is a compañía de financiamiento, not an establecimiento bancario. SFC supervision and FOGAFIN protection apply to both classes, so the day-to-day experience for a depositor is identical, but the class is one tier below the full commercial bank Bancolombia parent. Treat the FOGAFIN ceiling as the relevant protection figure, not the parent's balance sheet.

FOGAFIN aggregation is per institution. Cover is COP 50,000,000 per depositor per institution (verify current). Because Nequi (CFN) and Bancolombia (banco) are legally separate institutions, balances split across the two get two separate FOGAFIN ceilings rather than one. This is a feature, not a bug, but only if you size your balances deliberately.

COP-only by design. Nequi is not a multi-currency or travel-banking product. Cross-border card use carries Mastercard's network FX plus a Nequi-side margin (~3% per the public disclosure) plus any foreign-ATM surcharge. For frequent international travel, pair Nequi with a multi-currency product (Wise, Revolut) — Nequi is the wrong product for that job.

KYC denial and re-application cycles. The Cédula-gated KYC is fast for a clean profile but unforgiving for edge cases: name mismatches on the Cédula, expired documents, or OCR struggles bounce the applicant to a manual-review queue. Repeated failed attempts can lock the phone-number-and-Cédula combination for a cooldown period, requiring a support escalation to clear. If the first sign-up attempt fails, contact support before retrying.

Nequi vs the obvious alternatives

Nequi vs DaviPlata. DaviPlata is the structural Colombian peer — Banco Davivienda's digital banking arm. The licence-class difference is the headline: DaviPlata sits inside a full commercial bank (establecimiento bancario), while Nequi runs on its own compañía-de-financiamiento licence. Both are SFC-supervised and FOGAFIN-covered up to the statutory ceiling, but DaviPlata's depositor relationship is direct to the full bank parent, where Nequi's is to a separate (Bancolombia-owned) credit institution. Pick DaviPlata if you prefer a digital arm sitting inside a full bank; pick Nequi if you want Colombia's largest neobank by user count, the cleanest Bancolombia-network interop, and the most polished Colombian-neobank app.

Nequi vs Movii. Movii operates under an SEDPE licence — Sociedad Especializada en Depósitos y Pagos Electrónicos — a Colombian e-money / payments class below the credit-institution tier that Nequi sits in. SEDPE customer funds are held under segregation requirements rather than as deposits, and the FOGAFIN treatment differs from the credit-institution path. Pick Movii only if a specific Movii product feature (a promotional yield, a particular crypto integration) outweighs the licence-class difference; for a default Colombian peso primary account, Nequi is the structurally safer choice.

Frequently asked questions

Is Nequi a bank?

Yes — but as a compañía de financiamiento, not as an establecimiento bancario. Both are SFC-supervised credit-institution classes; the latter is the full commercial-bank class. Bancolombia is the latter; Nequi is the former.

Are Nequi deposits FOGAFIN-insured?

Yes, up to the statutory FOGAFIN ceiling per depositor per institution. Historical figure: COP 50,000,000. Verify the current ceiling on the FOGAFIN published cover before relying on a specific number.

What does Nequi cost?

Zero monthly fee, zero minimum balance, free intra-Nequi transfers. ATM withdrawals follow a free-allowance plus per-transaction model — verify on the current tarifas page.

Is Nequi the same as Bancolombia?

No. Two separate Colombian credit institutions. Bancolombia owns Nequi's equity; the deposit relationship at Nequi runs to Nequi.

Can I use Nequi outside Colombia?

The Mastercard débito card works internationally, but the account is COP-only. Not optimised for cross-border use. Pair with Wise or Revolut for travel.

What are Nequi Pockets?

Sub-balances inside the Nequi account for goal-based saving. Some variants pay interest; verify the current rate on the product page.

Nequi vs DaviPlata — which is safer?

Both FOGAFIN-covered. DaviPlata's parent (Davivienda) is a full bank; Nequi is a compañía de financiamiento. The depositor protection ceiling is the same; the parent licence class differs.

Who Nequi is for

Use Nequi if you are a Colombian resident wanting a free, FOGAFIN-covered digital primary account with the deepest distribution network in Colombia and the cleanest Bancolombia- network interop. Use DaviPlata if you prefer a digital arm sitting inside a full establecimiento-bancario parent. Pair with Wise or Revolut for international travel — Nequi is COP-only by design and is not the right product for cross-border use.

References and sources

Facts in this review are sourced from primary Colombian regulatory and corporate documents captured on 29 April 2026. Where rates, fees, and ceilings may change — particularly the FOGAFIN cover ceiling and the Nequi tarifas page — verify against the institution's published source before opening an account.

• Nequi corporate site and tarifas page: nequi.com.co.
• Superintendencia Financiera de Colombia (SFC) — institution registry and Compañía de Financiamiento Nequi S.A. supervisory record: superfinanciera.gov.co.
• Fondo de Garantías de Instituciones Financieras (FOGAFIN) — published deposit-cover ceiling and member-institution list: fogafin.gov.co.
• Bancolombia S.A. — annual report and Form 20-F filings (NYSE: CIB) at SEC EDGAR for Nequi disclosures (ownership, customer figures, segment results): SEC EDGAR — Bancolombia (CIB) filings.
• Bancolombia investor-relations site (financial calendar, press releases, segment disclosures): grupobancolombia.com/inversionistas.
• Colombian financial press for context and customer-count corroboration: Portafolio, La República, El Tiempo (Economía), and international wire coverage on Reuters / Bloomberg where Nequi disclosures intersect with Bancolombia investor disclosures.