A BaaS platform, short for banking as a service, gives a non-bank company APIs for deposit accounts, cards and payments while an FDIC-insured bank holds the funds. Three models are in the market: a technology platform over partner banks, software sold to banks so the fintech contracts with the bank itself, and a bank that publishes its own APIs. The nine platforms below span all three.
What a BaaS platform is
The bank holds the deposits in every arrangement, and the platform supplies the software. Unit puts the split plainly in its footer disclosure: “Unit is a financial technology company and not a bank.” Banking services, it adds, come from its bank partners (Unit). A bank-owned platform states the reverse relationship: Newline “is a division of Fifth Third Bank, National Association. Member FDIC” (Newline).
That difference decides who you sign with, who runs program management (onboarding checks, transaction monitoring, disputes) and who the regulator holds responsible. The rest of this comparison groups the platforms by model. For the wider definitions, see embedded finance vs banking as a service and the BaaS and sponsor banks section.
BaaS platforms compared
The order of the rows carries no meaning. Every cell comes from the company documents linked in the sections below.
| Platform | Model | Accounts and cards | ACH, wires, instant payments | Lending | Banks named publicly | Pricing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unit | Technology platform and program manager over several partner banks | Deposit and FBO (for benefit of) wallet accounts; debit, charge and revolving credit cards | ACH, wire, RTP, international payments; FedNow not listed | Credit accounts | Thread, Transpecos, i3, Five Star, Pacific West (2023 product terms) | Not published |
| Treasury Prime | Bank-direct software; the fintech signs with the bank | Accounts and card issuance | ACH, wires, book transfers, check deposit and issuing, FedNow via select banks; no RTP guide in the docs index | Not published | i3 Bank, Coastal, KeyBank, People Trust CFCU, U.S. Bank; network of more than 20 institutions | Not published |
| Synctera | Technology platform with a bank network; also sold to banks | Accounts; card issuance and processing, including credit cards | ACH, domestic wires over Fedwire, FedNow account flag; RTP not found on the pages checked | Credit cards with CCBank | Lineage, Stearns, First Internet, Veritex, Midland States, Emigrant, Regent, CCBank | Not published |
| Increase | Own core, own bank since 2026, plus partner banks | Bank accounts; cards | ACH, wires, checks, RTP, FedNow, push-to-card | Not detailed on the pages cited | Increase Bank, Grasshopper Bank, N.A., First Internet Bank of Indiana, Core Bank | Published fee schedule |
| Column | Nationally chartered bank with its own APIs | FBO, sweep, clearing and custom account types; card programs | ACH, domestic and international wires, FedNow and RTP | Yes | Is the bank | Not published |
| Cross River | State-chartered bank with its own API core (COS) | Accounts and subledgers; Visa, Mastercard and American Express BINs | ACH, wires, RTP, FedNow, CRNow | Yes | Is the bank | Not published |
| Lead Bank | Bank with its own APIs | Accounts; cards through the client’s own issuer processor | ACH, wires, FedNow and RTP through one integration | Term loans, lines of credit | Is the bank | Not published |
| Stripe Treasury for platforms | Payments company’s embedded accounts at partner banks | FDIC-eligible financial accounts; Stripe Issuing cards | Standard and same-day ACH and wires on Fifth Third accounts | Not in the platform product | Evolve Bank & Trust, Fifth Third | Not published on the pages checked |
| Newline by Fifth Third | Bank-owned platform, a division of Fifth Third Bank, N.A. | FDIC-insured accounts; commercial credit and prepaid debit cards | ACH, wires, book transfers, Real-Time Payments | Not listed | Is the bank | Not published |
Technology platforms over partner banks
Unit lists deposit accounts, FBO wallet accounts, credit accounts, cards, ACH, wire, RTP and international payments as its building blocks, with debit, charge and revolving credit cards on top, and takes on program management work including KYC/KYB, AML monitoring and dispute handling (Unit). Its API documentation describes “a direct connection to the Federal Reserve systems - Fedwire, FedACH, and Check21” and tells the customer that “as a program manager, you manage the relationship with your partner bank(s)” (Unit docs). In June 2026 Unit said it had crossed $100 billion in annual transaction volume, twice the $50 billion of 12 months earlier, and handles more than 11 million API calls a day (Unit). Unit does not publish a consolidated list of partner banks; its legal pages carry product terms for Thread Bank, Transpecos Bank, i3 Bank, Five Star Bank and Pacific West Bank, last updated between October and December 2023. Piermont Bank announced a Unit partnership in a press release dated February 15, 2022.
Synctera sells onboarding (KYC/KYB), payments, core banking technology, fraud and transaction monitoring, card issuance and processing, and its own ledger, which “ingests and stores all end user, account and transaction data” (Synctera). Its documentation covers ACH through the sponsor bank, domestic wires over Fedwire and a FedNow flag on the account object; no RTP support appeared on the pages checked. Named bank partners run from Lineage Bank, whose 2022 launch with GoGetr Synctera called its first, through Stearns Bank National Association in 2023, First Internet Bank, Veritex Community Bank, Midland States Bank, Emigrant Bank, Regent Bank, and CCBank for business and consumer credit cards in July 2026. Synctera also announced a partnership with National Bank of Canada, the only non-US market here besides Stripe’s use of a UK-listed product name.
Stripe’s platform product is now called Treasury for platforms. It offers FDIC-eligible financial accounts, ACH, wires and Issuing cards to Stripe Connect platforms, and the documentation limits sandbox access to “businesses serving US-based commercial businesses”, with review required for everyone else (Stripe). Funds sit at Evolve Bank & Trust or Fifth Third Bank, and Fifth Third accounts can originate standard or same-day ACH and wires (Stripe).
Bank-direct software
Treasury Prime sells the opposite arrangement: the bank keeps program management, and the fintech signs with the bank. “Own your program management,” its site says, and its Find a Bank page tells applicants to “sign direct agreement with your bank partner” and to reach up to 17 banks with one submission (Treasury Prime). On January 22, 2026 it added i3 Bank and Coastal to a network it describes as more than 20 financial institutions, after KeyBank in February 2025, People Trust Community FCU as its first credit union in June 2025 and U.S. Bank in October 2025. Its documentation covers ACH, book transfers, wires, check deposit, check issuing, card issuance and FedNow “via select partner banks”; no RTP guide appears in the index. In June 2026 it launched Prime Cash, which lets customers add cash at more than 90,000 retail locations through Green Dot’s Arc platform.
Selling to the bank is not exclusive to Treasury Prime. Synctera markets sponsor-bank programs to banks, and Increase sells its core to banks as “a standalone parallel core”, with “banks contracting directly with customers” (Increase). If you are choosing at this layer, the bank side matters as much as the API; see how to choose a sponsor bank.
Banks that offer their own APIs
Column N.A. calls itself “the first nationally chartered bank created to serve developers and builders” and supports FBO, sweep, clearing and custom account types, wires including Swift, ACH, book transfers, card programs and lending (Column). It routes instant payments itself over both the Federal Reserve’s FedNow Service and The Clearing House’s RTP network, each with a $10,000,000 per-transaction limit (Column docs). Column reports $4.5T+ in annual transaction volume, a company-reported figure, and names Brex, Mercury, Ramp and Best Egg as clients.
Cross River runs its own API-driven core, COS, covering lending, payments, cards, accounts and compliance infrastructure, and settles instant payments across three networks: its internal CRNow, RTP via The Clearing House and FedNow (Cross River docs). It is a member of Visa, Mastercard and American Express and sponsors debit, credit and prepaid BINs.
Lead Bank describes itself as “a bank built for builders” delivering programmable financial services through REST APIs (Lead). Its API scopes include accounts, ACH, wires, instant payments, lending, subledger balances and blockchain payments; it offers FedNow and RTP through a single integration and states a direct FedNow connection. Card issuing runs on the client’s own issuer processor while Lead handles settlement flows and oversight.
Newline is Fifth Third’s own platform, built on Rize Money, whose acquisition the bank announced on May 22, 2023. It offers one API for ACH, wires, book transfers and Real-Time Payments, plus commercial credit and prepaid debit cards on FDIC-insured accounts. Fifth Third said in September 2024 that Newline had been selected by Stripe in July 2024 to power Stripe Treasury.
Increase sits across the categories. Its product list covers ACH, bank accounts, cards, checks, wires, Real-Time Payments, FedNow and push-to-card, and its banking services come from “Increase Bank, Grasshopper Bank, N.A., First Internet Bank of Indiana, or Core Bank” (Increase).
What changed since 2024
On July 29, 2026 Increase announced Increase Bank, an FDIC member with direct connections to the Federal Reserve, The Clearing House and Visa, and said Gusto, Ramp and Stripe already use its core to process more than $500B annually (Increase). Separately, the Federal Reserve’s H.2 release records that on June 13, 2025 the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco permitted Darragh Buckley, of Bend, Oregon, to acquire voting shares of Twin City Bancorp, Inc., and indirectly of Twin City Bank, Longview, Washington. Neither page states a name change, so the Increase Bank name here rests on Increase’s own announcement.
Synctera bought Cable, which “automates control testing so banks know if their fintechs are complying”, on April 14, 2026, and keeps it available as a standalone product. Treasury Prime kept adding institutions through 2025 and 2026. Stripe retired two product names for platforms, Treasury in November 2025 and Financial Accounts for platforms in April 2026.
One provider left. Solid Financial Technologies filed a voluntary Chapter 11 (Subchapter V) petition in the US Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware on April 7, 2025, case 25-10669. Its first-day declaration cited “regulatory shifts post-crypto collapse that rendered the BaaS model and bank partnerships unsustainable”. The court confirmed the second amended plan of liquidation on November 14, 2025, and it took effect on November 30, 2025.
BaaS platform pricing
Of the nine, only Increase publishes a fee schedule. As of July 30, 2026 it lists $2.00 per same-day ACH origination, $0.50 next-day ACH, $15.00 per wire origination, $2.50 per RTP origination, $2.50 per FedNow origination and $0.25 per virtual card, with monthly fees that vary by use case and custom pricing for platforms (Increase). Unit, Treasury Prime, Synctera, Column, Cross River, Lead Bank and Newline publish no fees, and no pricing for Treasury for platforms appeared on the Stripe pages checked. Expect the bank to price the program as well as the platform.
