The busiest day of the year for ISAs is the first of the new tax year, investment platforms confirmed again, with half of customers pouring their full allotment of £20,000 into their tax-free savings accounts.
From 8am until 9am is the busiest hour of the whole tax year, with a stocks and shares ISA opened every four and a half seconds on Hargreaves Lansdown, the UK's largest investment platform with over 1.8 million clients.
Interactive Investor (ii), the second-largest fund supermarket, said half its customers contributed their full ISA allotment in the first two days of the new tax already.
Others waited until the 11th hour to open their account on 5 April, with the last application coming 17 minutes before the window slammed shut at midnight.
The early investors rush to open new savings accounts as research shows investing early gives an ISA investor a full extra year of protection from tax.
"Investing early allows your investments more time in the market to potentially grow over the course of the year, benefiting from compounding returns," says Myron Jobson, ii's senior personal finance analyst.
Sarah Coles, head of personal finance at Hargreaves Lansdown, said the final hour of the ISA dash in the recently closed tax year was "even more hectic than last year", though the busiest hour was a much more sociable 3pm-4pm.
"There was still a last-minute flurry, with an HL stocks and shares ISA opened or topped up via the app or online every 9.6 seconds in the final hour before midnight – with the peak minute at 11.09pm – when one was opened every four seconds."
But at the other end of the spectrum, the 2023/24 tax year saw more activity from early birds than from last-minute dashers.
The early bird approach is sensible, she says, even for those who opened or topped up at the end of the last tax year.
"If you’re still recovering from the drama of the last-minute ISA dash, don’t be tempted to put your feet up until the next race for the deadline.
"The beginning of the tax year is by far the best time to take advantage of your new ISA allowance, whether as a lump sum, or by setting up a regular investment, through a direct debit, so you take advantage of pound/cost averaging."