Checkatrade vs MyBuilder vs TrustATrader: Which Is Worth Paying For?

If you're weighing up MyBuilder vs Checkatrade, or Checkatrade vs TrustATrader, you've probably already had the sales call. Someone friendly told you your area is "really busy at the moment" and that places are going fast.

Maybe they are. But these three platforms charge you in completely different ways, and the right one depends on your trade, your patch and how much risk you can carry. So here's a fair head-to-head, with every price and term checked against the platforms' own pages as of October 2026.

Bias label first. I don't sell leads and I'm not a member of any of them. I build websites and do local SEO for trades, which makes me a sort of competitor to all three. I'll still tell you where each one is genuinely good.

The short answer

• MyBuilder if you're new, testing the water, or your availability comes in lumps. No membership and no contract: you pay a fee only when a homeowner shortlists you.
• Checkatrade if you're in a busy area, your jobs are worth a few hundred pounds or more, and you can answer enquiries fast. It's the biggest name, but every paid plan is a 12-month commitment that renews unless you stop it.
• TrustATrader if you're established, you've got reviews to show, and there's a space in your trade and area. It's one annual fee with no per-lead charges and a cap on how many of you share a category.

None of them is a scam and none of them is magic. They're marketplaces, and you're paying for a spot in someone else's shop window.

Checkatrade vs MyBuilder vs TrustATrader at a glance

Prices and terms as of October 2026, from each platform's own pricing page, help pages and terms.

How each one charges you

Checkatrade: a monthly membership, with leads on top

Checkatrade now publishes starting prices. Its pricing page shows three tiers: a free profile, Approved at £30 a month and Growth from £59 a month. Its own help pages quote the £30 before VAT, so budget £36.

The catch is what each tier includes. Approved gets you the tick, the profile, review requests and the app, but no leads. Growth is where leads come in: you choose roughly how many you'd like a year and pay a fixed monthly price for them, set by your trade and postcode. "From £59" is the floor, not the typical bill.

There's also a pay-as-you-go option, where you set a monthly budget and pay per lead, and an Opportunities Board where you spend credits on single jobs. I've gone through all of it in what Checkatrade costs per month, so I won't repeat it here.

MyBuilder: pay when you're shortlisted

MyBuilder flips it round. Joining is free, there's no membership, and sending a homeowner an introduction costs nothing. You pay a shortlist fee only when the homeowner shortlists you and you swap details. MyBuilder's sign-up page says those fees typically run from £2 to £35 depending on the size of the job, and you see the fee before you show interest.

The complaint you'll hear is the one every pay-per-lead site gets: you're paying for contact details, not a job. A homeowner who shortlists three of you and then goes quiet has still cost each of you a fee. There's more on that in my guide to MyBuilder fees for tradesmen.

TrustATrader: one annual fee, no lead charges

TrustATrader is the old-school directory model. You pay a yearly membership (its trader terms say the fee is payable annually in advance) and in return you get a profile, reviews and enquiries with no per-lead fee and no commission.

What it doesn't do is publish a price. You fill in a form and book a callback. I've pulled together what is and isn't known in how much TrustATrader costs, but the honest version is that you won't know your figure until they quote you.

Who else gets the same lead?

This matters more than the headline price, because it sets your win rate.

Checkatrade doesn't publish how many members receive each lead on a fixed plan. On its newer Opportunities Board, it says a job goes on the board when three trades haven't shown interest, and comes off once three trades have paid to take it. Members on plans get first look at new leads.

MyBuilder lets several trades express interest in the same job for free. The homeowner reads the profiles and shortlists the ones they like, and only those pay. So you're competing on your profile and feedback before you've spent a penny, which is fairer than most.

TrustATrader works like a classic directory: the customer browses members and rings who they like. Its terms say there will be no more than ten entries in your trade category in your area at any one time. Ten is still ten, but it's a ceiling, which is more than the other two promise.

Vetting and reviews: what the badge actually means

Checkatrade says members go through up to 12 checks before getting the tick. Customers can also claim under the Checkatrade Guarantee, up to £1,000, on eligible work found or paid through Checkatrade, if they raise it within six months of the job finishing.

TrustATrader asks for copies of certificates (Gas Safe for gas work, Part P compliance for electricians), insurance documents, references and at least two years in your trade. Reviewers have to register, and it says it spot-checks reviews by phone and investigates any score under 60%.

MyBuilder says it screens new trades and checks jobs before they're posted, and homeowners leave feedback once the job's done.

Checkatrade reviews, Trust a Trader reviews, MyBuilder feedback: the same rule applies to all of them. They live on the platform's website, not yours. Leave, and they stay behind. Checkatrade's terms go further: once you leave, its logo and its reviews have to come off your van, your website and your leaflets.

So whatever you join, ask every customer for a Google review as well. It's one extra text message and it's the one review you keep.

Contracts: getting in is easy, getting out is the test

Checkatrade: paid memberships run for 12 months and renew automatically for another 12 unless you cancel in time. Its master service terms say the business owner has to phone to cancel, in the 35 days before the renewal date, and that cancelling your direct debit doesn't end the contract. There's a two-business-day cooling-off window at the very start. I've set out the steps in how to cancel a Checkatrade membership.

MyBuilder: no contract and no membership. If it isn't working, you stop expressing interest in jobs.

TrustATrader: 12 months, paid in advance, and its terms say you can't cancel before the year is up and the fee isn't refundable. On the plus side, the same terms say there's no automatic renewal: it gets in touch at the end of the year instead.

If you remember one line from this post, make it this one. The contract decides how much a bad guess costs you. A wrong call on MyBuilder costs you a few shortlist fees. A wrong call on the other two costs you a year.

MyBuilder vs Checkatrade: which suits you?

This one is really "pay per job or pay per month".

MyBuilder suits you if you're new and the diary has gaps, your availability is up and down, or you want to test a service before you commit. You can switch it off in a busy month and it costs you nothing.

Checkatrade suits you if you've got steady capacity, you work in a busy area, and you can reply to an enquiry within the hour. You get the bigger brand and the tick on the van, which does real work on a nervous customer's doorstep. You also get a monthly bill that doesn't care whether it was a quiet month.

Checkatrade or MyBuilder? If you can't say with confidence how many enquiries your postcode produces, start with the one you can walk away from. You'll learn what your area is worth for the price of a few shortlist fees.

Checkatrade vs TrustATrader: which suits you?

These two are closer cousins. Both are membership directories with vetting and reviews, and both want a year from you.

The differences that matter: Checkatrade is the bigger brand and gives you more ways to buy leads, but the bill climbs with the number of leads you want and the membership rolls over unless you phone. TrustATrader charges one fee with no lead charges and caps the numbers in your category, but you're paying for exposure rather than a set number of enquiries, and the price is a mystery until the callback.

So "Checkatrade or Trust a Trader" usually comes down to your area. TrustATrader says it gets over 700,000 searches a month; Checkatrade calls itself the UK's number one trade directory. Neither number tells you what happens in your postcode. Before you join either, ask how many members are in your category locally and what a typical member there received last year. Then ring one of those members and ask them.

Bark vs Checkatrade, and where MyJobQuote fits

Bark is a different animal. It isn't a trade directory: it covers over a thousand services, from accountants to dog walkers, and trades are one corner of it. You buy credits (£1.80 each plus VAT, according to Bark's help centre as of October 2026), each lead costs a number of credits that you see before responding, and up to five professionals can respond to a general request. There's no contract unless you take an optional subscription, and credits bought since November 2025 expire after three months.

Bark vs Checkatrade, then: Bark is cheaper to try and easier to leave, while Checkatrade carries more weight with a homeowner choosing a trade. My full verdict is in is Bark worth it for tradesmen.

MyJobQuote vs MyBuilder is a closer fight. MyJobQuote offers memberships with a free month's trial and no contract, or pay-as-you-go credits, with up to three trades per job, but it only shows prices once you've signed up. MyBuilder publishes its typical fee range and charges only when you're shortlisted.

The sum that settles it

Every one of these platforms comes down to the same sum: what you paid in a month, divided by the jobs you actually won that month. Then hold that number up against your profit per job.

Here's a made-up example to show the sum. These aren't forecasts, just round numbers. Say you're a plasterer in Rotherham and an average job leaves you £250 profit.

• MyBuilder: shortlisted 10 times in a month at an average of £15. That's £150. You win 3 jobs, so £50 a job.
• Checkatrade: say your lead plan comes back at £110 a month plus VAT, £132 in all. You get 8 leads and win 2, so £66 a job.
• TrustATrader: say the callback quote works out at £50 a month. You get 3 enquiries and win 2, so £25 a job. A month with no enquiries is £50 for nothing.

Against £250 profit, all three work. Now run the same sum on £90 call-outs with £40 profit in them, and watch which ones survive.

The platform that wins isn't the one with the cheapest headline. It's the one where you win the biggest share of what you pay for, and that's down to your area and how fast you reply, not the logo.

What I'd do

Pick one platform at a time, the one with the smallest downside for where you are now. For most people starting out, that's the one with no contract. Track your cost per won job from day one, and only move up to a membership once the numbers say your area can carry it.

And build the thing you own alongside it. A properly filled-in Google Business Profile, a steady trickle of Google reviews and a website that turns a search into a phone call don't charge you per lead, and they don't vanish if a platform changes its prices or shuts its doors like Rated People did.

Platforms can be worth it for some trades at some stages. Renting every lead forever is the trap. I've laid out every route to work, paid and owned, on my page about lead generation for tradesmen.

FAQs

Is MyBuilder better than Checkatrade?

Neither is better across the board. MyBuilder is cheaper to try and has no contract, so it's lower risk. Checkatrade has the bigger brand and steadier lead plans, but a 12-month term. Compare cost per won job in your area, not the headline price.

Is TrustATrader better than Checkatrade?

TrustATrader is simpler: one annual fee, no lead charges, no more than ten members per trade category in an area, and no automatic renewal. Checkatrade is bigger and more flexible but rolls over unless you phone to cancel. Ask both what members in your postcode actually received last year.

Which is cheapest: Checkatrade, MyBuilder or TrustATrader?

MyBuilder is cheapest to start, because joining and showing interest are free and you only pay when shortlisted. Checkatrade starts at £30 plus VAT a month but that tier has no leads. TrustATrader doesn't publish its fee. The cheapest in practice is whichever gives you the lowest cost per job you win.

What happened to Rated People?

Rated People closed all trade memberships in September 2026 and the company went into liquidation. Checkatrade Group bought the brand and website, and jobs posted on Rated People now go to Checkatrade members. If you were a member, your reviews stay on Rated People and questions about past memberships go to the liquidators.

Before you sign up to anything

If you want a second pair of eyes before you commit a year's money, that's what my free Search Opportunity Review is for. I'll look at what people in your area search for, who's showing up for it, and whether your own Google presence could win some of that work without a platform in the middle. If the honest answer is "join the platform for now", I'll tell you that too.