Best Digital Bank Philippines (2026): Tonik vs Maya vs GoTyme vs MariBank vs CIMB

A USD-backed venture round used to be the only reason a Philippine digital bank existed. That changed on May 13, 2026, when Tonik Digital Bank reported consolidated positive cash net income for Q1 2026 — the first standalone PH digital bank to fund itself from operations rather than parent-company subsidy. The newsbytes.ph and BusinessWorld reports both put the run-rate above USD 60M with a USD 110M loan book and a 51% net interest margin — meaningful because it kills the "is Tonik dying?" objection that's haunted every listicle since the 2022 layoffs.

That news matters for depositors because the five-bank race for parked cash just compressed: Maya cut its base rate, MariBank rebranded and trimmed, GoTyme flattened its booster, CIMB Prime stepped down to 3.5%. Tonik is the only one of the five whose headline rates went up in the last 90 days. This guide is the post-CMEPA, post-rebrand, post-rate-cut comparison — and the tax-adjusted footnote almost no listicle mentions.

The five-bank comparison

The five names that matter for an expat or local with PHP 50k–PHP 2M of parked savings: Tonik, Maya Bank, GoTyme, MariBank, CIMB. All BSP-licensed. All covered by PDIC up to PHP 1 million per depositor per bank since the March 15, 2025 ceiling increase.

The table hides one thing worth surfacing: only two of these five names have parent companies subsidising customer acquisition. Maya rides PLDT/Voyager/Smart. MariBank is owned by Sea Group (Shopee, Garena). GoTyme is a JV between Gokongwei's Robinsons Land and South Africa's Tyme. CIMB is the digital arm of CIMB Group Malaysia. Tonik is on its own — and the Insignia VC writeup frames its profitability as "without a pre-existing payments, telco, retail, or banking platform feeding its customers, deposits, or balance-sheet support." That's why the May 13 story made news.

Tonik — the headline winner

Tonik's rate sheet is the cleanest in the market. No tier games, no mission unlocks, no minimum-balance traps. Pulled live from tonikbank.com/deposit-interest-rates on May 14, 2026:

The 12-month tenor is the sweet spot. Going to 18 or 24 months earns less, because the rate curve inverts — Tonik wants 12-month money. Each TD caps at PHP 250,000, and you can run five concurrent TDs, so the ceiling is PHP 1.25 million across the ladder. Open one each quarter and you have a rolling redemption stream.

The honest tradeoff: pre-termination wipes the gain. Break a Tonik TD before maturity and the interest forfeits in full — closer to a Big-4 bank's punitive schedule than a soft penalty. A 12-month placement at 8% is functionally locked. If you'll need the cash in the next year, Solo Stash at 4.0% is the safer parking spot even though it pays half.

Post-tax math on a PHP 250,000 12-month TD: 8% gross interest = PHP 20,000, less 20% withholding = PHP 16,000 net. That's an effective 6.4% after CMEPA. Still better than every other bank on this page.

Maya Bank — the boost is the trap

Maya cut its base savings rate from 3.5% to 3.0% per annum on April 1, 2026 — confirmed on the Maya high-interest savings page and the official April announcement. The boost system stayed, but the numbers underneath shifted:

Run the numbers on a real balance. Park PHP 500,000 in Maya, hit every mission to unlock the full 15%: only PHP 100,000 earns the boost (PHP 15,000/year gross), and PHP 400,000 earns the 3.0% base (PHP 12,000/year gross). Blended pre-tax APY: 5.4%. After 20% CMEPA withholding: 4.32%. That's below Tonik Solo Stash at 4.0% after-tax-equivalent on the full balance, and well below the 12-month Tonik TD.

The "15% Maya" headline is real only for someone parking exactly PHP 100,000 who already spends PHP 35,000/month through the app on qualifying merchants and holds a Maya Black card. That's a small population. For anyone with PHP 200k+ of parked cash, the headline rate is functionally a 4–5% blended yield — and the missions become a monthly chore.

Maya's redeeming feature is the wallet-to-bank flow. Sweep from Maya Wallet to Maya Bank and balances earn the savings rate immediately. That's still a useful pattern for cash that cycles through bill payments.

GoTyme — the foreigner-KYC winner

GoTyme cut its Go Save rate from 3.5% to a flat 3.0% per annum in January 2026, killing the booster tier. That removed the only reason to chase GoTyme on rate. But for any foreigner in Cebu without a PH-issued government ID, GoTyme stays the best entry into the digital-banking stack.

The kiosks are the differentiator. GoTyme posted in October 2025 confirming a Moalboal kiosk at Gaisano Grand Mall, adding to its earlier SM City Cebu and La Nueva Supermart Mandaue (MC Briones) presence. At a kiosk, the staff handle face capture and ID scanning in person — passport plus ACR-I clears verification on the spot, and you walk out with a printed Visa debit card.

This sidesteps the single most common foreigner onboarding fail: the app's automated ID matcher rejecting foreign passports because it expects a PhilSys or driver's licence. Maya Bank and Tonik onboarding flows hit this wall constantly. GoTyme doesn't, because the human at the counter overrides it.

For the wider account-opening picture across the Big 4 plus digital, see the open bank account in Cebu guide for foreigners — GoTyme is the cleanest digital entry there too.

Rate-wise, 3.0% flat on the entire balance is honest. No tiers, no caps. It loses to Tonik Solo Stash on pure rate (4.0%), but if the alternative is no digital account at all because the app keeps failing, GoTyme is the answer.

MariBank — name the rebrand

SeaBank Philippines completed its rebrand to MariBank Philippines Inc. on July 31, 2025, aligning with parent Sea Group's MariBank Singapore brand. Same BSP licence, same PDIC coverage, same Sea/Shopee ownership. Existing SeaBank deposits and account numbers transitioned automatically.

What changed materially is the rate sheet. Effective January 15, 2026, MariBank announced a tiered cut: 3.25% per annum on balances up to PHP 1 million, 3.75% above PHP 1 million. The pre-cut rate was 3.5% / 4.0%, so anyone parking under PHP 1M lost 25 basis points overnight.

Most online listicles still call it SeaBank and still quote the old rates. Walking into a bank conversation with the rebrand named earns credibility immediately, and the tier break above PHP 1M means MariBank only competes for larger balances — at which point Tonik's TD ladder (PHP 1.25M ceiling across five TDs) at 6–8% materially beats it.

The Shopee integration is the soft argument for MariBank — auto-deposit from Shopee seller earnings, in-app voucher rebates. If you're running a Shopee store, the workflow matters. If you're just looking for a savings rail, MariBank is the third or fourth pick.

CIMB — the four-product maze

CIMB Bank Philippines runs four overlapping savings products and they're easy to confuse:

• UpSave: 2.5% per annum, no minimum balance, opened directly with CIMB.
• GSave: 2.6% per annum base, opened inside the GCash app, partnered with CIMB. Periodic "Earn More" promos add 0.5–1.65% for limited windows.
• CIMB Grow: 4.0% base, invite-only inside GCash, designed for active savers — can climb toward 7% with consistent monthly deposits hitting a PHP 10,000 ADB threshold.
• CIMB Prime: previously 4.0%, cut to 3.5% effective April 1, 2026, requires PHP 1 million Total Relationship Balance across CIMB's product suite. Drop below for a full quarter and benefits revert to partial tier (UpSave 2.5%, GSave 2.6%).

CIMB also won Best Digital Bank Philippines 2026 from Asiamoney, which the bank publicises heavily on its rate-page banners. The award doesn't translate to a better consumer rate sheet — Tonik beats every CIMB product line on standalone APY, and CIMB Prime's PHP 1M maintaining balance crowds out smaller savers entirely.

The realistic CIMB use case is GSave inside GCash as a 2.6% sweep destination — pair it with a GCash foreigner account and let idle wallet balance earn something instead of nothing.

Foreigner KYC — what actually works

The five banks differ sharply on whether they'll let a foreigner open an account at all, and which ID combination clears.

A 9a tourist visa with an ACR-I from a 60+ day stay is enough at GoTyme's kiosks. Maya and Tonik will keep failing until you have a PhilSys card, a Philippine driver's licence, or a UMID — all of which require a longer-term visa (13a, SRRV, work visa, or student visa). The path is documented in the open bank account walkthrough.

For the GCash-route savers, the GCash foreigner KYC and account limits guide covers the five accepted IDs and the wallet tiers that gate GSave access.

The MP2 footnote — why no digital bank wins on tax-adjusted yield

CMEPA killed the favoured-deposit tax exemption in mid-2025. Every digital bank rate above is now reported pre-tax, and 20% comes off at source. Tonik's 8% TD is 6.4% post-tax. Maya's headline 15% on PHP 100k is 12% post-tax — but only on that PHP 100k.

Pag-IBIG MP2 sits outside this regime. Its FY2025 dividend was 7.12% per annum — a record — and the Department of Finance reconfirmed that Pag-IBIG dividends stay tax-exempt under the Pag-IBIG Fund Law, untouched by CMEPA. Post-tax, 7.12% MP2 beats every digital bank on this page for cash you can lock up for the five-year MP2 term.

The catch: MP2 requires you to be a Pag-IBIG contributing member. Foreigners need PH employment or self-employment registered through SSS/Pag-IBIG to qualify. For an SRRV retiree without PH income, MP2 is closed — and Tonik's 12-month TD ladder becomes the best available post-tax instrument. For a foreigner with a work visa and Pag-IBIG contributions, splitting between MP2 (long-term, tax-free) and a Tonik TD (12-month, 6.4% post-tax) optimises around CMEPA cleanly.

The cluster article on high-yield savings will work the full split-allocation math; for now, the rule of thumb is: eligible for MP2, use MP2 first. Everything else competes for the marginal peso.

How to pick — by scenario

Parked cash above PHP 100,000, no monthly app activity. Tonik. Solo Stash at 4.0% if you need liquidity, 12-month Time Deposit at 8% if you can lock up. Don't bother with Maya — the boost ceiling makes the headline meaningless above PHP 100k.

Freelancer with weekly Payoneer or Wise inflows. GoTyme for the debit card and Cebu kiosks; sweep idle balance to Tonik Solo Stash. Wise card lands MYR/USD inflows at the mid-market rate; Payoneer USD lands as PHP via local withdrawal to GoTyme or Tonik.

SRRV or 13a retiree without PH employment. Tonik 12-month TD ladder is the post-tax winner. MP2 is closed without Pag-IBIG contributions. Foreigner KYC may need PhilSys (available to qualifying residents) before Tonik onboarding clears — if it doesn't, GoTyme kiosk first, then add Tonik later.

Foreigner on 9a tourist with ACR-I, no PH-issued ID yet. GoTyme kiosk at SM City Cebu, La Nueva Mandaue, or Gaisano Moalboal. Skip the others until you have a PH ID. The kiosk path is the only one that won't reject a foreign passport.

Active Shopee seller. MariBank for the auto-deposit, Tonik for parked cash. Don't pretend MariBank's 3.25–3.75% is competitive on rate — it's an integration play, not a yield play.

Already deep in GCash, want passive yield without a new app. CIMB GSave inside GCash at 2.6% (plus periodic promo bumps). Lower yield, zero friction. Step up to Tonik when the balance crosses PHP 100k and the rate gap becomes meaningful.

The withdrawal-rail reality

A high APY only matters if you can move the money out cheaply. All five digital banks send through InstaPay, capped at PHP 50,000 per outbound transfer. To withdraw PHP 500,000 in one day, that's ten InstaPay pulls — and each receiving bank may charge its own InstaPay fee (BDO PHP 10–25, BPI PHP 10, Metrobank PHP 8).

Tonik TD pre-termination is the bigger trap. Breaking a 12-month TD before maturity forfeits all accrued interest; the principal lands back in Solo Stash. A PHP 250,000 TD broken at month 11 returns PHP 250,000 — zero gain — instead of the PHP 270,000 you'd see at maturity. Plan the ladder so at least one TD redeems every quarter, or keep emergency cash in Solo Stash.

Maya Bank withdrawals require the funds to sweep back into Maya Wallet first, then out via InstaPay. The sweep is instant but the two-step has tripped users in panic moments. Practice the flow on a small balance before parking serious money.

GoTyme and MariBank both push InstaPay outbound directly from the savings balance. No sweep step. CIMB GSave withdrawals run through the GCash wallet — same two-step pattern as Maya, with the same PHP 50,000 InstaPay cap.

For high-volume outbound days — paying a Cebu landlord PHP 70,000 monthly rent, or moving SRRV deposit funds — PESONet (batch, free at most banks, business-day-only) beats stacking InstaPay pulls. PESONet settles same-day if initiated before the 3pm bank cut-off; InstaPay clears in seconds but caps at PHP 50,000 and most banks now charge PHP 8–25 per pull.

The close

Tonik won 2026 on three things: the rate sheet stayed sharp while everyone else cut, the bank funded itself from net interest margin instead of equity rounds, and the TD ladder paid post-CMEPA yields that still beat 90% of the listicle headlines. Maya is still useful for people who genuinely spend PHP 35k/month through the app — that's a real population, just not the parked-cash crowd. GoTyme stays the best foreigner KYC entry in Cebu and a clean flat-rate flex account. MariBank and CIMB are integration plays for users already deep in Shopee or GCash respectively.

The boring outcome: most expats parking serious money in 2026 should hold a Tonik 12-month TD ladder plus a GoTyme debit card, route monthly cash through GCash for utilities and merchants, and ignore the Maya 15% headline unless they're already running its missions. The exciting outcome is that for the first time, a PH digital bank's rate sheet looks sustainable for longer than the next funding round.

For how this fits into the broader Philippines tax picture — particularly the 180-day residency rule that determines whether CMEPA's 20% withholding hits your worldwide income at all — see the foreigner tax in Cebu guide.