Migrating Off Nordigen: A Field Guide for Indie Builders (2026)
What happened The short version: the era of free bank data for side projects is over at the big aggregators. Nordigen — the Latvian open-banking startup that ran a genuinely free account-information API — was acquired by GoCardless in 2022 and is being folded into "GoCardless Bank Account Data". The free tier has been sunset. And GoCardless Bank Account Data itself stopped taking new onboarding…
Nordigen, a free bank data API provider, has been acquired by GoCardless and will no longer offer its free tier. This has left many indie developers, such as budgeting apps, expense trackers, and spreadsheet users with bank connections, searching for alternatives. There are three main options for migration: direct PSD2 integration, aggregator-based solutions, or using a full broker aggregator.
Direct PSD2 integration requires obtaining eIDAS certificates, integrating with each bank's API, and handling all the associated costs, paperwork, and maintenance. This option is best suited for products that are bank connectivity-focused.
The second option involves using an aggregator with your own bank-issued keys. In this scenario, the aggregator handles the licensing and certificate burden, providing a harmonized REST interface across banks. This middle path is what most former Nordigen users have opted for.
Lastly, the full broker aggregator model holds all licenses, certificates, and bank relationships, requiring no bank credentials from the user. However, this option involves sales calls, per-call pricing tiers, and contract cycles, making it less suitable for side projects.
Regardless of the chosen migration path, users must understand that consents do not transfer between providers, and a new authorization is required for each switch. Planning for a 90-day re-authentication window is crucial, as this period resets after migration. Additionally, users must export historical data before canceling their accounts, as banks typically provide around 90 days of transaction history per consent window.
When storing this data, users should deduplicate transaction IDs using a hash function that combines the transaction ID and booking date, ensuring unique entries for each transaction.
Written by urgent.news from Dev.to's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
