We went looking for a straightforward comparison of deposit rates in two Gulf markets and ran into a more basic problem: most of the numbers cannot be aged. What follows is what each bank publishes, with the date where there is one and an explicit note where there is not.
The test
| Bank | Market | Rates published? | Dated? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gulf Bank | Kuwait | Yes — four currencies, full term structure | Yes — "Effective from 11/12/2025" |
| NBK | Kuwait | Yes — three deposit types | No |
| Boubyan | Kuwait | Rates agreed at contracting; none published | — |
| Doha Bank | Qatar | Yes — tiered by amount and term | No |
| Commercial Bank of Qatar | Qatar | Yes — by product | No |
| Qatar Islamic Bank | Qatar | Yes — expected profit rates | No |
One out of six. That is the finding, and it is more useful than any of the individual numbers below.
Gulf Bank, the exception
Gulf Bank publishes a term deposit rate table across four currencies, with a full term structure, stamped "Effective from 11/12/2025".
| Term | KWD |
|---|---|
| 1 month | 3.0000% |
| 3 months | 3.2500% |
| 6 months | 3.3750% |
| 9 months | 3.4375% |
| 12 months | 3.5000% |
| 18 months | 3.0000% |
| 24 months | 3.0000% |
Also published: USD at 3.1000% for twelve months, GBP at 2.5000% and EUR at 1.5000% over the same term.
The KWD curve does something unusual. It rises to a peak at twelve months and then falls back to 3.0000% at eighteen and twenty-four months. Locking money up for two years pays the same as locking it up for one month, and half a point less than twelve. Whatever the bank's funding reasons, the practical read is that the twelve-month point is where the curve pays and there is no compensation for going beyond it.
That is exactly the kind of observation you can only make when the whole table is published with a date on it.
NBK, undated
NBK publishes three deposit structures in Kuwaiti dinar: term deposits running from 3.00000% at one month to 3.50000% at twelve months and 3.87500% at sixty; flexible deposits from 3.25000% at six months to 3.50000% at thirty-six; and partial-withdrawal deposits from 3.37500% at twelve months to 3.75000% at sixty.
The page carries no date stamp.
A correction we owe. Earlier work in this project recorded NBK's rate card as timestamped 2 September 2026. That was a misattribution on our part. The stamp — "Last updated on 02/09/2026 at 14:50" — sits on NBK's currency rates page and is an auto-refreshing foreign exchange timestamp. NBK's interest rates page carries no publication date. We are correcting it here rather than quietly amending it.
Taken at face value, NBK's longer-dated rates read differently from Gulf Bank's — 3.87500% at sixty months against Gulf Bank's 3.0000% at twenty-four. But Gulf Bank's figures are stamped December 2025 and NBK's are stamped nothing, so a direct comparison is a comparison between a known date and an unknown one.
Boubyan, which prices by agreement
Boubyan's investment pages describe "fixed, pre-agreed profit rates" without publishing a numeric rate on the pages we checked. Its fixed deposit terms and conditions document sets out the product terms rather than the rates.
What it does publish is product structure — the Al Mona product takes increments from a minimum of KD 100 to a maximum of KD 100,000.
That is a coherent approach for an Islamic bank, where the return is a profit share agreed at the point of contracting rather than a rate advertised in advance. The practical consequence for a saver is simply that the comparison happens in the branch rather than on the website.
Qatar: three for three, all undated
Doha Bank publishes up-front deposit rates tiered by amount and term. For QAR 250,000 to 999,999: 3.30% over 150 days, 3.40% over 200 days, 3.50% over 300 days. For QAR 1 million to 2.999 million: 3.50%, 3.60% and 3.65% across the same terms. For QAR 3 million to 5 million: 3.60%, 3.70% and 3.75%.
No date on the page. Part of the table is served dynamically and did not load on our visit, so the published figures should be confirmed with the bank before you act on them.
Commercial Bank of Qatar publishes savings rates: Regular Saver up to 1.00% per annum, Elite Bonus Saver 1.25%, eSavings 1.00% on QAR and 0.50% on USD, Call account 0.75% QAR and 0.50% USD. No date.
Qatar Islamic Bank publishes expected profit rates: Flexi CD Premium at 2.75% to 3.50% over one to three years, fixed deposits at 0.90% to 1.45% over one to five years, and growing deposits at 3.50% to 4.15% over two to ten years. No date, with the note that rates are "subject to change periodically, as per market conditions".
The spread that shows up anyway
Set Doha Bank's roughly 3.5% on a 300-day deposit against Commercial Bank of Qatar's 1.00% to 1.25% on savings products, and the gap is around two and a half percentage points between two banks in the same market.
Some of that is a genuine difference between a locked-up term deposit and an instant-access savings account, and that difference should exist. Some of it may be a difference in when the two pages were last updated. Without dates on either, you cannot separate the two, and that is precisely the problem.
What can be said is that a two-and-a-half-point gap is large enough to be worth a phone call to both. Not to act on the published figures, but to find out what the current ones are.
What each publishes about expat access
The banking eligibility question is separate from rates and is published more reliably.
Gulf Bank publishes an expat salary package for "Non Kuwaitis with a salary of KD400+", aimed at "newly recruited first time employees / professionals" working in the government, private or oil sectors, and referencing loans up to KD 70,000 over fifteen years.
Its housing loan page, though, carries the real expat differential and it contradicts the package page's fifteen-year framing: "Repayment period from 1 to 15 years for Kuwaitis, and from 1 to 10 years for Expatriates". The grace period Gulf Bank offers is for Kuwaitis only. The rate is 6.5% annually, salary must be transferred to Gulf Bank, and the instalment cap follows the Central Bank's 40% of net salary rule.
Commercial Bank of Qatar is specific: "To open a Commercial Bank Savings Account, you need to hold or be applying for a Residence Permit" plus "a minimum monthly salary of QAR 4,000, or make an initial, one-time deposit of QAR 10,000".
Two figures we are dropping. A QAR 10,000 minimum salary is widely quoted for Doha Bank. It does not appear on Doha Bank's own pages, which require only that you are a resident of Qatar with a valid Qatari ID. It comes from comparison sites. Similarly, a KD 400 minimum salary is often attributed to NBK; NBK's salary packages page names a Kuwaiti package and an Expat package but publishes no threshold or criteria, and the dedicated expat page returns a 404. Gulf Bank's KD 400 is published and confirmed; NBK's is not, and the two should not be conflated.
The borrowing rules behind the deposit question
Kuwait's are unusually explicit, and they set the frame for any saving decision.
Central Bank of Kuwait instructions dated 11 November 2018 cap a consumer loan at 25 times net monthly salary with a maximum of KD 25,000, and housing finance at KD 70,000. A monthly instalment may not exceed 40% of net salary for employees, or 30% for retirees. Consumer loans run to five years and housing to fifteen.
One thing that is not in those instructions, despite being widely repeated: there is no borrower age limit and no age-at-maturity rule. We checked the 2018 instructions, the Central Bank's supervision FAQ, the earlier 2004 instructions, and Gulf Bank's consumer and housing loan pages. None contains one. The published expat differential is tenor, not age.
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The point of this article is not which bank pays most. It is that a rate published without a date cannot be checked against anything.
It might have been set last week, or it might predate the last two rate decisions — from the outside there is no way to tell. For a saver comparing two banks, an undated 3.5% and an undated 1.25% are not comparable quantities, and the accurate thing to say is that the comparison cannot be completed from the websites alone.
Gulf Bank stamping its table is a small thing that changes what the number is worth: a dated rate can be checked, an undated one cannot. It also makes a curve shape visible — the twelve-month peak and the fall-back beyond it, which an undated table could not tell you either way.
For anyone banking in either market, the practical method is unchanged and unglamorous: call, ask for the current rate on the specific product and term, and ask when it was last changed. In five of these six cases, that is the only way to know.
Common questions
Of the six major Kuwaiti and Qatari banks we checked, only Gulf Bank. Its term deposit table is stamped "Effective from 11/12/2025" and covers four currencies. NBK, Doha Bank, Commercial Bank of Qatar and Qatar Islamic Bank all publish rates without a date. Boubyan publishes no numeric rates at all.
On its rate card effective 11 December 2025: 3.0000% at one month, 3.2500% at three, 3.3750% at six, 3.4375% at nine, 3.5000% at twelve, then falling back to 3.0000% at eighteen and twenty-four months. Also USD 3.1000%, GBP 2.5000% and EUR 1.5000% over twelve months.
We do not know the bank's reasoning, and it does not publish one. What the table shows is that the twelve-month point pays 3.5000% while eighteen and twenty-four months both pay 3.0000% — the same as a one-month deposit. On that card there is no compensation for locking money up beyond a year.
None of the three we checked. Doha Bank, Commercial Bank of Qatar and Qatar Islamic Bank all publish figures without a date on the page. Part of Doha Bank's table is served dynamically and did not load on our visit.
Gulf Bank publishes an expat salary package for non-Kuwaitis with a salary of KD 400 or more. Commercial Bank of Qatar requires a residence permit plus a minimum monthly salary of QAR 4,000 or a one-time deposit of QAR 10,000. The KD 400 figure often attributed to NBK and the QAR 10,000 salary figure often attributed to Doha Bank do not appear on either bank's own pages.
Central Bank of Kuwait instructions dated 11 November 2018: consumer loans at 25 times net monthly salary up to KD 25,000, and housing at KD 70,000, with the two limits set separately and no combined ceiling stated. A monthly instalment may not exceed 40% of net salary for employees or 30% for retirees. Consumer loans run to five years, housing to fifteen.
We found no such rule. No borrower age limit or age-at-maturity requirement appears in the Central Bank's 2018 instructions, its supervision FAQ, the 2004 instructions, or Gulf Bank's loan pages. The published expat differential is tenor: Gulf Bank grants housing loans over 1 to 15 years for Kuwaitis and 1 to 10 years for expatriates.
Next steps
- Check whether any rate you are comparing carries a date. If it does not, it is not a figure you can act on.
- Call both banks and ask for the current rate on the specific product and term, and when it last changed.
- On the Gulf Bank card, note that twelve months is the peak — going longer pays less on the published table.
- Separate the instant-access and locked-term products before comparing. Some of the two-point Qatar spread is structural.
- Verify any minimum salary figure against the bank's own page rather than a comparison site.
Further reading on ExpatWealthPlus
- What it costs to trade Boursa Kuwait
- Qatar Stock Exchange broker fees
- Investment platforms in Kuwait
- Investment platforms in Qatar
- Savings account, fixed deposit or money market fund
Official sources
Every figure in this article is checked against the primary source. These are the places to verify the current position for yourself, since rates, rules and product terms change.
- Gulf Bank — term deposit interest rates →The four-currency table, effective 11 December 2025
- NBK — interest rates →Term, flexible and partial-withdrawal deposits, published without a date
- Boubyan Bank — investments →Product structure published; no numeric profit rates
- Doha Bank — fixed deposits →Tiered up-front rates, undated
- Commercial Bank of Qatar — savings accounts →Savings rates and the QAR 4,000 salary requirement
- Central Bank of Kuwait — consumer and housing finance instructions →The KD 25,000 consumer and KD 70,000 housing caps, and the 40% instalment limit