Lloyds Bank Is Closing 245 Branches and Retiring the Halifax Brand — Here's What That Means

Lloyds Banking Group, one of the UK's largest banks, is shutting down 245 branches between 2026 and 2027. As part of this closure wave, it will phase out the Halifax brand entirely — a name that has operated on British high streets for 173 years.

Halifax started as a building society in Yorkshire in 1853. A building society works like a bank but is owned by its members rather than shareholders. In 1997, Halifax stopped being a mutual organisation and became a regular company. It survived a major merger, a government rescue during the 2008 financial crisis, and decades of restructuring. But now it is disappearing.

How Many Branches, and Where

In February 2026, Lloyds announced the first wave: 95 branch closures, split between 53 Lloyds-branded sites, 31 Halifax locations, and 11 Bank of Scotland branches. The June 2026 figure of 245 total closures, reported by Yahoo Finance, is the final tally.

Lloyds operates three separate brand names — Lloyds, Halifax, and Bank of Scotland. Only Halifax faces elimination. This matters because Halifax has stronger recognition in England and Wales, especially among older customers and people on lower incomes. These groups tend to rely more on physical branches than younger people who use mobile banking apps.

Halifax branches were heavily concentrated in the north of England and the Midlands. In many areas, Lloyds had branches very close by. Merging the two brands into one Lloyds branch lets the bank cut costs — lease payments, staff wages, and technology systems all run more cheaply with one brand instead of two.

Why Retire the Brand, Though

The cost argument for closing branches is straightforward: digital banking has replaced most of what people used to do in person. Running three separate brands with their own marketing, staff training, and technology systems is expensive when one would do.

The decision to retire Halifax as a name is harder to defend on cost grounds alone. Halifax still carries customer loyalty, especially for mortgages — it was historically one of the UK's biggest mortgage lenders. Brokers and borrowers know the name. By ditching it entirely, Lloyds is giving up whatever goodwill remains. The bank has not yet said whether Halifax will continue as a digital-only brand or vanish completely.

What Happens Next

For customers using Halifax branches, the impact will be felt in two ways. They will lose a physical location nearby, and the rebranding process will create friction — new sort codes may not be necessary, but apps, website signage, and letters will all change.

For workers at affected branches, there will be redundancy consultations. This is a significant process involving hundreds of sites over 18 months.

Regulators require banks to prove they have thought about the communities losing a branch. The Financial Conduct Authority — the UK's banking watchdog — wants to see that customers still have somewhere to bank, either through other branches, Post Office counters, or digital services. In areas where Halifax is the last full-service bank, regulators will not accept a simple statement that "people can use online banking." The FCA has become stricter about this in recent years.

The bigger picture is worth stepping back to see. The UK had roughly 9,000 bank branches in 2015. Today there are well below 5,000, and the number keeps falling. Lloyds' 245 closures are the largest announced by any single bank recently, but other major banks — NatWest, Barclays, HSBC — have run similar programmes.

A real question sits underneath all of this, and the banking sector has not answered it yet: what is the minimum number of physical bank branches a country needs if people still use cash, some customers do not use smartphones or the internet, and banks are supposed to support financial inclusion? And who pays for it if profit alone does not justify keeping branches open?