2mins: The startup tackling Britain’s financial literacy crisis

The UK has one of the lowest levels of financial literacy in the developed world. A 2024 Santander study found that only 47 per cent of UK adults could correctly answer at least five out of seven financial knowledge questions, compared with 62 per cent across OECD countries. The same survey found that only 1 per cent of primary school teachers believed their pupils had adequate financial skills.

The government is expanding financial literacy through curriculum mandates and the HM Treasury’s Financial Inclusion Strategy, under which financial education will become statutory in primary schools across England starting in Autumn 2028. But critics argue this will still leave millions of children each year woefully unprepared for real life.

That challenge inspired Emily Boxall and her father, Chris, to set up their edTech startup 2mins to try and address this growing problem.

The genesis of the idea came from Chris’s interactions with clients at Fundamental Asset Management, many of whom were wealthy, sophisticated investors who simply valued plain-English clarity over industry jargon. “I think it was at this point that I realised that I could bring something”, says Emily. “I felt like I could bring the solution because I’ve got this different way of thinking about things,” she adds.

The team ended up creating 2mins, an app designed to teach users about money through a series of original, engaging, and challenging games. Since launching in January, 2mins has attracted over 2,000 users, who compete against each other to rack up the highest scores by playing a series of games every week. Games are designed, as the name suggests, to be played in 2mins, a name and format chosen to remove some of the stigma associated with financial education. Emily has taken on the role of chief games creator, developing the idea of each game and then putting that idea into practice with the help of AI.

Initially, Emily says they received critical feedback about the nature of the games and, in particular, the animals. “I asked if we needed to change it to fit all the feedback?” Emily explained. “But we said no; we’re doing this to be different, to be bold, and we’re trying to reach people who haven’t been reached before by this. And we stuck with it. And I’m so glad that we have.”

Now being piloted in nine schools across the UK, 2mins aims to make financial education easier for teachers to deliver and more engaging for students. While the government has taken important steps to put financial education on the curriculum, there’s still a lot to do. And telling schools to do something doesn’t necessarily mean they will.

Schools and teachers are constrained by time and resources. That’s where Emily and Chris believe they have an edge. “When schools need to deliver financial education as part of the curriculum, hopefully they’ll look to 2mins as a really accessible, easy way to deliver that education”, Emily explains.

While schools are a key focus of its current expansion, 2mins was originally designed for users aged 16 and over and has also attracted an enthusiastic adult following. “We’ve got a lovely group of over 45-year-old women playing,” says Emily, highlighting one example. The next version of the app will also be designed with teachers in mind, following lessons learned during the testing phase.

“It is about trying to engage the teacher; I think that’s the hardest part; it’s less about the student, more about the teacher,” Chris explains. “That’s probably the hardest thing that was a bit of an unknown,” he adds.

The corporate market

The father-daughter team are also developing the app for a rather different market: corporate HR departments.

The business is currently in discussions with a major corporate client to develop an app for new starters and younger employees, helping them navigate incentives and benefits on offer, from pension entitlement to share schemes and even parental leave.

The corporate version will build on the same principles as the original app, with bespoke content and branding designed around each company’s employee benefits, culture and objectives. The aim is to create something that’s “fun and light-hearted” that the company’s employees still want to engage with. “The last thing users want is to be lectured or educated in the formal sense,” Chris says.

Creating products for this market, Chris says, was always a long-term goal once 2mins proved itself with the most demanding audience: young people.

Following the completion of its initial schools pilot, Emily and Chris plan to roll out an enhanced version of 2mins in 2027, initially targeting independent schools with a paid subscription model and a dedicated teacher dashboard. At the same time, they want to continue developing the corporate product to cultivate this potentially lucrative market and attract a sponsor to help fund the rollout across state schools.

By combining gamification with accessible microlearning, 2mins is working to transform financial literacy for pupils and employees alike. Its success was recognised earlier this year when 2mins was awarded the runner-up award at The Money Awareness and Inclusion Awards for Best Fintech/AI by a For Profit Organisation, and the winner of Best Content Creation at the Financial Capability Awards.

As the app moves toward nationwide expansion, Emily and Chris Boxall’s innovative approach offers a promising solution to bridge the UK’s financial knowledge gap and empower the next generation.