Spring internships in banks: 30% lead to summer internships
If you’re interested in starting a career in banking & financial services, you’re probably well-informed about internships. And if you’re aiming to start your career in the UK, you’re probably already applying for your first spring internship. If you are, lock in - your spring internship is much, much more important than you think.
Data from Trackr, formerly known as the Bristol Tracker, showed that 31% of spring interns in 2025 received offers to join their banks’ summer internships scheme, a process known as conversion. A further 38% were fast-tracked for the summer internship recruitment process.
Spring internships are week-long programs in which students are invited to attend talks from senior bankers and to network - both with each other and within their host organisation. Spring internships at many banks are the first step to achieving a summer internship.
Summer internships are critical to an eventual career in banking. Some banks, such as Morgan Stanley, hire their intern class exclusively from their summer internships. Getting a summer internship is very, very important: not all summer interns become analysts upon graduation, but most do – and most get the chance to be, at least.
Trackr’s data had some other interesting tidbits. For one, it’s much easier to get a spring internship than a summer internship: spring internships had an average of 24 applications per offer, while summer internships (2024 data) require roughly 70 applications per offer.
Spring internships are very much concentrated among top applicants – although, crucially, not to the same degree as summer internships. Among spring applicants, the top 10% of candidates received 33% of offers given. Among summer applicants, the top 10% of candidates received 44% of offers given.
Spring interns are typically, but not necessarily, first year students. “So many second years get offers. It’s very luck-based and you have to apply early,” one RBC spring intern said to Trackr. All in all, 24% of 2025 spring interns were second-years, and 2% were third-years. Although that goes against conventional wisdom, it’s not illogical: after all, some spring internships are known to convert to off-cycle internships in banks.
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