$SGOV vs $BIL vs $USFR vs $TBIL: Which T-Bill ETF Is Best for Monthly Income in 2026?

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My $SGOV dividend guide is the most visited page on this site by a mile. And the follow-up question I get most is always the same: "Okay, but is $SGOV actually better than $BIL? What about $USFR? Or $TBIL?"

Fair question. All four are basically cash. They all hold U.S. Treasuries. They all pay every month. So which one should you actually own?

I pulled the last 12 payments, the fees, the assets and the pay dates for all four. Here's what I found.

$SGOV vs $BIL vs $USFR vs $TBIL: Side by Side

Look at that yield column. 3.64%, 3.66%, 3.71%, 3.66%. That's a spread of seven hundredths of a percent. On $10,000 that's about $7 a year.

This is the part most people miss. With T-bill funds, you're not picking a winner on yield. They all own the same kind of thing, so they all earn roughly what short-term Treasury rates are paying. You're picking on fees, size, structure and timing.

What Each Fund Actually Holds

$SGOV: iShares 0-3 Month Treasury Bond ETF

$SGOV holds U.S. Treasury bills that mature in three months or less. About 24 holdings, launched May 2020, and it has grown into a monster at $116.85 billion. That's more than double $BIL. It's the cheapest of the four at 0.09%.

$BIL: SPDR Bloomberg 1-3 Month T-Bill ETF

$BIL is the original. It launched in May 2007, long before T-bill ETFs were cool. It holds bills maturing in one to three months, about 28 of them. Its fee is 0.1356%, a bit higher than $SGOV. Its share price sits around $91.71 and barely moves, because it pays out what it earns every month. Every payment and date is in my $BIL dividend guide.

$USFR: WisdomTree Floating Rate Treasury Fund

$USFR is the different one. Instead of T-bills, it holds Treasury floating rate notes. These are two-year government notes whose interest resets every week based on the 13-week T-bill auction rate. So you still get a T-bill-like yield, but through a different instrument. About 7 holdings, launched February 2014, 0.15% fee. I broke down every payment, the end-of-month schedule and the income math in my $USFR dividend guide.

$TBIL: F/m US Treasury 3 Month Bill ETF

$TBIL is the simplest idea of the bunch. It's built to hold the most recent 3-month Treasury bill and roll into the next one. Launched August 2022, $7.51 billion in assets, 0.15% fee. If you want to own "the 3-month T-bill" and nothing else, this is the purest version.

How Much Each One Pays on $100,000

Let's make it real. If you'd put $100,000 into each fund at today's price, here's what the last 12 months of payouts would have added up to:

About $300 a month on $100K, whichever one you pick. That's the honest answer.

And it's falling. $SGOV paid $0.34664 a share in October 2025. This October it paid $0.30055. That's a drop of about 13%, because short-term Treasury rates came down. If rates keep falling, all four of these will pay less. That's not a flaw in any one fund. That's just what you sign up for with cash.

Want to see what this looks like over 5 or 10 years with reinvesting? Plug it into DividendProjection.com.

When Each One Pays (This Is the Fun Part)

Here's where these funds actually differ in a way you'll notice.

$SGOV and $BIL pay right after the month ends. The payment you get in early October is really September's interest. $USFR and $TBIL pay at the end of the month they earned it in.

So if you split your cash between, say, $SGOV and $USFR, you get paid twice a month. Once in the first week, once in the last week. Same total income, but the cash shows up more often. I laid out the full version of this idea, with 23 funds, in my monthly dividend ETF calendar. And if you want a T-bill-style fund that pays mid-month, $CSHI fills that gap.

One December quirk to know: $SGOV and $BIL both paid twice in December 2025 (early December and again on December 18 or 19) and then skipped January 2026. So don't panic when there's no January deposit. $USFR and $TBIL paid in late December and late January as normal.

Do Fees Even Matter Here?

Yes. More than people think.

On a stock ETF that might return 10% a year, a 0.06% fee difference is noise. On a fund that earns about 3.6%, it's a much bigger slice. $SGOV's 0.09% takes about 2.5% of your yield. $USFR and $TBIL at 0.15% take about 4%.

Now, you'll notice $USFR still had the highest trailing yield despite the higher fee. That's because floating rate notes pay the 13-week T-bill rate plus a small spread, and the timing of the 12 payments matters too. So fees aren't everything. But when everything else is basically equal, I'd rather pay less. On big cash balances that's real money every year.

Taxes: Same Story for All Four

All four funds earn interest from U.S. Treasuries. Two things follow from that:

• Federal: the dividends are taxed as ordinary income. They are not qualified dividends. Same rate as your paycheck.
• State: interest from U.S. Treasuries is generally exempt from state income tax, and that usually carries through to funds that hold only Treasuries. But each state has its own rules for funds, and some, like California, have extra requirements. I went deep on this in is $SGOV state tax exempt, and the same logic applies to $BIL, $USFR and $TBIL.

If you live in a high-tax state, this is a big deal. It's one of the main reasons I'd hold cash in one of these instead of a regular high-yield savings account, which is fully taxable at the state level. Check your fund's year-end tax letter and talk to a tax pro.

The Risks Nobody Talks About

These are about as safe as it gets in the market. But "safe" isn't "zero risk."

• Falling income: the big one. Your payout drops when rates drop. We've already seen about a 13% decline in $SGOV's monthly payment over the past year.
• No growth: these prices barely move. $SGOV's 52-week range was $100.27 to $100.74. That's great for stability, terrible for building wealth. Inflation slowly eats it.
• Price drop on ex-date: $BIL and $SGOV prices tick down when they pay. You're not getting free money by buying the day before.
• Fund size: $TBIL at $7.5 billion is still big, but it's the smallest here. I don't worry about any of these closing.

For total return numbers with every dividend counted, ETFTotalReturns.com lets you compare these head to head.

Which One I'd Pick

• "I just want the best default." $SGOV. Lowest fee, most assets, tightest trading. It's the one I'd tell a friend to use.
• "I want the fund with the longest track record." $BIL. It's been around since 2007 and made it through 2008 and the zero-rate years.
• "I want my cash paid at the end of the month." $USFR or $TBIL. Handy if your bills are due on the 1st.
• "I want income twice a month." Split between $SGOV and $USFR.

My Take

I've been a dividend investor for over 10 years, and I reached financial freedom at 31 by building income. Cash was never what got me there. But cash is what lets you sleep at night and be ready when the market gives you a gift.

For that cash, I don't overthink it. $SGOV does the job at the lowest cost. If I wanted a second fund just to get paid at the end of the month too, I'd add $USFR. I wouldn't spend more than five minutes on this decision, because the difference between these four is a rounding error.

Where I'd spend my time instead: the rest of the portfolio. That's where a good decision is worth thousands, not $7. Start with every monthly dividend ETF we track, my best ETFs for monthly income in 2026, or if you want a step up in yield with a bit more risk, CLO ETFs that pay monthly. And for the bigger universe, TopDividendETFs.com and WeeklyETFs.com track everything else.

$SGOV vs $BIL vs $USFR vs $TBIL FAQ

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Sponsored By Read carefully before investing. Prospectus: https://lsfunds.com/hubfs/Regulatory/Prospectus.pdf?hsLang=en