New York (CNN Business) Citibank is beefing up its checking account offering with free ATM withdrawals and higher yields. It's battling online-only banks that have been luring consumers with low costs and big perks. Kind of.

Competition is robust, and banks are bringing fees down to attract more customers. But there's often a catch, as is the case with Citi.

For potential Citi customers, these checking accounts are available only to those who live outside Citi's 700-strong branch system, which is concentrated in the metropolitan areas of New York, Washington DC, Miami, Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Citi didn't clarify how far away from a branch you have to live to get access to this new account.

JPMorgan Chase JPM Citibank C Charles Schwab SCHW By offering benefits to those outside its branch catchment area, Citi hopes to compete against the likes of, with its much larger network of more than 5,000 branches.is also the latest bank to try to win clients with a high yield checking account without ATM fees, similar toand SoFi, the fintech start up that has backing from Japan's SoftBank. Online-only banks like SoFi aren't reliant on branches to begin with, but Citi now has an answer to them as well.

Checking accounts are important business for bank. In the third quarter, Citi's global consumer banking division contributed nearly half of the company's revenues, with the North American consumer business contributing more than $5 billion.

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