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A brokerage account is like a checking account for your investments. The difference, however, is that brokerage accounts act as both a safe place to hold your investments and a place to access the investment markets.
Brokerage accounts can hold cash, stocks, bonds, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), mutual funds, and other investments. For most investors, a long-term, passive investment strategy is ideal. Many experts suggest building a diverse portfolio of low-cost index funds over picking individual stocks and riskier active trading tools.
Best Online Brokerages
- Charles Schwab: Best online broker overall
- SoFi Invest: Best online brokerage for beginners
- Fidelity Investments: Best online brokerage for retirement savings
- TD Ameritrade: Best online brokerage for experienced investors
- Interactive Brokers: Best online brokerage for active traders
- Public Investing: Best online brokerage for mobile use
- Stockpile: Best online brokerage for kids and teens
Here are the best online brokerages as picked by Insider's editors.
Compare the Best Online Brokerages
Online Brokerage Frequently Asked Questions
Brokerage accounts are a type of account used for investments. With a brokerage account open and funded, you can buy and sell stocks, bonds, funds, and other investments.
Brokerage accounts are best managed online. Using your online broker's website or mobile app, you can transfer funds, enter trade orders, monitor your positions, research current and future investments, and just about anything else you need to do in a brokerage account.
In most cases, modern brokerage accounts are free to open and keep. There should be no recurring fees or minimum charges if you're looking for the best online brokerage account for most investors. There should also be few or no commissions for stock, ETF, and options trades. Some fees for phone or broker-assisted trades are common, as are commissions for some mutual funds and other investments.
Before opening an account, brokers will request to see your personal information in order to comply with current laws and regulations. You'll need information, such as your name, address, telephone number, Social Security number, annual income, and more.
Paper trading is provided by many online brokers as a way to minimize risk. With a paper trading account, you can practice buying and selling investment assets before applying your strategy to your live account. Beginners can benefit from paper accounts since these accounts are usually free and have no risk.
Online Brokerage Reviews
Best Online Brokerage Overall
Charles Schwab
Charles Schwab is a major discount brokerage and one of the largest investment management firms in the United States. Schwab offers a wide range of brokerage accounts and products that meet the needs of virtually any investor.
In addition to offering competitive accounts with no minimum balance requirements and no recurring fees, Schwab is a leader in low-cost pricing for retail investors. In late 2019, Schwab was among the first of a big list of major brokerage firms to lower commissions on stock and ETF trades to zero.
Hands-on investors are best served by the basic Schwab self-directed brokerage account, which gives you access to a vast array of investment choices. If you want more help, you can sign up for a managed Schwab Intelligent Portfolios account, also known as a robo-adviser. This account also doesn't charge any fees.
Schwab also offers both fractional shares (with a $5 minimum) and its own family of mutual funds and ETFs. Trades of Schwab mutual funds require no commissions or trading fees inside of a Schwab account. Plus, while Schwab doesn't offer cryptocurrencies, it provides several alternatives. These include crypto coin trusts, bitcoin futures, and cryptocurrency stocks (see its complete list of crypto offerings here).
What to look out for: The biggest downside of Charles Schwab is how it treats cash in your account. While some competing brokerages automatically invest cash balances to get interest rates on par with savings accounts, Schwab's rates for cash balances are pretty low (only 0.01%).
There are also high costs for phone and broker-assisted trades. While online trades are commission-free for stocks and ETFs, you'll pay $5 extra for automated phone trades and $25 extra for broker-assisted trades.
Best Online Brokerage for Beginners
SoFi Invest
SoFi Invest doesn't have the same storied history as some brokerages in the United States, but it comes with innovative features and a technology-forward experience that make it ideal for newer investors.
SoFi started as a student lender and grew to include banking, investing, insurance, and other financial products. Plus, the company recently received approval to become a national bank.
It charges almost no fees for its investment accounts, which include self-directed investing and automated investing (managed portfolios) with no recurring fees and a very low $1 minimum to get started.
The self-directed "Active Investing" account has no fees to trade stocks, ETFs, and even cryptocurrencies (it currently offers 22 coins). You can buy fractional shares of stocks, which SoFi calls "Stock Bits." SoFi also has a few of its own exchange-traded funds that could be a fit for your portfolio. Plus, it now offers options trading.
The app also offers a very easy-to-navigate dashboard, collections of stocks and other investments to browse, and integrated links to education pages within the SoFi website and mobile app.
One SoFi login also gets you access to banking and lending services. Customers get free access to SoFi Relay, a personal finance data aggregator comparable to a lightweight version of Mint or Empower Personal Dashboard™.
Customers also get free access to career coaching and financial planning sessions.
What to look out for: SoFi doesn't offer investments like mutual funds or bonds. Also, look out for the fees on SoFi ETFs. While two of them have no expense ratio for the first year, the long-run cost is above many other ETFs.
SoFi's account selection is also fairly limited compared to larger brokers that offer any type of retirement or business investment account under the sun.
Best Online Brokerage for Retirement Savings
Fidelity
Like its large industry peers, Fidelity offers just about anything a typical investor might want from a brokerage. That includes a wide variety of account types (including the Fidelity Youth account for minors), a long list of available investments, and competitive pricing with industry leaders for low-cost investments. It has about 190 locations nationwide.
The basic brokerage account at Fidelity has no minimum balances or recurring fees. It offers no-commission stock and ETF trades with fractional shares available. With an account at Fidelity, you can invest in stocks, ETFs, options, mutual funds, bonds, CDs, and precious metals. Fidelity offers international investing in 25 foreign markets and foreign currency exchange between 16 different currencies.
Fidelity also shines when it comes to retirement investing. The app gives you access to tools like retirement calculators and just about any tax-advantaged retirement plan you could want with the same list of investments as regular taxable brokerage accounts.
If you're big on passively investing in funds, the brokerage's selection of low-cost ETFs and mutual funds might also impress you. Not only does it offer zero-expense ratio Fidelity Flex mutual funds, but it also uses these same funds for its robo-advisors, Fidelity Go and Fidelity Personalized Planning & Advice.
Fidelity can be a great choice for most investment needs, but it's an especially strong choice for investors with a long-term retirement focus. The combination of low fees and a focus on helping investors reach a successful retirement helped make it the top choice for retirement brokerage accounts.
What to look out for: Fidelity gives you a lot for free, but mutual funds outside of the no-fee list cost up to $49.95 each, not including added fees for phone or broker-assisted trades. Phone trades cost an extra $12.95 per trade and assisted trades cost an extra $32.95 each. In addition, Fidelity charges higher margin rates than many competitors.
Best Online Brokerage for Experienced Investors
TD Ameritrade
TD Ameritrade is a large discount brokerage that's great for both new and expert investors. Beginners will enjoy the simple online platform at TD Ameritrade's website. Experienced investors will want to take advantage of the advanced trading platform, called thinkorswim, and other expert resources TD Ameritrade makes available.
Like other large discount brokerage firms, TD Ameritrade gives you access to just about any kind of brokerage account you could want. It offers a list of tradeable assets bigger than most peers, though, which is another draw for experienced investors. In addition to commonly available investments like stocks, bonds, options, mutual funds, and ETFs, TD Ameritrade offers less common investments, including futures, foreign exchange, and cryptocurrency.
The importance of a powerful trading platform grows with your investment expertise. TD Ameritrade's thinkorswim gives you a professional-style trading platform with advanced charting and advanced order types. An embedded CNBC TV widget is a nice perk that keeps your trading strategy in sync with the markets. It's nearly Wall Street quality and comes included with TD Ameritrade accounts.
Serious options and active traders will appreciate free access to NASDAQ Level I and Level II quotes, and real-time quotes for OPRA, AMEX, and NYSE. Professional clients have to pay for access to advanced quotes.
Its managed portfolios — Essential Portfolios, Selective Portfolios, and Personalized Portfolios — are no longer available to new clients. But due to the Schwab acquisition, TD Ameritrade clients now have access both to Schwab's two automated portfolios and its other managed accounts. The first automated account, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, includes a $5,000 account minimum, but it charges no advisory fees to invest your money into a diversified blend of ETFs. The second option — Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Premium — has a $25,000 minimum, and it charges a $300 one-time fee and $30 monthly fee.
What to look out for: There's an important footnote for TD Ameritrade. The company was acquired by Charles Schwab on October 6, 2020. TD Ameritrade has said on its website that it will continue to conduct business as usual, while combining many components of its business with Schwab. TD Ameritrade also no longer offers any of its managed accounts to new clients.
Schwab's StreetSmart Pro and StreetSmart Edge are fine for most investors, but serious traders could prefer thinkorswim. There's always a risk when opening an account with a company being acquired, but Schwab is still a good home for most investing and trading needs.
TD Ameritrade has a high $49.99 fee for mutual fund trades off of the no-transaction-fee list.
Best Online Brokerage for Active Traders
Interactive Brokers
Interactive Brokers is a top choice for active traders who trade at higher volumes and want access to tools optimized for their needs. Typical investors may not care about the difference of a few seconds when entering and executing a trade. Very active traders, however, care about milliseconds.
Interactive Brokers has multiple pricing options depending on your level of trading activity and your personal trading needs. The basic account, IBKR Lite, gives you commission-free stock and ETF trades and competitive fees for most other trades. Most investors would want this type of account. But active traders could be willing to pay more for additional features.
IBKR Pro accounts use tiered or fixed pricing models. This means you won't get completely commission-free trades as you do with IBKR Lite. Pro accounts have additional access to market data. They also get access to the IBKR Web Trader platform and IBKR APIs for automated trading. Algorithmic trading, also known as algos, is included with Pro accounts.
With IBKR Pro, you don't have tools similar to what professional traders use — you have the exact same tools. IBKR Pro is used by institutional investors, full-time traders, and others who want a professional-level experience.
Under the fixed-rate pricing plan, fees start at .005 cents per share with a $1 minimum per trade for US stocks and ETFs (some ETFs have no transaction fees). Tiered pricing is best for traders with very large order sizes. Prices are per-share with discounts starting over 300,000 shares.
With very competitive pricing and an experience tailored to active traders, IBKR Lite could be a good place to test the waters before upgrading to IBKR Pro for the most advanced experience. Plus, the brokerage also recently launched a new app, IMPACT, that focuses solely on helping investors find companies that align with their values (this is commonly known as socially responsible investing).
Finally, if you're interested in investing in cryptocurrencies, Interactive Brokers offers several. These include bitcoin, ethereum, bitcoin cash, and litecoin. Commissions for these assets range from 0.12-0.18%.
What to look out for: Not all accounts and trades are free. Make sure to choose the right account level for your investment goals and experience. IBKR Pro charges a fee of up to $10 per month if you have less than $100,000 in your account or generate less than $10 in commissions per month.
Best Online Brokerage for Mobile Use
Public
Public is an investment app that uses a mobile-first experience. The result is a mobile investment experience that's somewhat unique but still easy to navigate for both beginner and experienced investors.
As the name suggests, trades at Public allow you to connect with other investors on the app. You can follow others and chat about investment ideas. You can even join a group chat for live interaction with other investors. In some ways, it's like a built-in social network for investors.
Another useful feature for newer investors is the ability to view various themes. These group stocks by industry or other major categories to help you zero in on companies that make sense for your investment strategy.
Public uses a commission-free pricing model. Most users won't pay any fees at all. It also offers fractional shares. These two features make Public great for people who are new to investing and want to start with a small amount of money. Fractional investing is supported for more than 2,800 stocks and ETFs.
Plus, Public recently launched cryptocurrency trading, so you can now invest in more than 25 digital assets, including bitcoin, ethereum, and dogecoin. You'll typically pay a markup of 1% or 2% for each transaction. It also now offers trading for alternative assets like art, collectibles, and NFTs. Public charges a 2.5% fee of each of those transactions.
What to look out for: Only a limited set of investments are available. You can invest in stocks and ETFs with Public, but not the full investment landscape. Public offers access to most US publicly traded stocks and ETFs, but not the entire market.
Public has a somewhat basic trading platform that may not be suitable for expert investors and very active traders.
Best Online Brokerage for Kids and Teens
Stockpile
Stockpile is a newer and smaller brokerage than some others on this list, but it's perfect for kids. Stockpile offers brokerage and custodial accounts with no recurring fees, no minimums, and no gift card fees. Trades are also free, and fractional shares are available starting with a $5 investment. It has a $4.95 monthly subscription fee.
Stockpile is great for kids and teens for a few reasons. The simple and easy-to-navigate platform shows kids the logos and companies they are familiar with in their portfolios. You can fund the account through a bank account or with stock gift cards. Because fractional shares are supported for the 1,000+ stocks and ETFs on the platform, gifts and trades can be made in round dollar amounts.
Parents or other family members can get gift cards redeemable for stock in Stockpile accounts. Plus, you'll pay no fees to buy an e-gift, redeem a gift card, or switch to another stock.
Parents and kids will enjoy the built-in education resources. Stockpile's "mini-lessons" teach stock market basics that prepare anyone for a more successful future in the stock market.
What to look out for: Users only have access to the most popular stocks and ETFs (Stockpile also recently launched cryptocurrency trading), but many stocks are not included and other types of investments are not supported.
What to Look for When Choosing an Online Broker
Everyone's investment goals and preferences are unique, so there is no perfect brokerage for everyone. To choose the best online brokerage, start by looking at your own investment style and what you want from a brokerage. Whether that's cutting-edge active-trading tools or a long list of no-transaction-fee mutual funds, there's a good online brokerage for everyone.
Once you understand what you need, look at costs, platforms, investment account types, and available investments to lock in the decision on what's best for you.
Other Online Brokerages we Considered
- E*TRADE: Etrade is the original online brokerage. It offers a good experience for active traders with competitive pricing. Etrade was recently acquired by Wall Street powerhouse Morgan Stanley. It is a large discount brokerage that supports most investment types and a wide range of accounts. For experienced investors, Etrade is a good choice for its platforms and range of investments, but the trading experience is not quite as good as thinkorswim at TD Ameritrade.
- Webull: WeBull is a newer brokerage that uses a no-commissions model. It uses a high-tech web platform ideal for more active traders. WeBull offers personal and retirement accounts and a more limited set of investment options. WeBull is a top choice for free brokerage accounts. However, it doesn't offer the full range of available investments and can be tricky to navigate for beginner investors.
- TradeStation: TradeStation was a close runner-up for the best brokerage for active traders, but its pricing isn't quite as good as the winner. It gives traders access to a set of powerful tools on par with what's used by professional and institutional traders.
- Ally Invest: Ally Invest is a very low-cost brokerage that pairs well with Ally's best-in-class checking and savings accounts. It is a great platform for beginner stock and ETF traders. It has trading platforms that are fairly straightforward but don't offer the same depth of features as some of the best platforms for active trading.
- Merrill Edge: Merrill Edge gets its name from legendary brokerage Merrill Lynch. Now a division of Bank of America, it's best for loyal Bank of America customers with high combined balances across Bank of America accounts, which include Merrill Edge. While Merrill Edge is great for loyal customers, its pricing and features are less exciting for those with smaller balances.
- Vanguard: Vanguard is known for pioneering the low-cost index fund industry. It also offers brokerage and managed portfolio products (e.g., Vanguard Digital Advisor and Vanguard Personal Advisor Services). It's best for people who want to primarily invest in the Vanguard family of mutual funds. This titan of index funds is known for low fees, but customers with less than $10,000 will pay $20 per year in account service fees.
- Robinhood Investing: Robinhood is the original no-commission brokerage. It currently offers stocks, ETFs, cryptocurrencies, and options with a mobile-first platform. Robinhood is a great choice for no-fee trading. However, earlier in 2021 it suffered several major outages that left people unable to buy or sell on some of the biggest market days in over a decade. In addition (and like multiple other trading platforms at the time), the company restricted users from buying shares of Gamestop, AMC, and several other stocks that surged due to a market tactic used by several members of a Reddit forum known as r/WallStreetBets.
- tastytrade: Previously called tastyworks, tastytrade is an online trading platform that offers commission-free trades for stocks and ETFs. But this platform is more focused on trading options and futures.
Why You Should Trust Us: Our Expert Panel For The Best Online Brokerage
We consulted financial advisors, investing experts, and our own wealth-building reporter to inform our choices for the best online brokerages.
We interviewed the following investing experts to see what they had to say about online brokerages:
- Brian Fry, CFP, founder at Safe Landing Financial
- Charlotte Geletka, CFP, CRPC, managing partner at Silver Penny Financial Planning
- Kaysian Gordon, MBA, CFP, CDFA, CPA, wealth manager at Clarus Group
What are the advantages or disadvantages of opening a brokerage account?
Brian Fry, CFP:
A taxable brokerage account offers the flexibility to have funds available when needed and without a tax penalty. They offer transparency and freedom when considering costs and investment options.
Depending on a household's financial situation, other account types may add more value and/or tax-efficiency. For example, if qualified, HSAs provide tax-deductions, tax-free growth, and tax-free distributions if used for qualified medical expenses; retirement accounts may provide tax deductions, tax-deferred or tax-free investment growth, and potentially tax-free distributions.
Education accounts may provide tax deductions and/or tax-free distributions if used for qualified educational expenses.
Charlotte Geletka, CFP, CRPC:
The advantages include access to stock exchanges to buy almost endless options of investments. This is where you can purchase stocks, bonds, ETFs, mutual funds, options and almost the entire inventory of the open markets.
The multitude of options can also be a disadvantage. Most retirement plans offer a curated list of choices which have been well vetted by consultants and investment experts. When you go into a brokerage account it is daunting to know where to start. The recent rise of social media blogs surrounding investing may increase the interest but be cautious about investing as any investment comes with risk.
Kaysian Gordon, MBA, CFP, CDFA, CPA:
The advantage of opening a brokerage account is — if you're interested in investing in stocks or bonds, or mutual funds or ETFs, as examples, a brokerage is a great way to do it.
Savings accounts or checking accounts just do not have those features. So the disadvantage is [that] you have to be aware of what you're looking for. Lots of different brokerage accounts will provide you with different things, so it's a matter of specifically what it is that's important to you.
Who should consider opening a brokerage account?
Brian Fry, CFP:
A taxable brokerage account can be a good fit for anyone and everyone. Before saving in a taxable brokerage account, it's important to consider where saving adds the most value to your unique financial situation. Make sure to have an adequate emergency fund.
Charlotte Geletka, CFP, CRPC:
Once you have set up an emergency fund, and started funding a retirement account then you might consider opening a brokerage account as a place to invest after-tax dollars.
Most often, the account you have set up in a brokerage will be a flexible investment. This is great because you have use of the money for various purposes, and you are not tied to specific withdrawal requirements the same way you would be in a retirement or college 529 account.
Kaysian Gordon, MBA, CFP, CDFA, CPA:
When you're looking to start the process of investing after you have saved the amount that you need for your emergency funds — and typically that's three to six months— you should start looking to invest other personal cash. Make it a point to contribute as frequently as you can, because that's how wealth is built over time.
Is there any other advice you'd offer someone who's considering opening a brokerage account?
Brian Fry, CFP:
Before saving with a taxable account, consider the order of where you should save first to best accomplish your financial goals. Are you comfortable taking the responsibility in making investment decisions? How are you going to rebalance? How are you going to take emotion out of investing? If you can check all the boxes, taxable accounts can be a good vehicle.
Charlotte Geletka, CFP, CRPC:
There is a difference between trading and investing. Trading is exchanging [which is] usually short term in nature. Investing involves time and is long term in nature.
Kaysian Gordon, MBA, CFP, CDFA, CPA:
Do your research because that's very important. Think about the things that are important to you. Do a comparison of the different names that you hear and see what the benefits are of one company over another before making a decision.
Nothing will have everything that you need, but go with the brokerage account that has the best of what you need.
Methodology: How we Reviewed The Best Online Brokerages
In evaluating the best online brokerage accounts available today, we rate investing products on a wide range of criteria. The most important factors for Personal Finance Insider rates and reviews products are pricing, account types, investment availability, platforms, and overall customer experience.
Most brokerage accounts on this list have no minimum balance and no recurring monthly fees. After a major shift in pricing in 2019, most brokerage firms on this list also offer commission-free trades for stocks and ETFs. They also removed base fees for options trades, but still charge per-contract fees in most cases.
Top brokerage firms offer different platforms for different investment needs. Some are best for beginners and others are ideal for more advanced investors. Platforms were evaluated with a focus on how they serve in each category.
Editorial Note: Any opinions, analyses, reviews or recommendations expressed in this article are those of the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any card issuer. Read our editorial standards.
Please note: While the offers mentioned above are accurate at the time of publication, they're subject to change at any time and may have changed, or may no longer be available.
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