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Investors can buy and sell different investment assets with an online brokerage account, which provides secure storage and market access. The best online brokerages provide an intuitive interface and a variety of account types to serve your needs.
Most online brokers for beginners offer a $0 minimum requirement and commission-free trading on investments, including stocks, bonds, ETFs, and more. Even though most of the best online brokers for free stock trading provide low minimum fees, you may still need to pay a small contract fee.
If you're new to the investing world, the best online brokerages for beginners can give you the tools to reach your goals.
Best Online Brokerages for Beginners
- Charles Schwab: Best overall for beginners
- SoFi Invest: Best overall for beginners runner-up
- Fidelity Investments: Best for all levels of investors
- TD Ameritrade: Best for active trading
- Vanguard: Best for retirement-focused investors
- Betterment Investing: Best robo-advisors
- Ally Invest: Best for banking-brokerage combo
Here are Insider's editors' top picks for the best online brokerage for beginners.
Compare Online Brokerages for Beginners
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SoFi Invest
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Fidelity Investments
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TD Ameritrade
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Vanguard
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Betterment Investing
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Ally Invest
Best Online Brokerages for Beginners — Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
A brokerage account is like a checking account for your investments. Where a checking account holds your cash, a brokerage account holds your stocks, treasury bonds, funds, and other investments. When you open and fund a brokerage account, you can buy and sell investments. Unlike the cash in a bank account, however, the value of the investments in your brokerage account can go up and down.
It's easiest to manage a brokerage account online using a website or mobile app. Online brokerages allow you to transfer funds, enter trade orders, monitor your positions, research current and future investments, and handle any other transactions you need to make in a brokerage account.
In the US, brokerage accounts are insured by the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC). If your brokerage goes out of business, you are guaranteed to get your money and other assets back, up to SIPC limits.
Brokerage firms are regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission and Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), among other government agencies and industry groups.
If you want to invest, you need a brokerage account. That goes for long-term investing for retirement, short-term gains, or anything in between. Make sure you're covering your bills before adding investments to your budget.
Most modern brokerage accounts are free to open and keep. You shouldn't be paying any recurring fees or minimum charges if you're looking for the best brokerage account for most investors.
You should also look for brokerage accounts with no commissions for stock, ETF, and options trades. You may see some fees for phone or broker-assisted trades, as well as commissions for some mutual funds and other investments.
You should not have to pay any fees to keep an account open and store your cash and investments there.
The best brokerage for you will reflect your investing style and what you want from a brokerage (for example, robo-advising or active trading, or access to a human financial advisor). Everyone's investment goals and preferences are unique, so there is no perfect brokerage for everyone.
Once you know what features you're looking for, look at costs, platforms, available account types, and investment options to lock in the decision on what's best for you.
What to Look for When Choosing a Brokerage for Beginner
Online brokerages providing multiple asset classes, secure storage, stock market access, and an intuitive interface are the best kinds of brokers for beginners. The online brokerage should also offer various account types, as well as low minimums and fees.
The best brokerages for beginners offer a handful of investing and goal-building tools, such as tax loss harvesting features, automatic rebalancing tools, portfolio management, and other similar financial planning tools. Educational resources, like webinars and blogs, are also extremely beneficial for new investors.
Financially, when assessing which online brokerage is best for you, compare different minimums and fees. Low minimums and fees are more suitable for beginners who are just getting acquainted with investment products and services. More advanced online brokerages will require higher fees and minimums in order to access advanced trading and charting tools.
Best Overall Online Brokerage for Beginners
Charles Schwab
Charles Schwab is our choice for the best overall broker for beginners because it offers something for investors with virtually any investment need. Not only does it give you the ability to manage all of your banking and investments with one login, but its investment tools are also designed in a way that they can grow with you as you learn more and level up your investing style.
For investors who want to manage everything themselves, you can choose self-directed traditional brokerage and retirement accounts where you pick all of your investments with no commissions for stock or ETF trades. These accounts have no fees and no minimum balance requirements. Charles Schwab also offers a robo-adviser, Charles Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, that can manage all of your investments for you for no added charge. But you'll need at least $5,000 to use this account.
If you want to take automated investing a step further, you can upgrade to Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Premium. This account combines robo-advice with unlimited guidance from a certified financial planner (CFP). Note, however, that you'll need a minimum of $25,000 to get started. The account has a $300 one-time planning fee and includes a $30 monthly fee.
Schwab is best for investors who want every potential investment need covered at a very low cost. Whatever your needs are in the future, odds are Schwab will have a solution that works for you.
What to look out for: Schwab's robo-advisor, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios charges no advisory fees, but it has a higher account minimum requirement ($5,000) than most automated accounts.
Best Overall Online Brokerages for Beginners Runner-up
SoFi
SoFi is the best broker for beginners seeking a simple and straightforward investing experience. It has a slimmer lineup of accounts than some bigger competitors, but it covers the most common needs for managing your investments. It also offers a great bank account, lending products, and other financial tools to help you get an understanding of your investments.
SoFi Invest offers active investing accounts and managed robo-adviser accounts with no recurring fees and a $1 minimum to get started. Those include both taxable investment accounts and IRA or Roth IRA retirement accounts. The only big downside of these accounts is that you can only trade stocks, ETFs, and cryptocurrencies. There are no mutual funds available through SoFi. Stock and ETF trades are commission-free. SoFi offers automated investing for $0.
On the cryptocurrency end, you can exchange bitcoin, ether, litecoin, and 19 other coins and tokens. SoFi charges a 1.25% markup on each crypto transaction.
While it doesn't have quite as robust an offering, SoFi comes with several very valuable perks at no extra charge. That includes free financial planning sessions, career coaching, and other perks for SoFi members. SoFi is best for inventors who are comfortable with technology.
What to look out for: While SoFi is generally a great choice for investors who value low costs, it has a fairly limited investment selection. It primarily offers stocks, ETFs, and cryptocurrencies.
Best Online Brokerage for All Levels of Investors
Fidelity
Fidelity is a top choice if your main goal is investing for retirement. Fidelity offers a wide range of accounts with no fees or minimum balance requirements, as well as a suite of investor tools and resources focused on helping customers reach their retirement goals.
In addition to free stock and ETF trades, Fidelity Investments customers have access to nearly 3,500 mutual funds with no transaction fees. Among those are four funds from Fidelity that charge no expense ratio (that means no fund fees).
Fidelity also offers a handful of useful tools and calculators. One favorite is the Retirement Score, which helps you assess your retirement preparation and includes guidance to help you reach your goals. Fidelity Go is Fidelity's robo-adviser offering; it's a solid product, though fees are slightly higher on some balances than competitors such as Betterment.
Fidelity is a large brokerage that can handle just about anything. But retirement is definitely a specialty.
What to look out for: The brokerage offers a long list of tradeable assets, but it isn't the best option for those who want to invest in cryptocurrencies.
Best Active Trading Online Brokerage for Beginners
TD Ameritrade
If you have plans to manage your account actively and are interested in the fast-moving world of options trading, TD Ameritrade could be the best choice for your needs.
TD Ameritrade offers similar low fees to other large investment brokerages, with many account types available with no recurring fees and no minimum balance requirements. As with most other brokerages on this list, there are no fees for stock or ETF trades as well as no base fee for options trades.
TD Ameritrade stands out for active traders due to its suite of investment platforms. Brand new investors will probably be most comfortable on the TD Ameritrade website and using the standard TD Ameritrade mobile app. As your investment chops improve, you can upgrade to the professional-quality thinkorswim mobile and desktop platforms.
One thing to note about TD Ameritrade is its acquisition by Charles Schwab. Schwab is our top brokerage on this list and plans to keep beloved trading tools from thinkorswim post-acquisition, so it's still worth considering as your new brokerage when starting out. Another thing to note is that TD Ameritrade's robo-adviser and managed accounts — Essential Portfolios, Selective Portfolios, and Personalized Portfolios — are no longer available to new clients.
You'll have to set up managed or automated accounts through its affiliate, Charles Schwab.
What to look out for: TD Ameritrade doesn't allow customers to invest in fractional shares.
Best Retirement-focused Online Brokerage for Beginners
Vanguard
Vanguard has long been a one-stop shop for all things investing. The brokerage's investment selection includes self-directed accounts, automated investing accounts (robo-advisors), IRAs, education savings plans, and much more.
Plus, like many of the brokerages listed above, it offers commission-free trading for stocks, ETFs, and options. Vanguard also gives you access to mutual funds, bonds, and CDs, and many of its mutual funds are actively managed, meaning the brokerage itself oversees the funds.
If you're more of a hands-off investor, Vanguard's Vanguard Digital Advisor and Vanguard Personal Advisor Services automated accounts might suit you. The first, Vanguard Digital Advisor, builds a personalized portfolio of Vanguard ETFs for you based on your preferences. Vanguard Personal Advisor Services, on the other hand, is an advisor-managed account that allows you to work one-on-one with experienced Vanguard advisors.
Beginners might also appreciate the brokerage's vast suite of educational resources. Vanguard offers both a library of insights and guides on a variety of investing topics, and it additionally provides market analysis and expert research.
What to look out for: Vanguard offers competitive products for long-term focused investors, but some of its products that best suit active traders (e.g., options) fall short of its competitors. For instance, options contracts will cost you $1 each. This is higher than the options contracts fees for many brokerages. In addition, Vanguard doesn't offer any additional trading platforms for advanced traders.
Vanguard Digital Advisor review
Best Robo-advising Online Brokerage for Beginners
Betterment Investing
Betterment is the largest independent online financial advisor. If you are looking for an investment experience where you explain your investment goals, hand over your money, and someone else takes care of everything for you, Betterment is a great broker for beginners.
The term "robo-adviser" is intimidating to some people, but rest assured an actual robot isn't sitting there picking stocks for you. Instead, you answer some basic questions about yourself and your investment goals when signing up. Based on your answers, Betterment Investing will then provide investing advice and recommendations based on the goal details you provided.
Betterment is good for both taxable and retirement accounts. Pricing starts at 0.25% of your portfolio balance per year, though you can pay more for a plan that includes access to a human financial adviser as well. For most beginners, the basic plan covers your needs.
What to look out for: You'll have to pay extra to take advantage of human advisor guidance if you can't meet the $100,000 minimum attached to Betterment's premium account.
Best Banking-brokerage Combo Online Brokerage for Beginners
Ally Invest
Most of the brokerages above offer some type of integrated bank account, but if you are looking for the best bank account and brokerage combo, Ally Invest may be the best option for your needs. Ally Bank is a broker for beginners that offers some of the highest-rated checking and savings options out there, and it also offers a low-fee investment platform that works well for beginners.
The investment side of Ally Invest can handle your taxable or retirement accounts. It features commission-free stock and ETF trades and no base fee for options. Most mutual fund trades are $9.95, which is more than you would pay for mutual fund trades on the no-transaction-fee (NTF) lists at competitors, but less than most charge for funds off of their NTF lists. Managed portfolios are available, too, with no advisory fees and a $100 minimum balance.
Ally Invest's Robo Portfolios rely on ETFs, and Ally manages and monitors each portfolio daily. The robo-advisor also offers four different portfolio options: Core, Income, Tax optimized, and Socially Responsible.
Ally Invest doesn't have the flashiest or fullest-featured trading platform, but it gets the job done and makes it easy for beginners to manage their banking and investments with one login.
What to look out for: Ally doesn't offer any cryptocurrencies or no-transaction-fee mutual funds.
Other Online Brokerages for Beginners We Considered
- Firstrade: Firstrade isn't as well known as some others on this list, but it's been around for decades and offers commission-free trades for most assets including no per-contract fee for options and no commissions for any mutual fund trades. The trading platform isn't as modern and polished as some competitors, but the price is right.
- Webull: Webull is also almost completely free to use; there are no account fees or trading commissions. You can trade stocks, options, ETFs, and cryptocurrencies. But while it's available account types include taxable investment accounts and IRAs, it doesn't currently offer joint brokerage accounts, education savings accounts, or automated investing options.
- E*TRADE: E*TRADE is a major brokerage with a long history of serving online traders. It has a great web platform and works well for beginner to experienced traders. E*TRADE is currently in the process of being acquired by Morgan Stanley.
- Interactive Brokers: Interactive Brokers are best for investors who are looking to become more active traders. It may be good for beginners looking to invest time to learn the markets and how higher-powered trading tools work.
- Merrill Edge: Merrill Edge is part of Bank of America. It does a good job of rewarding very loyal customers with high balances across Bank of America and Merill accounts. It's less ideal for traders who don't have a strong relationship with Bank of America.
- tastytrade: tastytrade (previously called tastyworks) is an online brokerage account that offers stocks, ETFs, cryptocurrencies, options, futures, and more. Traders can choose to open a cash account or a margin account. The platform's educational blog, tutorial videos, and Follow Feed feature can be beneficial to beginners. But tastytrade, in general, is best suited for experienced active traders.
Why You Should Trust Us: How We Reviewed The Best Online Brokerages for Beginners
We applied Personal Finance Insider's rating methodology for investment platforms to consider the best online brokerages for beginners. We considered a dozen brokerages and zeroed in on options that offered competitive pricing and features most important to beginner investors and traders.
To make it onto this list, brokerages must offer commission-free stock and ETF trades and no recurring account fees (not including robo-advisors). Other important focus areas include available investments, types of accounts, and high-quality investment platforms. Strong investment research and education resources were another plus, but carried less weight in the decision process.