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The best investment apps offer all kinds of investors access to worthwhile trading accounts and investment products on mobile devices and desktops. Get easy access to stocks, bonds, ETFs, crypto, and more with low fees, access to research, educational resources, and accessible user interfaces.
If you're interested in stock trading or other investment vehicles, a good place to start is with some of the best apps for trading stocks and other great investment apps with no fees.
Best Investing Apps of 2024
- E*TRADE: Best overall
- Betterment: Best robo-advisor
- Robinhood Investing: Best for active investing
- Acorns Invest: Best for mobile
- M1 Finance: Best for portfolio customization
- Ellevest: Best for goal-driven investing
- Vanguard: Best for retirement plans
- Wealthfront Investing: Best for socially responsible investing
Complete Editorial Review of the Best Investment Platforms
The best investment apps help you achieve wealth-building goals while diversifying your portfolio and providing the accessibility and convenience of mobile trading for the everyday investor.
Here are the best investment apps available to traders, as chosen by Business Insider's editors in 2024.
Best Investing App Overall
E*TRADE
E*TRADE is a one-stop shop for investing and the overall best app. Whether a seasoned investor or a beginner, you'll find what you want with this investing app. E*TRADE is also a great stock trading app for eliminating all stock and ETF trading fees.
E*TRADE's Core Portfolios is an app for trading stock and other assets if you're not interested in self-directed investments. After you fill out a risk profile to share your goals, time horizon, and risk tolerance, you'll get a recommended tax-sensitive portfolio of ETFs. E*TRADE also offers socially responsible ETFs and smart beta ETFs.
In addition to a more customized portfolio, these plans include one-on-one advising with a financial consultant.
What to look out for: While you can open an account and choose a Core Portfolio with $0 down, you'll need to fund the account with at least $500 to start investing.
Best for Automated Investing
Betterment
Betterment Investing is one of the strongest stock apps and robo-advisors for low-cost trading, account flexibility, CFP access, and goal-based investing. It offers stock ETFs, bond ETFs, and cryptocurrencies.
Betterment Investing offers cryptocurrency portfolios, socially responsible portfolios, tax-loss harvesting, personalized retirement plans, and options for charitable giving. You can use the investment app's goal-building strategies, such as retirement savings and income, creating a financial safety net, meeting cash goals, and building toward a major purchase.
What to look out for: You won't be able to access ongoing advisor access with a basic Betterment digital account, and only account holders with at least $100,000 get unlimited access with Betterment premium. Otherwise, ongoing financial guidance must be purchased for around $299 per session.
Best for Active Traders
Robinhood
Robinhood Investing is a top app for beginner investors looking for commission-free trading options for US-exchange-listed stocks, ETFs (and fractional shares of both), options, and cryptocurrencies. The stock trading app doesn't have a minimum account size requirement for stocks, ETFs, and options trades.
For access to larger instant deposits, research reports from Morningstar, and NASDAQ market data, investors can upgrade to Robinhood Gold for a $5 monthly fee. The membership includes up to $50,000 in instant deposits, plus $1,000 of margin and a 5.00% interest on any excess margin used.
What to look out for: Despite being one of the best investment apps for beginners, Robinhood doesn't offer a robo-advisor or automated features. Only hands-on traders should open an account with this investment app.
Best Investment App for Mobile
Acorns Invest
As one of the best stock trading apps for beginners, Acorns Invest is the best investing app for mobile traders seeking automated trading strategies and customized ETF portfolios. The simplified trading platform provides account holders with beginner-friendly charting tools, easy portfolio diversification, and ESG portfolios.
Acorns' easy-to-use interface is designed mainly for the convenience of investing through a mobile device. Users can open a regular individual brokerage account, IRA, custodial account, emergency fund, and cash account on the same platform.
What to look out for: Although fairly low-cost, Acorns is more expensive than some beginner-friendly investing apps. It requires at least a $3 monthly fee, and it offers plans up to $9 a month.
Best Investment App for Portfolio Customization
M1 Finance
M1 Finance offers some of the best-advanced features in an investment app. It offers brokerage accounts, cash management accounts, and lending, all under the same roof. On the investing end, you can trade stocks and ETFs on your own or choose from among 60 different curated portfolios, thanks to its Pies feature.
The investing app's Pies gives you two options: build your investment strategy with stocks and ETFs or choose from pre-built pies (also known as Expert Pies). With M1 Finance's Expert Pies, you can sift through multiple portfolios to find the Pie that best aligns with your personal goals (like general investing, responsible investing, retirement investing, and more).
Suppose you want to leave the maintenance of your portfolio to the professionals. In that case, you can use the investment app's auto-invest settings to schedule portfolio contributions and have M1 Finance automatically rebalance your investments when necessary.
You can access much more with an M1 Plus subscription. This includes a morning and afternoon trading window (standard M1 users' trades only execute during a morning window), custodial accounts, smart transfers, and more.
What to look out for: You can only invest in stocks, ETFs, and cryptocurrencies with M1 Finance. If you want to diversify your portfolio outside of these investment types, you may need to consider other investment platforms.
Best for Goal-Driven Investing
Ellevest
Ellevest is one of the best investing apps that encourages you to build an investment philosophy around your goals. Your access to these goals can vary based on your chosen membership plan.
Then, this female-forward online adviser takes it a step further and considers your gender, lifespan, and earning potential to create a custom portfolio of mostly ETFs. You can also opt for a socially responsible allocation if that's important to you.
As a fiduciary, Ellevest automatically rebalances and regularly updates your performance forecast, taking into consideration fees, taxes, and the occasional market crisis to show you whether you're on track to meet each of your goals — and what you can do to make up for it if you're not.
What to look out for: You'll have to spring for the higher-tier offerings if you want more specific guidance for your goals beyond "build wealth." Ellevest does not offer automated tax-loss harvesting, which can be valuable for investors with higher balances. As with any investment app that charges monthly fees rather than per-account advisory fees, it's important to note how much of your balance they represent.
Best for Retirement Plans
Vanguard
Vanguard is an undeniable leader in investing as one of the top online brokerages. The stock trading app offers a large selection of investment options, self-directed brokerage accounts, and managed account options. But Vanguard is the best investment app for retirement plans, such as a traditional or Roth IRA.
Vanguard offers SEP IRAs, 401(k) rollovers, individual 401(k)s, and SIMPLE IRAs. With a retirement account, you'll get access to numerous ETFs, such as Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF and Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF. You can also access Vanguard's All-in-One retirement funds.
On top of multiple retirement account options, Vanguard provides investors with a handful of retirement tools and additional resources, including tax loss harvesting features and ESG investing options.
What to look out for: Vanguard's managed accounts, including its robo-advisor, are pricier. It also doesn't have many options for advanced traders.
Best for Socially Responsible Investing
Wealthfront
Wealthfront is an investment app for folks looking for socially responsible investing options, tax-loss harvesting, and low-cost automated trading. This investment app is fairly low-fee with only a $1 ($500 for automated investing) minimum. It also has a low-cost bond ETF portfolio.
Socially responsible investing portfolios through Wealthfront are great for long-term investing goals. Moreover, these portfolios rely on Blackrock funds that track ESG indices. Socially responsible investing is available through Wealthfront's self-directed brokerage account and the investment app's robo-advisor.
Wealthfront also offers IRAs, smart beta investing, US direct indexing, auto-rebalancing features, and a handful of crypto selections.
What to watch out for: Wealthfront's robo-advisor platform has a higher minimum than competitor investment platforms. Plus, there's no ongoing human advisor access.
Best Investment Apps Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
How much money you need to start investing with an app varies by platform and the kind of account you're opening. Some investment apps for beginners don't require any minimum investment, while others may require much higher minimum requirements.
Yes. Like any investing platform, investing apps come with a degree of risk, as there's no guarantee that your investments will succeed. To mitigate this risk, you can invest in low-risk investments like bonds. Also, you can diversify your portfolio.
Investment apps are regulated by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) to ensure investment platforms are upholding industry standards and ethical business practices.
To choose the best investment app for you, consider your investment goals, risk tolerance, and time horizon. You should also consider the kind of investments you wish to trade, your investment style, and other features you need.
Why You Should Trust Us: Our Expert Panel on The Best Investment Apps
Investing feels more accessible than it's ever been. Whether you prefer a hands-off approach or love to pore over market research and make trades — or fall somewhere in between — the best investment apps and stock trading apps can make it that much easier to reach your goals.
Our list of best apps for investing skews toward so-called robo-advisors — which use an algorithm to manage your investments — because, in many ways, these types of stock trading apps feel more accessible to average investors; fees and balance minimums are generally low, and your big-picture goals can help create an individualized and diverse portfolio that doesn't require much ongoing maintenance.
But we've also included a few of the best online brokerages that offer both active trading and automated portfolios.
We interviewed the following three investing experts to inform our picks for the best investment apps:
- 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 and/or disadvantages of using an investment app?
Brian Fry:
"Using an investment app helps you better understand your financial situation. An app can greatly help to track progress toward financial goals and investment performance. [A disadvantage is that] using an app might lead to more trading instead of focusing on investing toward your financial goals."
Charlotte Geletka:
"An investment app can be great for keeping informed and up to date, but it can also allow you to make impulse decisions so proceed with caution."
Kaysian Gordon:
"It depends on how much guidance you're looking for. A robo-advisor can create a portfolio based on a series of questions you have answered. However, we know that as humans, we're way more complex than what a robo-advisor can provide."
Who should consider using an investment app?
Brian Fry:
"DIY investors should work with an investing app that best suits their situation. Whether that's the ability to trade investments online, have a robo-advisor, or [get] access to a call center. Every platform offers similar but different resources. The key is finding the one that works best for you."
Any other advice for those interested in investment apps?
Brian Fry:
"Choose the platform that simplifies the investing and rebalancing process and offers the best transparency. Find the app that provides the best user experience and greatest value to your unique financial situation."
Kaysian Gordon:
"It goes back to doing the research and looking at the things that are important to you."
Our Methodology: How We Reviewed The Best Investment Apps
People may have varying risk capacities and financial goals they're working toward, but you'd be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn't prefer a cheaper way to invest. Therefore, the cost was a huge factor in determining our list.
Personal Finance Insider's rating methodology for investment platforms examines companies that offer platforms that keep fees to a minimum (generally below 0.50% of assets under management, or AUM, for balances under $100,000) and offer a high-quality experience. In some cases, that means access to free financial planning tools — or financial planners themselves — and clear and easy-to-understand investment options.
We compared nearly two dozen brokerages, placing heavy weight on their advisory and trading fees, investment philosophy, investment options, and available account types. User experience is also important, so we looked at each brokerage's accompanying mobile app and scoured reviews on the Apple Store and Google Play to find out what regular users think of the product.
