Best investment platforms is more than just selecting the stocks you want to buy and sell. A good online stock broker can serve as a teacher, advisor and investment analyst as you grow your portfolio and investing knowledge. The best investment platforms help you get started, build a solid foundation and stay focused on your goals as you develop as an investor.
As with last year, we weighed a number of factors to determine our list of the top investment platforms. We look at costs, investment account types and available investments (stocks, ETFs, mutual funds and bonds). We also consider whether the brokerage offers flat fees or percentage-fee accounts. Percentage fees take a smaller bite out of a small pot of money and leave more wealth to compound, but flat fees can add up quickly.
Best Investment Apps Canada: Smart Investing Made Easy
The winners and runners-up in this category reflect the diverse needs of beginner investors, advanced traders and anyone in between. Robinhood, which pioneered commission-free trading in the industry, won for focusing on simplifying investing to appeal to a wide range of people. It’s also one of the few online brokers that allows you to purchase no-transaction-fee mutual funds and ETFs, and it has a robust library of evergreen learning materials, coaching programs and live training events.
Schwab, which acquired TD Ameritrade in 2020, has the most comprehensive educational content among all online brokers and a deep set of tools for new traders and investors. Its intuitive website and mobile apps are easy to navigate, while its ETF Select List tool provides a diversified portfolio tailored to your financial goals. Moreover, its extensive proprietary research from Morgan Stanley and third-party analysis from Argus, LSEG/Refinitiv, MarketEdge and TipRanks earned it high scores in our research measures.
