Best Stock Investing App for Beginners
Guide
July 22, 2021
In the past few years, newer financial technology companies have disrupted the stock investing app industry — raising billions of dollars in the process to build better platforms for consumers. As a result, investors now have an abundance of options to choose from when picking the best stock investing apps .
Many of the older stock investing applications (i.e. TD, Fidelity and Charles Schwab) have focused on building their products for wealthy clients with millions of dollars to invest — lacking features tailored to everyday investors.
While emerging fintech companies build their investing apps with one person in mind: the consumer. These companies have focused on innovative products, better user experience and lower fees.
With features like social investing, copy trading, auto-investing — these are the stock investing apps you should be using, not the clunky, outdated investment platforms.
Content: Best Investment Apps
- The Best For Convenience: M1 Finance
- The Best For Trading and Crypto: eToro
- The Best For Beginners: Public
- The Best Stock Investing Apps: Feature comparison
The Best Investment Apps For Convenience: M1 Finance
M1 Finance differentiates itself from traditional stock investing apps — by offering both a stock trading and robo-advisor service. Investors can choose to buy individual stocks or select from over 80 different strategies that auto invests on your behalf.
Among all the stock investing applications, M1 Finance offers the most customizations and automation. By offering investing, banking and borrowing all in one app, M1 Finance has many unique features that a standalone investing app doesn’t.
Best for: Those who like customization/flexibility in managing their investments with the option to switch between active/passive investing. Also great for those who want to manage their finances in a single place.
Key Features:
- Expert portfolios: Choose from over 80 different portfolios with unique themes that auto invests on your behalf.
- Super app: M1 Finance offers a finance app that includes investing, borrowing, saving and spending tools.
- Smart transfers: Set up automatic transfers based on “rules” like investing excess cash past a certain point.
- Borrowing options: Borrow money to invest, pay down debt, or cover large expenses using your portfolio as collateral — interest rates as low as 2%.
Bonus: Investors can get up to $4,000 when transferring an account from a different brokerage.
One of the most iconic things with M1 Finance is its investing “pies” — a dashboard that beautifully lays out your portfolio holdings and shows your portfolio diversification.
Cons: Lack of more advanced investments like crypto, options, forex and futures trading.
The Best Investment Apps For Trading and Crypto: eToro
eToro is one of the fastest-growing investment platforms globally and one of the few that offers both stock investing and crypto trading. Over 20 million users in the world trade on eToro, making it one of the largest.
Unfortunately, in the US, eToro only offers crypto trading but has plans to launch its stock investing app in the US by the end of 2021.
eToro received its license to launch stock trading services in 2020 so expect it to come by the end of 2021. We’re excited for this one as eToro has several unique features that aren’t available on other platforms (see below).
Best for: Investors who are looking to trade cryptos and stocks. Although the app is not currently available in the US, opening an account just for crypto trading would be convenient once eToro opens its stock trading platform in the US.
Key features:
- CopyTrading: This is a eToro unique feature that lets investors see and copy the trades of top investors on its platform.
- Social investing: eToro offers a Twitter-like feed and the ability to follow other investors and create group chats with friends.
- Crypto trading: Unlike other stock investing apps listed here, eToro is the only one with crypto trading — the most popular cryptos including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, Dogecoin and more.
- Virtual portfolio: Learn to invest with a free $100k demo account.
- Educational resources: eToro offers lots of educational videos and step-by-step tutorials to teach investing basics as well as more advanced topics
Discover all of eToro’s features
Unlike other platforms, eToro’s non-US platform offers more advanced trading assets like options and forex trading. All these features will likely be available to US users once it launches in the US.
Cons: Only crypto trading is available in the US.
The Best Investment Apps. for Beginners: Public
Public is one of the newer stock investing apps, but the company has grown exponentially since being founded in 2018. Today, the app has over 1 million users. And there’s a reason why it has snowballed.
The stock investing app focuses on long-term investing and doesn’t allow day-trading and other risky investments like options trading and buying risky over-the-counter stocks.
Best for: Focusing on building a long-term portfolio without distraction from risky investments, Public is the app for you.
Public has a significant social investing component by building an app where investors can discuss and follow other investors — similar to eToro.
Key features:
- Social Investing: Public has a Twitter-like feed and the ability to follow other investors and create group chats with friends.
- Investing Themes: Browse through its various investing themes like Crypto Revolution, Dividend Stocks and Artificial Intelligence to invest in relevant companies.
- Town Halls: Live Q&A’s directly in the app with CEOs and leaders of public companies that are investable within its apps.
- Safety Labels: Public labels its stocks with tags that indicate if they filed for bankruptcy, are small-cap stocks and are other risky investments
Cons: No over-the-counter (OTC) stocks or options trading (which might not matter if you plan on investing in less risky stocks).
The Best Stock Investing Apps: Feature Comparison
Features |
M1 Finance |
eToro |
Public |
|---|---|---|---|
Fractional Investing |
✅ |
✅ (Outside US) |
✅ |
Commission |
0% |
0.75-2.9% (Crypto) |
0% |
Crypto Investing |
❌ |
✅ |
❌ |
Options trading |
❌ |
✅ |
❌ |
FDIC Insurance |
$250,000 USD |
$250,000 USD |
$250,000 USD |
Options trading |
❌ |
✅ |
❌ |
Country |
US Only |
US (Crypto) |
US Only |
Mobile app |
✅ |
✅ |
✅ |
Taxable accounts |
✅ |
✅ |
✅ |
Joint accounts |
✅ |
❌ |
❌ |
Roth IRA accounts |
✅ |
❌ |
❌ |
Continue reading our investing guides:
- Learn the commonly used terms in the stock market — to make your life easier when reading financial content.
- Learn how to pick stocks for long-term investment — by understanding the qualities to look for in a strong company.
- Discover the best tools for investing — which will help you find and research stocks, and managing your portfolio.
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