11 Best Investing Apps of April 2024

More about investing apps

Which features are most important when choosing the best investing app?

The most important thing to consider when choosing an investing app is how you're going to use it — if you're a frequent stock trader, you may require different functionality than someone who simply wants to monitor the performance of their long-term investments. Here's a Nerdy overview of the features you might consider when choosing the best app for you:

How much money do you need to start investing through an app?

Shockingly little. Thanks to micro-investing apps like Acorns and Stash, you can kick-start an investment portfolio with small amounts of money — just your spare change, in fact. Acorns, for example, sweeps a linked credit or debit card account, rounds up purchases to the nearest dollar and invests the change. Stash offers a similar opt-in feature that rounds up purchases to deposit money in a user's account.

Beyond the micro-investing apps, the amount of money you’ll need to begin investing after you open your account depends on the assets you intend to buy. Individual stock shares range from as little as a few dollars to hundreds or even thousands of dollars per share. Mutual funds often have minimums, but exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and index funds are more accessible to smaller investments.

Many of NerdWallet’s picks for best apps have no account minimum, so you can open an account right away and entirely online. Here’s more on what a brokerage account is and how to open one.

What can you trade through an investing app?

The mobile trading experience varies by broker — and so does the range of available investments. Typically, an app from a traditional online broker will offer the largest range of investment options, while smaller apps or start-ups tend to limit their selection.

Which investing app is best for stock traders?

Many of the apps above are good choices for stock traders, but to see a narrower list focused specifically on trading, check out our picks for the best stock apps.

What is the best investment app for beginners?

For new investors, working with a larger, established brokerage like Fidelity or Charles Schwab is often a good fit — their apps rate highly, and they also offer higher levels of educational support and strong customer service. You might also consider an investing app from a robo-advisor. Robo-advisors build and manage portfolios for you, often using ETFs, so you don't have to choose any investments yourself.

While the idea of buying individual stocks might be exciting, building a portfolio of stocks requires a fair amount of research and discipline. ETFs offer instant diversification in that they contain shares of multiple companies (dozens, even) like a mutual fund, but trade like individual stocks.

If buying individual shares of companies is something you’d like to do, see our guide on how to buy stocks.

Are investing apps safe?

Just as FDIC insurance insures bank accounts, SIPC insurance insures the money you have in your brokerage account (or robo-advisor account) up to $500,000. This includes investing apps. $250,000 of that total can be applied to protect cash that you haven’t yet invested. All of NerdWallet’s picks for best apps are members of the SIPC. (Here’s more on SIPC insurance and what it does and doesn’t protect.)

Some of the investment apps listed here also offer bank or savings accounts, which are FDIC insured against loss.

Investment apps typically also use industry-standard security measures, including two-factor authentication, hashing of passwords and encryption of personal information.

Can you lose money with an investing app?

That largely depends on how you invest your money within the app, rather than the app itself. Like traditional brokers, your investment decisions can determine how much money you gain or lose and how "safe" your money is overall. Some investments carry more risk than others — for example, individual stocks or cryptocurrencies are known to be riskier than bonds or Treasurys.