Best Brokers

core ranking · Primary query: best brokers for investing

Best Brokers for InvestingUpdated August 2026 · 12 brokers, every figure sourced

Written by
Juan Manuel Gonzalez
Published
Data verified

Quick verdict

On the evidence we can read and check, Interactive Brokers, Fidelity and Charles Schwab lead. All three combine a long, clean registration record with a zero-commission equity schedule; they separate on breadth. Interactive Brokers publishes the widest product range of any firm here. Fidelity offers the widest set of account types, including HSAs and solo 401(k)s. Schwab sits between them. None of these is a universal answer: the right broker depends on which of those three things you actually need.

The ranking

Safety and regulation 30% · Fees and total cost 30% · Investment selection 22% · Account types and features 18%

Verified August 28, 2026

Positions 1–2 are a statistical tie

Interactive Brokers, Fidelity finish within 0.08 points of each other on a 10-point scale built from whole-number sub-scores. That gap is smaller than the resolution of the evidence behind it, so the order between them is not a verdict. Read their sub-scores and pick on the criterion that matters to you.

Sub-scores are integers, so the bars carry more information than the order does.

  • Safety and regulation
  • Fees and total cost
  • Investment selection
  • Account types and features

Showing 12 of 12 brokers, sorted by editorial rank.

  1. Rank 1 of 12

    Interactive Brokers

    CRD 36418 · SIPC member

    Widest product range

    9.0

    Strong

    • Safety and regulation9
    • Fees and total cost9
    • Investment selection10
    • Account types and features8
    Account minimum
    $0No account minimums
    Stocks and ETFs
    IBKR Lite $0; IBKR Pro from $0.0035/share (tiered) or $0.005/share (fixed)Pro minimum $0.35 (tiered) or $1.00 (fixed) per order, capped at 1% of trade value
    To open
    $0No account minimums
    Account types
    8/12
    Visit Interactive BrokersFull review →

  2. Rank 2 of 12

    Fidelity

    CRD 7784 · SIPC member

    Most account types

    9.0

    Strong

    • Safety and regulation9
    • Fees and total cost9
    • Investment selection8
    • Account types and features10
    Account minimum
    $0No minimums to open an account
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Online US stocks and ETFs
    To open
    $0No minimums to open an account
    Account types
    12/12
    Visit FidelityFull review →

  3. Rank 3 of 12

    Charles Schwab

    CRD 5393 · SIPC member

    8.7

    Strong

    • Safety and regulation9
    • Fees and total cost8
    • Investment selection9
    • Account types and features9
    Account minimum
    $0$0 account minimum, $0 opening and maintenance
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Online listed stocks and ETFs
    To open
    $0$0 account minimum, $0 opening and maintenance
    Account types
    10/12
    Visit Charles SchwabFull review →

  4. Rank 4 of 12

    E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley

    CRD 149777 · SIPC member

    8.2

    Solid

    • Safety and regulation8
    • Fees and total cost8
    • Investment selection8
    • Account types and features9
    Account minimum
    Not verified
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Stocks, options base, mutual funds and ETFs
    To open
    Not verified
    Account types
    10/12
    Visit E*TRADE from Morgan StanleyFull review →

  5. Rank 5 of 12

    Merrill Edge Self-Directed

    CRD 7691 · SIPC member

    7.6

    Solid

    • Safety and regulation9
    • Fees and total cost7
    • Investment selection6
    • Account types and features8
    Account minimum
    $0No minimum for general investing accounts
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Online, no trade or balance minimums
    To open
    $0No minimum for general investing accounts
    Account types
    10/12
    Visit Merrill Edge Self-DirectedFull review →

  6. Rank 6 of 12

    tastytrade

    CRD 277027 · SIPC member

    Cheapest large multi-leg options orders

    7.4

    Mixed

    • Safety and regulation8
    • Fees and total cost8
    • Investment selection7
    • Account types and features6
    Account minimum
    Not verified
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Opening and closing
    To open
    Not verified
    Account types
    7/12
    Visit tastytradeFull review →

  7. Rank 7 of 12

    Vanguard

    CRD 7452 · SIPC member

    7.3

    Mixed

    • Safety and regulation9
    • Fees and total cost6
    • Investment selection6
    • Account types and features8
    Account minimum
    Not verified
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Online
    To open
    Not verified
    Account types
    11/12
    Visit VanguardFull review →

  8. Rank 8 of 12

    Public

    CRD 127818 · SIPC member

    7.0

    Mixed

    • Safety and regulation8
    • Fees and total cost8
    • Investment selection6
    • Account types and features5
    Account minimum
    Not verified
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0US-listed stocks and ETFs in regular hours. Extended hours and OTC are $2.99 per trade unless you hold Premium
    To open
    Not verified
    Account types
    4/12
    Visit PublicFull review →

  9. Rank 9 of 12

    Webull

    CRD 289063 · SIPC member

    7.0

    Mixed

    • Safety and regulation7
    • Fees and total cost9
    • Investment selection6
    • Account types and features5
    Account minimum
    $0No deposit minimum stated in the fee schedule
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0US-listed securities
    To open
    $0No deposit minimum stated in the fee schedule
    Account types
    5/12
    Visit WebullFull review →

  10. Rank 10 of 12

    TradeStation

    CRD 39473 · SIPC member

    6.8

    Mixed

    • Safety and regulation8
    • Fees and total cost6
    • Investment selection7
    • Account types and features6
    Account minimum
    $2,000Stated as the minimum to open and maintain a margin position; no cash-account opening minimum published
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0 per shareDirect routing adds $0.0032–$0.0048 per share by volume tier
    To open
    $2,000Stated as the minimum to open and maintain a margin position; no cash-account opening minimum published
    Account types
    6/12
    Visit TradeStationFull review →

  11. Rank 11 of 12

    Robinhood

    CRD 165998 · SIPC member

    Lowest options contract fee

    6.4

    Limited

    • Safety and regulation6
    • Fees and total cost8
    • Investment selection6
    • Account types and features5
    Account minimum
    $0No fees to open or maintain an account
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Commission-free stocks, ETFs and their options
    To open
    $0No fees to open or maintain an account
    Account types
    4/12
    Visit RobinhoodFull review →

  12. Rank 12 of 12

    eToro (US)

    CRD 298361 · SIPC member

    6.1

    Limited

    • Safety and regulation7
    • Fees and total cost8
    • Investment selection5
    • Account types and features3
    Account minimum
    Not verified
    Stocks and ETFs
    $0Zero commission to buy or sell a stock
    To open
    Not verified
    Account types
    1/12
    Visit eToro (US)Full review →

Positions are computed from published sub-scores at build time. Interactive Brokers, Fidelity, Charles Schwab lead; their unrounded totals are 9.04, 8.96, 8.70.

Why these weights

The default profile. Safety and cost carry the most weight because they are the two things a broker can get wrong in a way you cannot undo, and they are also the two we can source most completely.

Winners by category

  • Widest product range

    Interactive Brokers

    The only firm in our set publishing every asset class we track on a single schedule, across four regional markets.

  • Most account types

    Fidelity

    The only firm here publishing HSAs and solo 401(k)s alongside the full IRA, custodial and trust lineup.

  • Lowest options contract fee

    Robinhood

    $0.04 per equity options contract, against $0.65 at the incumbents and $1.00 at Vanguard.

  • Cheapest large multi-leg options orders

    tastytrade

    $1 per contract to open, nothing to close, capped at $10 per leg.

How we ranked these brokers

Each broker carries four sub-scores, each an integer from 0 to 10: safety and regulation, fees and total cost, investment selection, and account types and features. The total is a weighted mean of those four, expressed out of 10 and rounded to one decimal place.

We do not round to two decimals. The underlying evidence is a published fee schedule and a regulator's entity record; that supports a coarse integer judgment, not a figure like 9.73. If our scoring implied that kind of precision, it would be implying a measurement we never made.

Five categories that other sites score — platform usability, research, education, customer service and execution quality — carry zero weight here. Each rests on hands-on assessment rather than on a document a reader can pull up, and no such assessment is published on this site. Rather than infer them from marketing pages and present the result as a measurement, we leave them unweighted and say which they are.

What we verified, and what we did not

Every fee figure on this page was read from the broker's own published schedule on the verification date shown. Every legal entity, CRD number, SEC file number and registration status was read from FINRA's BrokerCheck firm records on the same date. Where a figure was not published on the page we read, the field is marked as unverified rather than filled with an estimate.

Two firms we researched — Public and SoFi Invest — are excluded from this ranking entirely. We confirmed both as active SEC-registered broker-dealers and SIPC members, but we could not read their fee schedules from a primary source. Scoring them anyway would have meant guessing, so they sit outside the table with the reason stated.

Safety is the pillar that behaves differently

Every broker in this table is an active SEC-registered broker-dealer and a SIPC member. SIPC coverage is capped at $500,000 per customer, of which no more than $250,000 may be cash. That coverage restores securities and cash missing from your account if the firm fails — it does nothing about a decline in the value of what you hold.

What separates the safety scores is operating history and enforcement record, not the existence of coverage. Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith holds SEC file number 8-7221, one of the oldest in the industry. eToro USA Securities holds 8-70212, one of the newest. Robinhood Financial scores lowest here not because its custody arrangements differ, but because in 2025 it settled a $29.75 million FINRA matter covering anti-money-laundering, supervisory and customer-disclosure failures, alongside a $45 million SEC settlement.

Zero commission is not the same as zero cost

Ten of the eleven brokers here advertise $0 stock and ETF trades. That headline hides most of what you will actually pay. Vanguard charges $1.00 per options contract and a $25 annual account service fee unless you take electronic statements. Webull charges $75 to transfer your account out. Merrill Edge charges $49.95 for the same move. TradeStation charges $10 a month if you go inactive. Schwab charges $6.95 on over-the-counter equities.

Interactive Brokers is the most instructive case. IBKR Lite is genuinely $0 on US exchange-listed stocks — but only for US residents, only on certain account types, and with OTC stocks, delisted ETPs, warrants, overnight trading and recurring investments all carved out and priced under the Fixed schedule instead. The published detail rewards reading.

Why each broker sits where it does

The figures that matter for investing, and the arithmetic that produced each position under this page’s weights. The same brokers rank differently elsewhere on this site because a different question is being asked; the sub-scores do not change, the weights do.

1.Interactive Brokers

9.0/10

INTERACTIVE BROKERS LLC · CRD 36418 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
IBKR Lite $0; IBKR Pro from $0.0035/share (tiered) or $0.005/share (fixed)
To open
$0
To transfer out
$0

Leads this ranking on 9.0/10. The largest single contribution is 9/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.7 of the total. Its 8/10 on account types and features adds 1.4 at 18%.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-47257), FINRA member, SIPC member, and part of a US-listed group. No headline retail enforcement matter identified in our sourced review.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Interactive Brokers

2.Fidelity

9.0/10

FIDELITY BROKERAGE SERVICES LLC · CRD 7784 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To open
$0
To transfer out
$0

Ranks 2nd on 9.0/10. The largest single contribution is 9/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.7 of the total. Its 10/10 on account types and features adds 1.8 at 18%.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-23292), FINRA member since 1979, SIPC member. Long operating history under a single entity, with no headline retail enforcement matter identified in our sourced review.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Fidelity

3.Charles Schwab

8.7/10

CHARLES SCHWAB & CO., INC. · CRD 5393 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To open
$0
To transfer out
$50 full, $0 partial

Ranks 3rd on 8.7/10. The largest single contribution is 9/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.7 of the total. Its 9/10 on account types and features adds 1.6 at 18%.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-16514) with one of the lowest CRD numbers in our set, indicating long registration history. SIPC member. No headline retail enforcement matter identified in our sourced review.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Charles Schwab

4.E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley

8.2/10

MORGAN STANLEY · CRD 149777 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0

Ranks 4th on 8.2/10. The largest single contribution is 8/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.4 of the total. Its 9/10 on account types and features adds 1.6 at 18%.

On safety and regulation: Accounts sit with an active SEC-registered Morgan Stanley broker-dealer (8-68191) that is a SIPC member. Marked one point below the long-single-entity firms because BrokerCheck lists the original E*TRADE Securities LLC registration as inactive, so clients have been through an entity migration.

Every fee, source and sub-score for E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley

5.Merrill Edge Self-Directed

7.6/10

MERRILL LYNCH, PIERCE, FENNER & SMITH INCORPORATED · CRD 7691 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To open
$0
To transfer out
$49.95 full account; $0 partial

Ranks 5th on 7.6/10. The largest single contribution is 9/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.7 of the total. Its 6/10 on investment selection adds 1.3 at 22%, and is what holds it back here.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-7221) — the lowest SEC file number in our set, indicating a very long registration history — and a SIPC member within Bank of America. No headline retail enforcement matter identified in our sourced review.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Merrill Edge Self-Directed

6.tastytrade

7.4/10

TASTYTRADE, INC. · CRD 277027 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To transfer out
$75

Ranks 6th on 7.4/10. The largest single contribution is 8/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.4 of the total. Its 6/10 on account types and features adds 1.1 at 18%, and is what holds it back here.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-69649), FINRA member and SIPC member. Scored below the incumbents on operating history — its CRD number places registration in the mid-2010s — with no enforcement matter identified in our sourced review.

Every fee, source and sub-score for tastytrade

7.Vanguard

7.3/10

VANGUARD MARKETING CORPORATION · CRD 7452 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To transfer out
$100

Ranks 7th on 7.3/10. The largest single contribution is 9/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.7 of the total. Its 6/10 on investment selection adds 1.3 at 22%, and is what holds it back here.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-21570) with a low CRD number indicating long registration history, and a SIPC member. No headline retail enforcement matter identified in our sourced review.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Vanguard

8.Public

7.0/10

OPEN TO THE PUBLIC INVESTING, INC. · CRD 127818 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To transfer out
$100

Ranks 8th on 7.0/10. The largest single contribution is 8/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.4 of the total. Its 5/10 on account types and features adds 0.9 at 18%, and is what holds it back here.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-66049), FINRA member and SIPC member, with no enforcement matter identified in our sourced review. Its CRD number, 127818, is lower than those of Robinhood, Webull, tastytrade and eToro, which means the legal entity has been registered longer than the app’s launch date suggests. Still well short of the multi-decade registration records that earn a 9 here.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Public

9.Webull

7.0/10

WEBULL FINANCIAL LLC · CRD 289063 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To open
$0
To transfer out
$75

Ranks 9th on 7.0/10. The largest single contribution is 9/10 on fees and total cost, weighted 30% here and worth 2.7 of the total. Its 5/10 on account types and features adds 0.9 at 18%, and is what holds it back here.

On fees and total cost: $0 on US-listed stocks, ETFs and standard options contracts, with regulatory fees itemised transparently. Held off a 10 by the $75 outgoing transfer fee, which is a real switching cost.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Webull

10.TradeStation

6.8/10

TRADESTATION SECURITIES, INC. · CRD 39473 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0 per share
To open
$2,000
To transfer out
$125

Ranks 10th on 6.8/10. The largest single contribution is 8/10 on safety and regulation, weighted 30% here and worth 2.4 of the total. Its 6/10 on account types and features adds 1.1 at 18%, and is what holds it back here.

On safety and regulation: Active SEC-registered broker-dealer (8-48711) and SIPC member with a registration history predating the newer app-first firms. No enforcement matter identified in our sourced review.

Every fee, source and sub-score for TradeStation

11.Robinhood

6.4/10

ROBINHOOD FINANCIAL, LLC · CRD 165998 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To open
$0
To transfer out
$100

Ranks 11th on 6.4/10. The largest single contribution is 8/10 on fees and total cost, weighted 30% here and worth 2.4 of the total. Its 5/10 on account types and features adds 0.9 at 18%, and is what holds it back here.

On fees and total cost: $0 commissions on stocks and ETFs and $0.04 per equity options contract — the lowest per-contract fee we recorded — alongside the lowest margin rates in our set, from 5.00% down to 3.95%. Marked down from 9 on 30 August 2026 after we read the standard fee schedule, which charges $100 to move an account out, on partial transfers as well as full ones. That is the joint-largest exit charge among the firms we publish.

Every fee, source and sub-score for Robinhood

12.eToro (US)

6.1/10

ETORO USA SECURITIES INC. · CRD 298361 · SIPC member

Stocks and ETFs
$0
To transfer out
$75

Ranks 12th on 6.1/10. The largest single contribution is 8/10 on fees and total cost, weighted 30% here and worth 2.4 of the total. Its 3/10 on account types and features adds 0.5 at 18%, and is what holds it back here.

On fees and total cost: $0 stock and ETF commissions with no per-contract options fee for US users, and $0 withdrawal fees. The full brokerage fee schedule, read on 31 August 2026, shows the costs the headline does not: $75 to transfer the account out, $10 a month in inactivity fees, and a 0.25% FX spread on non-USD wires. With crypto at a flat 1% as well, that is a wider fee surface than the zero-commission framing suggests.

Every fee, source and sub-score for eToro (US)

Every sub-score and why

The arithmetic behind every position on this page: each sub-score, the weight it carries here, and what it contributes to the total. If you disagree with a weight, these let you recompute the ranking yourself — that is the point of publishing them. The written reason behind each integer is on that broker’s review.

Interactive Brokers9 / 9 / 10 / 89.0/10Strong
Safety and regulation9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Fees and total cost9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Investment selection10/10 × 22% = 2.2
Account types and features8/10 × 18% = 1.4

Total 9.0/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Interactive Brokers review, with every fee and source
Fidelity9 / 9 / 8 / 109.0/10Strong
Safety and regulation9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Fees and total cost9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Investment selection8/10 × 22% = 1.8
Account types and features10/10 × 18% = 1.8

Total 9.0/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Fidelity review, with every fee and source
Charles Schwab9 / 8 / 9 / 98.7/10Strong
Safety and regulation9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Fees and total cost8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Investment selection9/10 × 22% = 2.0
Account types and features9/10 × 18% = 1.6

Total 8.7/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Charles Schwab review, with every fee and source
E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley8 / 8 / 8 / 98.2/10Solid
Safety and regulation8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Fees and total cost8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Investment selection8/10 × 22% = 1.8
Account types and features9/10 × 18% = 1.6

Total 8.2/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley review, with every fee and source
Merrill Edge Self-Directed9 / 7 / 6 / 87.6/10Solid
Safety and regulation9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Fees and total cost7/10 × 30% = 2.1
Investment selection6/10 × 22% = 1.3
Account types and features8/10 × 18% = 1.4

Total 7.6/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Merrill Edge Self-Directed review, with every fee and source
tastytrade8 / 8 / 7 / 67.4/10Mixed
Safety and regulation8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Fees and total cost8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Investment selection7/10 × 22% = 1.5
Account types and features6/10 × 18% = 1.1

Total 7.4/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full tastytrade review, with every fee and source
Vanguard9 / 6 / 6 / 87.3/10Mixed
Safety and regulation9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Fees and total cost6/10 × 30% = 1.8
Investment selection6/10 × 22% = 1.3
Account types and features8/10 × 18% = 1.4

Total 7.3/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Vanguard review, with every fee and source
Public8 / 8 / 6 / 57.0/10Mixed
Safety and regulation8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Fees and total cost8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Investment selection6/10 × 22% = 1.3
Account types and features5/10 × 18% = 0.9

Total 7.0/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Public review, with every fee and source
Webull7 / 9 / 6 / 57.0/10Mixed
Safety and regulation7/10 × 30% = 2.1
Fees and total cost9/10 × 30% = 2.7
Investment selection6/10 × 22% = 1.3
Account types and features5/10 × 18% = 0.9

Total 7.0/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Webull review, with every fee and source
TradeStation8 / 6 / 7 / 66.8/10Mixed
Safety and regulation8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Fees and total cost6/10 × 30% = 1.8
Investment selection7/10 × 22% = 1.5
Account types and features6/10 × 18% = 1.1

Total 6.8/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full TradeStation review, with every fee and source
Robinhood6 / 8 / 6 / 56.4/10Limited
Safety and regulation6/10 × 30% = 1.8
Fees and total cost8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Investment selection6/10 × 22% = 1.3
Account types and features5/10 × 18% = 0.9

Total 6.4/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full Robinhood review, with every fee and source
eToro (US)7 / 8 / 5 / 36.1/10Limited
Safety and regulation7/10 × 30% = 2.1
Fees and total cost8/10 × 30% = 2.4
Investment selection5/10 × 22% = 1.1
Account types and features3/10 × 18% = 0.5

Total 6.1/10 · sum of weighted contributions, rounded to one decimal

Full eToro (US) review, with every fee and source

How we evaluated

Safety and regulation30%
Evidence: FINRA BrokerCheck entity record — legal name, CRD number, SEC file number and registration status — SIPC membership, and public enforcement actions from the regulator or SRO that brought them.
Fees and total cost30%
Evidence: The firm's own published commission and fee schedule, read in full.
Investment selection22%
Evidence: The asset classes named on the firm's own published pricing or product pages.
Account types and features18%
Evidence: The account types named in the firm's own published account lineup.

Five further pillars — access and eligibility, platform and usability, research and education, customer service, execution quality — carry no weight in any ranking, because none of them can yet be settled from a document a reader can open. What each would require is set out in the methodology.

Researched but excluded

  • SoFi Invest (SOFI SECURITIES LLC, CRD 151717) — Legal entity confirmed via FINRA, but the fee page returned HTTP 403 when we attempted to read it. Re-attempted on 30 August 2026 against the published fee schedule PDF and the SoFi support articles: both returned 403 as well. Secondary summaries of SoFi’s pricing are available and we are not using them — we will not score a firm from anything but its own document.
Read the full methodology

Frequently asked questions

Which broker is best for investing overall?
Interactive Brokers, Charles Schwab and Fidelity finish within 0.08 points of each other and all display as 9.0 — that is a tie, not a podium, and the page says so above the table. 'Overall' is a weighting decision rather than a fact: if you will never trade a futures contract or a non-US listing, Interactive Brokers' product range earns it nothing and Fidelity's account-type coverage matters more. The sub-scores are published so you can re-weight them for your own situation.
Do you get paid by the brokers you rank?
As of the date on this page, we have no affiliate or commercial relationship with any broker listed, and every outbound link is a plain link. If that changes, the link will carry rel="sponsored", the relationship will be disclosed on the broker's row, and the score will not move. Scores are computed from published evidence by code that has no access to commercial data.
Why do you not score customer service or trading platforms?
Because scoring them properly requires evidence of a different kind. A platform score means using it with real money in a funded account; a support score means timed contact tests, repeated. Until that assessment exists and is published here, a number in those columns would be an opinion presented as a measurement.
Is my money safe at these brokers?
Every broker here is an active SEC-registered broker-dealer and SIPC member. SIPC protects up to $500,000 per customer, including a $250,000 limit for cash, and it covers the custody function only — it does not cover investment losses, bad advice, or a decline in the value of your holdings. Check any firm's current status yourself on FINRA BrokerCheck using the CRD number we publish on its row.

Sources

  1. [1]Interactive Brokers — Stocks, ETFs, warrants and structured products commissionsRead August 28, 2026
  2. [2]Interactive Brokers — Options commissionsRead August 30, 2026
  3. [3]FINRA BrokerCheck — Interactive Brokers LLCRead August 28, 2026
  4. [4]Interactive Brokers — Other feesRead August 30, 2026
  5. [5]Interactive Brokers — Mutual fund commissionsRead August 31, 2026
  6. [6]Interactive Brokers — Bond commissionsRead August 31, 2026
  7. [7]Interactive Brokers — Futures commissionsRead August 31, 2026
  8. [8]Interactive Brokers — Cryptocurrency commissionsRead August 31, 2026
  9. [9]Interactive Brokers — Margin ratesRead August 31, 2026
  10. [10]Interactive Brokers — Spot currency commissionsRead August 31, 2026
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