Today, all of the top online brokers offer $0 account minimums and commission-free stock and ETF trades. Some even allow for commission-free options trades. So for discount brokers to rise to the top, they 💟must also provide high-quality, robust trading platforms, solid investing and trading tools, good customer service, and a wide selection of tradable assets.
Investopedia’s researchers spent hundreds of hours compiling and collating data from various online brokerage firms and testing live platform demos. We concluded that Fidelity is the best overall online broker. Fidelity provides an all-around strong trading experience, doesn’t charge commissions on stock and ETF trading, and does not participate in 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:payment for order flow (PFOF).
Best Low-Cost Brokers for June 2025
- Best Overall: 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网: Fidelity
- Best Broker for Low Margin Rates, Best Broker for Fractional Shares, Best Low-Cost Futures Broker: 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网: Interactive Brokers
- Best Low-Cost Options Broker: Webull
- Best Broker for Earning High Interest on Uninvested Cash: moomoo
Best Overall : Fidelity
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- Account Minimum: $0
- Fees: $0 for stocks and ETFs, $0.65 per contract for options
No payment for order flow
Extensive investment selection
$0 commissions on stocks and ETFs
Physical branches avai🌞lable offering in-person customer support
Margin rates and account fees are low
Charges commissions on pr🎃oducts such as mutual funds, fixed income, and bonds.
Doesn’t offer futures trading
Cryptocurrency selection is limited
Could improve its virtual assistant an✤d portfolio analysis too♏ls.
We chose Fidelity as the best overall broker for low costs because of its no-fee stock and ETF trades, competitive fees for other asset classes, and low miscellaneous fees. Fidelity’s platform delivers these low costs while still providing every benefit of a full-service brokerage, such as user-friendly yet powerful trading platforms on all devices, great customer support, and a wide asset selection.
Founded in 1946 and headquartered in Boston, Fidelity has long been a household name in the brokerage industry. A pioneer and a veteran, the company has a storied history of innovation, both in terms of lowering costs for clients, and in expanding and improving its technology and product offerings to make it among the most comprehensive on the market. Today, Fidelity is a trading powerhouse catering to 39.2 million clients of all levels and holding $15.1 trillion in assets under administration.
Like most online brokers, Fidelity offers no-fee stock and ETF trades. Unlike the competition, however, Fidelity is able to do so while still providing every benefit of a traditional full-service brokerage. The company has solid trading platforms for every device, offers nearly every account type imaginable, and access to many asset types, including cryptocurrencies. It has a reputation for excellent customer support, even maintaining a network of physical locations–something very few brokers can boast about in 2025. Importantly, in contrast to most online brokers and even its arch-rival Schwab, Fidelity doesn’t accept payment for order flow, ensuring no conflicts of interest when executing your orders. Lastly, the interest it pays on unused cash is among the best in the industry. This combination of factors makes Fidelity the best choice for cost-conscious traders and investors.
Best Broker for Low Margin Rates, Best Broker for Fractional Shares, Best Low-Cost Futures Broker : Interactive Brokers
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Interactive Brokers
- Account Minimum: $0.00
- Fees: $0.00 commissions for equities/ETFs available on IBKR’s TWS Lite, or low costs scaled by volume for active traders that want access to advanced functionality such as order routing. $0.65 per contract for options on TWS Lite; that is also the base rate for TWS Pro users, with scaled rates based on volume. $0.85 per contract for futures, also scales with volume for TWS Pro users. 0.12%-0.18% on cryptocurrency trades depending on volume with a minimum $1.75 fee per trade
A wide selection of fractional shares
Low margin rates
Fees on futures contracts are among the industry's best
Excellent trade execution
The commission-free plan has limitation
Full advanced functionality is more costly
Trader Workstation r🐲equires a learning curve for beginnꦕers
Best Broker for Low Margin Rates
Interactive Brokers (IBKR) margin rates are among the industry’s lowest, and drop further for those who borrow large amounts on margin.
Best Broker for Fractional Shares
Interactive Brokers offers investors a wide selection of fractional stocks and ETFs at low cost. It also offers robust research scanners to help investors find stocks or ETFs to trade.
Best Low-Cost Futures Broker
Interactive Brokers offers global futures trading at a competitive starting price per contract of $0.85, and the fee drops to as low as $0.25 per contract for high-volume IBKR Pro clients.
Our extensive research has found Interactive Brokers to be the leader in three key categories of affordability - the best broker for low-margin rates, the best broker for fractional shares, and the best low-cost futures broker.
Founded in 1977 and headquartered in Greenwich, Connecticut, Interactive Brokers charges the lowest margin rates of the brokers we reviewed. Its rates are even lower for traders with larger accounts who borrow sums in the six- or seven-figure range. It also offers industry-leading 10,500+ stocks and ETFs in its fractional shares program, allowing clients to invest in the stocks they want regardless of the share price or their account size. Lastly, for those trading assets like futures, Interactive Brokers charges some of the lowest fees in the industry, further scaled down with volume.
Despite its affordability, even offering no-fee stock and ETF trades via the IBKR Lite plan, the company’s technology and product offerings are by far the most extensive on the market. Interactive Brokers offer access to unrivaled 160+ market centers in 36 countries while providing some of the most advanced trading platforms and competitive execution speeds on the market. IBKR’s continuous platform updates, like the recent launch of AI-powered news summaries and the pioneering of innovative market segments–most recently, with the launch of forecast contracts–reinforce its reputation as a global trading powerhouse.
Read our full 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Interactive Brokers Review.
Best Low-Cost Options Broker : Webull
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- Account Minimum: $0
- Fees: $0 commissions for stocks, ETFs, and options
Options contracts are $0.00
Solid resear꧂🎶ch, charting, and general options trading user experience
Extended market and aft💯er-market trading are available
Easy to se﷽t up an account and get options tradiඣng approval
Payment for order flow may reducꦏe trade execution quality
No mutual funds offered
Portfolio management tools are not as robust as on s๊omꦬe other platforms
Doesn’t offer access to human financial advisors
We chose Webull as thℱe best broker for low-cost optiꦡons trades as it offers no-fee options trading through an easy-to-use, powerful platform.
Webull was founded in 2017 as a discount online broker. While it doesn’t charge a commission on stocks and ETFs—in line with most online brokers—it truly stands out by also offering no-fee options contracts.
Despite marketing itself as a discount broker, Webull’s overall offering is quite impressive. The company has solid trading platforms with many advanced tools, including for options, and supports a wide range of tradable assets, even the more exotic ones like futures, fractional shares, and OTC stocks. It is also one of a handful of brokers that supports 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:24-hour trading. Lastly, the company has competitive margin rates and pays a great interest on uninvested cash -- and offers ever greater rates on cash, and even lower margin rates for subscribers to its $3.99/month or $40/year Webull Premium membership plan.
Webull is a great choice for options traders and any cost-conscious trader, but there are a few things to keep in mind. A non-issue for most, but the company does charge fees for “oversized” options trades, defined as those of 500 contracts or more. Webull also subsidizes its commission-free trading by receiving payment for order flow, which may impact execution quality.
Read our full 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Webull Review.
𒈔Best Broker for Earning High Interest on Uninvested Cash : moomoo
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- Account Minimum: $0
- Fees: $0 for stocks, ETFs, and options
Very competitive interest rate on uninvested cash
Low interest rate on margin balances
No commissions on U.S. stocks, ETFs, and options
Provides a good charting and trading user experꦍience
Limited account types
High fees on some account withdrawals
Limited investment selection
moomoo scores very high in almost every cost-related category, but where it really outshines the competition are its regular welcome offers for new clients. For example, right now you can get an unrivaled 8.1% APY on uninvested cash (for the first 3 months, then dropping to still impressive 4.1%), and receive up to 25 free stocks with a deposit of $2,000.
moomoo was founded in 2018, making it one of the newer discount brokers. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, it offers zero-commission trades on stocks, ETFs, and options. To attract customers, it regularly offers massive perks and bonuses, for example, right now new clients get a massive 8.1% APY on uninvested cash (for the first 3 months, then dropping to still impressive 4.1%), and receive up to 25 free stocks with a deposit of $2,000.
Even bonuses aside, with $0 fees for stocks, ETFs, and options, among the lowest margin rates in the industry, and some of the highest interest rates on uninvested cash – moomoo’s cost structure is tough to beat. The company’s platforms, including the recently launched new desktop software, are solid, charting is good, so are additional tools and features. On the downside, moomoo only offers stocks, ETFs, options, and fractional shares. It also only supports cash and margin account types, putting it significantly behind competition. Still, for most cost-conscious options traders, and particularly for those seeking great interest on uninvested cash, moomoo is a really solid choice.
Read our full 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:moomoo Review.
Survey Insight
According to 澳洲幸运5官方开🔯奖结果体彩网:Investopedia's latest Reader Survey, our readers reve🃏aled that they still own their favorite stocks, despite tariff and recession-related worries being among their top concerns.
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Why You Should Trust Us
Investopedia is committed to independently researching and analyzing the best discount brokers to give readers a factual, unbiased review of the best platforms in the industry. To write our review, Investopedia analyzed 27 online brokerage platforms and collected data based on the service it provides. We used this information to carefully evaluate each company based on trading technology, costs, customer support, and many other features investors find important to ensure that inventors are fairly informed to make the right decision for their financial needs. Investopedia started in 1999 and has been assisting readers in finding the best discount brokers since 2019.
Survey Insight
According to 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Investopedia’s latest ꦬReader Survey, readers still choose individual stocks as their top choice for where they would invest if they had an extra $10,000 on hand, even th൩ough their appetite for risk has faded since February. Thi💝s is followed by ETFs, money market funds, and CDs.
How Does a Discount Broker Work?
A 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:discount broker carries out buy and sell orders for investments at reduced—or zero—澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:commissions. These brokers are typically available online, and unlike 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:full-service brokers, they generally don’t offer much if any personalizedꦯ inv🐲estment advice.
Many brokers offer commission-free trading, which means there are no fees when investors buy or sell certain types of investments—like stocks and 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:exchange-traded funds (ETFs). However, some of these brokers still charge commissions on other types of investments like options and bonds.
Note then when brokers offer commission-free trading, they may 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:profit from trades in other ways. Some discount brokers rely on a practice known as 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:payment for order flow (PFOF). With PFOF, brokers receive payments when they route transactions to 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:market makers who execute the transaction.
How We Picked the Best Discount Brokers
We sent our researchers and subject matter experts on a quest to find the best discount brokers and trading platformsཧ by using our proprietary investor survey data, which they combined with other industry research and subject matter expertise. We collected data via a digital survey, which included 110 questions for each of the 27 brokerage firms in the survey. Our team collated the data♛ and verified the responses. For any missing data points, they reached out to the brokerage or did further independent research. The data collection process lasted from Dec. 20, 2024, to Feb. 19, 2025.
Once the data was collected and scored via our proprietary model, we were able to rate each brokerage's performance across 11 categories and 120 separate criteria. Each brokerage was then given a final score, which amounted to the weighted average of the criteria used in the 11 major categories.
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Investopedia / Tara Anand
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