Best IRA Accounts for September 2024 (2024)

Best IRA Accounts for September 2024

Best IRA Accounts for September 2024

Fidelity delivers the complete package of brokerage services for IRA investors. Its accounts come with a top-tier investment offering, excellent pricing, quality trading platforms, and in-person support from Fidelity’s brick-and-mortar centers.

As the largest broker in the country, Fidelity can offer plenty to its IRA investors. It provides a full range of IRA account types. Its IRAs have no account minimums or monthly fees, and they offer access to Fidelity's massive selection of low-cost investments. Fidelity also pays a decent interest rate on uninvested cash - a major factor to consider in periods of high interest rates, like the one seen currently.

Fidelity, Investopedia's choice as the best online broker overall, as well as the winner in numerous other categories, shines with its service. It offers an extensive library of educational resources, abundant financial planning tools, and industry-leading customer support options. Investors can even get help in person at over 210 Fidelity brick-and-mortar branches nationwide. That’s a key reason why it scored as the best full-service broker for IRAs.

Fidelity’s flaws are minor. Its plentiful analysis and planning tools could be better organized on the platform. Fidelity is also missing some investment options, such as futures trading, and it only offers limited access to commodities and crypto. Fidelity launched in 1946 and is headquartered in Boston. It continues to grow by providing quality investment options for clients of all needs, including IRAs.

Read the fullFidelity Investments review.

Charles Schwab makes it easy for investors to learn how to properly use an IRA. It provides user-friendly investment platforms, plenty of educational materials and live training sessions, and high-quality customer support, including in person.

Charles “Chuck” Schwab founded the Charles Schwab Corporation in 1971 as a discount brokerage to open investing to regular people. Headquartered in Westlake, Texas, Charles Schwab still focuses on supporting newer investors and offers the best investor education. Its website provides plenty of quality educational materials and guides on investing and retirement. Its IRAs have no account minimums or fees. Charles Schwab offers multiple retirement account types, including IRA custodial accounts.

If a customer needs help, they can reach Charles Schwab by phone, email, live chat, or at one of its in-person branches. Charles Schwab’s IRA accounts lack a few investment options seen elsewhere, such as fractional shares of ETFs and direct investments in crypto. However, Charles Schwab offers spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs. If you keep uninvested cash in your IRA, Charles Schwab pays interest, but the rate is low compared to others.

Read the fullCharles Schwab review.

E*TRADE’s Complete IRA account makes it easy for retirees to access their IRA savings. It offers multiple fast withdrawal options, including checks, a debit card, and bill pay directly from the IRA.

An IRA has two stages. First, you build up your savings, and second, you spend them in retirement. E*TRADE's Complete IRA product does an exceptional job with the second part. Once you turn 59½, you can immediately take money out of your IRA without waiting to complete paperwork. You can also tap into your IRA using a debit card, checks, and bill pay. It’s much faster and more accessible than other brokers.

E*TRADE also does a good job helping you build your savings first, with zero-commission trades and two trading apps for investors. It has a few minor downsides. E*TRADE doesn’t pay the best interest rate on uninvested cash, doesn’t have direct crypto investing, but does offer spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs. E*Trade also requires a high minimum investment for ETFs. Still, it’s a solid choice, especially as you get closer to retirement. E*TRADE launched in 1982 and has its headquarters in Arlington, Virginia.

Read the fullE*TRADE review.

As a robo-advisor, Wealthfront manages your IRA investments automatically. It does an excellent job for investors hoping to set it and forget it with their retirement plans.

Wealthfront is a robo-advisor. It uses technology to create and manage portfolios for investors at a much lower cost than a human advisor. You can use Wealthfront to set up your IRA and then leave the investment management to the platform, making it ideal for hands-off investing. The platform is user-friendly and does a terrific job designing your portfolio. You can customize across hundreds of categories like crypto, clean energy, cannabis, and many others. Wealthfront also offers goal-planning tools to help you figure out how much you need to invest and what is the right fit for your portfolio.

As a true robo-advisor, Wealthfront has limited human support. There’s no live chat and no access to human financial advisors. You do pay an ongoing 0.25% annual fee for using the service. Wealthfront also has fewer IRA account options and is limited to the main ones: Traditional, Roth, simplified employee pension (SEP), and rollover. Wealthfront was launched in 2011 in Palo Alto, California, where it continues to operate today.

Read the fullWealthfront review.

Betterment is a top-tier robo-advisor that still gives the option to get human advice. This powerful combination can offer the best of both worlds to IRA investors.

Betterment launched in 2008 as a robo-advisor. It is headquartered in New York City. As a robo-advisor, Betterment can create and manage your IRA investment portfolio automatically. In addition to the traditional IRA, it also offers Roth IRA and SEP IRA. The user-friendly platform makes it easy to set goals and find the right design for your portfolio. Even though Betterment is based on robo-advisor technology, you can still get support from human advisors. It’s a hybrid solution for those who want to use a robo-advisor without losing the human touch.

However, you need at least $100,000 in your account to access human advisors. Until then, you’d need to manage things with the technology alone. While you can customize the funds in your portfolio, you can’t trade individual stocks or other investments with Betterment as it doesn’t offer full brokerage capabilities.

Read the fullBetterment review.

Merrill Edge provides access to over 15,000 financial advisors across all 50 states and several U.S. territories. That’s on top of offering some of the industry's best research and investment platforms.

Merrill Edge is a brokerage platform run by Bank of America. It was created in 2010, after Bank of America acquired Merrill Lynch. These two long-time financial giants prioritize the human touch with investing. That’s why Merrill Edge provides access to human advisors nationwide, including at Bank of America branches. It can be an excellent choice if you want real-life support for your IRA. If you bank with Bank of America, you can qualify for rewards and discounts on all your accounts by using Merrill Edge as well.

It takes at least $20,000 to access human advisors with Merrill Edge. For DIY investors, the platform stands strong, ranking in the top quartile of the 26 online brokers we reviewed as part of our Best Online Broker awards. Where Merrill Edge falls short is its lack of advanced trading tools and inability to trade forex, crypto, and futures.

Read the full Merrill Edge review.

Vanguard is famous for its low-cost mutual funds. It offers the industry’s largest selection of low-cost funds along with top-tier customer service.

John Bogle founded Vanguard in 1975 in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, where it is still located today. Bogle designed the first index fund to track markets while keeping fees low. Vanguard continues to follow Bogle’s investment philosophy. It offers the largest selection of mutual funds and ETFs on the market, all at rock-bottom fees.

If you want to follow a long-term, buy-and-hold investment strategy for your IRA, Vanguard could be an excellent fit thanks to its low costs, quality educational materials, and supportive customer service. If you want to trade frequently, Vanguard might not be right for you. Its platform isn’t well designed for active traders, and is missing the features and capabilities offered by other brokers.

Read the fullVanguard review.

Serious IRA investors will appreciate Interactive Brokers. Not only does it offer an excellent range of U.S. investments, but it also provides trading opportunities across 34 countries using 27 currencies.

If you want to use advanced trading strategies with your IRA, consider Interactive Brokers (IBKR). It offers one of the widest investment offerings, including assets not commonly seen in other IRAs, like options, forex, futures, and American depositary receipts (ADRs). Interactive Brokers also gives you access to 150 markets across 34 countries using 27 currencies, making it the best for global assets. The Interactive Brokers platform provides faster trade execution and advanced trading tools, giving you an edge against the competition.

While IBKR's Trader Workstation is complex and requires a learning curve, the company has committed to making its platforms more accessible to beginners. With a growing library of educational content; available fractional investing; the recent addition of the user-friendly IBKR Desktop platform and GlobalTrader app (as well as other user-friendly platforms), Interactive Brokers is quickly gaining ground on the industry’s top all-around brokerage platforms.

IBKR's Pro account with full functionality charges commissions on every trade, but delivers excellent execution. There is a Lite version with commission-free trades available; however, it has slower trade execution. Interactive Brokers launched in 1977. Today, it is headquartered in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Read the fullInteractive Brokers review.