How Forbes Advisor Rates Investing Products

Forbes Advisor strives to make smart financial decisions simple. We aim to turn aspirations into reality by providing consumers with the knowledge and research they need to make informed financial decisions they can feel confident in.

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Online brokerage trading platforms are essential tools for accessing markets. The companies that offer online brokerage platforms have eliminated commissions on many if not most tradable asset classes, which means that evaluating and choosing the best products requires in-depth research and analysis.

The Forbes Advisor investing team examined over 100 different features and variables for the top online brokers available on the market today—from commissions and costs to customer service and investment offerings—to determine which platforms were best for different types of users.

The data we collected has helped us create several lists of the best online brokers for different categories including the best online brokers for beginners and the best day trading platforms. In addition, the same dataset has informed individual reviews of each of the top online brokers in our survey.

Robo-advisors are an increasingly popular choice for retirement investing. These easy-to-use, low-cost platforms provide savvy retirement savers with managed investment portfolios that are tailored to their specific needs and goals.

Forbes Advisor retirement experts analyzed 180 variables, including costs and a wide range of features, for each robo-advisor platform in its survey of the industry. Platforms were evaluated for fees, customer service, investment portfolio composition, account minimums, availability of human advisors and financial planning capabilities.

The data we collected has helped us create a list of the best robo-advisors. In addition, the same dataset has informed individual reviews of each of the top robo-advisors covered in our survey.

Investment apps offer users an easy and convenient way to manage their investments, track their portfolio performance and make informed decisions. In today’s world, these apps are many investors’ go-to source for monitoring their investments. However, with so many options available, choosing the right app can be overwhelming.

Forbes Advisor has compiled a list of the best investment apps by evaluating more than 20 platforms and ranking them based on their unique features. While hundreds of data points were collected and assessed by the Forbes Advisor team, particular attention was paid to usability, fees, investment profile, trading ability and educational materials.

The data we collected has also helped inform individual reviews of each of the top investment apps covered in our survey.

Crypto exchanges are a gateway to investing in cryptocurrency. With hundreds of crypto exchanges available on the market today—not to mention the tens of thousands of cryptocurrencies to choose from—would-be crypto investors can feel overwhelmed by the choices available to them in this new asset class.

The crypto experts at Forbes Advisor have ranked the leading crypto exchanges by assessing the full gamut of costs and features that come with these trading platforms. Crypto exchanges were primarily evaluated based on the range of cryptocurrencies available for trading, plus basic and advanced trading features, and costs.

The data we collected has helped us create a list of the best crypto exchanges and the best crypto exchanges for staking. In addition, the same dataset has informed individual reviews of each of the top crypto exchanges covered in our survey.

The world of cryptocurrency investing can be complicated, and security is always top of mind for crypto investors. Therefore, it is essential to choose the right crypto wallet to store the private keys for your cryptocurrencies and allow you to send and receive crypto payments.

Forbes Advisor’s crypto experts have assessed the leading crypto wallets—both hot and cold—and recommended the top options. Each wallet was evaluated based on eight key variables: stablecoin availability, access to top cryptocurrencies, usability, staking availability, customer service, costs and fees, security and additional features.

The data we collected has helped us create our list of best crypto wallets. It has also helped inform individual reviews of some of the crypto wallets covered in our survey.

Choosing the best stocks for your investment portfolio is a challenging, time-consuming process that demands a high level of commitment. Equity markets are dynamic, which means the best stock choices today are almost guaranteed to be completely different from the best options a year ago or a year in the future.

Forbes Advisor’s best stock lists aim to help people understand the world of investing in individual equities by providing well vetted, professionally composed lists of stocks that we consider to be great choices in a wide range of different stock market sectors. We rely on the expertise of qualified financial professionals to create and maintain our best stock listings.

The best stock listings published on Forbes Advisor should not be considered to be investment advice, as the securities on these lists may not be right for your individual investing goals and risk tolerance. We encourage investors to do plenty of their own research to ensure the stocks they own are aligned with their particular needs. As always, past performance is not indicative of future results.

Mutual funds and exchange-traded funds offer regular investors a great way to invest in every corner of the market while leaving most of the hard work of choosing the right assets to the professionals. There are countless fund options available for every variety of investor with wildly different fees and costs, making it very challenging to choose the right one for your goals.

The best mutual fund, index fund and ETF lists published by Forbes Advisor are designed to point investors in the right direction as they choose the best options for their portfolios. Each best funds list is created by an experienced, qualified financial professional.

Forbes Advisor’s best fund listings should not be considered to be investment advice, as the funds on each list may not be right for your investing goals and risk tolerance. We encourage investors to do plenty of their own research to ensure the funds they own are aligned with their needs. As always, past performance is not indicative of future results.

In addition to providing rankings of online brokers, robo-advisors, crypto exchanges and crypto wallets, Forbes Advisor offers readers reviews of the companies included in those rankings, as well as many of those companies’ competitors. The foundation of our reviews is the data acquired during our rating process.

Once the ratings data has been parsed and collated for the purposes of rankings, we provide each company reviewed with a star rating from one to five. We then dive back into the data to answer our questions concerning attributes such as technology, resources, customer service and more with regard to the companies we’ve ranked.

Forbes Advisor’s investing product and platform reviews are impartial and have no input whatsoever from the companies being reviewed. We encourage investors to make the most of our reviews when choosing a product or platform. However, we always recommend conducting a thorough review process of your own, of which Forbes Advisor’s review and rating system should only be a part.

The Forbes Advisor investing team is staffed by the following expert editors: Michael Adams, Rae Hartley Beck, Paul Katzeff and Lisa Dammeyer.

Each story we publish faces a detailed vetting process. At least two staff editors give each story an in-depth editorial review and fact-check. After an article is formatted for publication, the initial editor reviews the article once more prior to publishing.

In total, an article is reviewed at least three times before publication, ensuring accuracy.

Accurate ratings are our first priority. The Forbes Advisor editorial team updates investing product data and methodology-based articles regularly to ensure all information and ratings remain accurate. In some cases, specific articles may be updated more frequently, depending on the product.

The Forbes Advisor investing and retirement team has more than 70 years of combined experience writing about and educating readers on financial topics. This includes our editorial team members working for multiple local, national and international business and investment publications as well as the Social Security Administration, mutual fund companies and other financially-adjacent organizations and businesses.

We receive no direct compensation from any of the companies we write about, rank or review. This allows us to remain unbiased and true to our mission as well as our readers’ needs. Every article we publish goes through a lengthy editorial process, which includes fact-checking, three internal reviews and the potential of advisory board oversight.