Best IRA Accounts for July 2026

Fidelity, which is the largest broker in the country and Investopedia's choice as the best online broker overall, is a great choice for IRA investors. Fidelity offers a range of IRA types with no account minimums or fees to open, while providing access to a wide selection of low-cost investments. Fidelity’s zero expense ratio index mutual funds in particular are an excellent option for building a very efficient retirement portfolio.

Fidelity offers something for investors at every level, with a helpful educational library, many financial planning tools, and a range of customer support options, including in-person help at over 215 Fidelity branches across the country. Fidelity also pays a competitive interest rate on uninvested cash, which can make a difference for investors during periods of high interest rates. In the last year, Fidelity has been working on streamlining platform workflows, improving the layout of its tools and resources, and upgrading its virtual assistant.

As with any investment platform, there is some minor room for improvement. Fidelity doesn’t offer futures trading, and it only offers limited access to commodities and crypto. Its portfolio analysis and planning tools could still be better organized on the platform. But overall, Fidelity has earned its place as the best full-service broker for IRAs by offering immense value at a low price. It has all the tools and resources you need whether you are looking to actively manage your retirement portfolio or have it managed by Fidelity Go, the firm’s digital investment manager.

Charles Schwab offers the best investor education and is ideal for beginner investors who can access a variety of educational material and guides about investing and planning for retirement. Charles Schwab, which was founded in 1971, offers several types of retirement accounts, including IRA custodial accounts, and its IRAs carry no account minimums or fees. Charles Schwab also provides customer support by phone, email, live chat, and at in-person branches.

In the past year, Schwab has seen the full integration of its acquisition of TD Ameritrade, with TD bank group and Schwab seemingly going their separate ways, although some relationships persist. With a CEO transition also now concluded, Schwab is expected to focus on increasing the brokerage’s capabilities and offerings again. The last major change was the introduction of 24 hour trading for the thinkorswim platforms in early 2024.

An often overlooked strength of Schwab’s IRA offerings is the ability to have Schwab Intelligent Portfolios manage your funds provided you have $5,000 to get started. Schwab Intelligent Portfolios doesn’t charge a management fee, so you only end up paying the expense ratios of the ETFs in your portfolio.

On the downside, Charles Schwab does not offer fractional ETFs investing and its fractional stock shares, Schwab Stock Slices, are limited to the S&P 500. While Schwab does offer spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs, it does not provide direct investment access to crypto in its IRA accounts. The company also pays a lower interest rate for uninvested cash than some competitors. 

Read the full Charles Schwab review.

E*TRADE, founded in 1982, makes it easy to withdraw your retirement savings when the time comes. E*TRADE’s Complete IRA allows you to take money out of your IRA immediately once you turn 59½ without waiting to complete paperwork. It also allows you to withdraw savings from your account using a debit card, checks, and bill pay — a faster and more accessible option than other brokers offer. And while you’re still building up your savings, E*TRADE offers zero-commission trades and two of the best trading apps on the market. 

It’s worth noting that E*TRADE doesn’t offer direct crypto investing. Though, it does offer spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs. The platform also requires a high minimum investment for some ETFs. It also offers a lower interest rate on uninvested cash compared to other brokers. But it’s still a solid choice for those who are nearing retirement and preparing to make withdrawals. 

There are some signs that E*TRADE is going to leverage its ties with Morgan Stanley to get more aggressive with zero-cost funds for customers, but this hasn’t happened yet. As it stands, E*TRADE’s overall retirement suite is quite strong with a range of tools and strong trading platforms for you to manage your account. If you don’t want to manage your IRA actively, you can go with prebuilt portfolios or let Core Portfolios do it for you ($500 minimum).

Read the full E*TRADE review.

Wealthfront, which launched in 2011, is ideal for hands-off investing because it’s a robo-advisor that uses technology to create and manage portfolios. It costs much less than a human financial advisor would. Investors simply set up their IRA on the user-friendly platform and then leave Wealthfront to design their portfolio. Investors can access goal-planning tools to figure out how much they should invest, and they can customize their portfolio across hundreds of categories, including crypto, clean energy, and emerging markets. 

Some of Wealthfront’s standout features, daily tax-loss harvesting and direct indexing, don’t apply to retirement accounts because of their tax protected status. That said, Wealthfront is still excellent at taking your risk tolerance and time horizon and creating an ideal portfolio that it will guide you along into building towards your goals. Wealthfront also offers a decent amount of customization for a fully automated solution, allowing you to tweak your allocations and add exposure to crypto, clean-tech, and so on. 

Wealthfront offers limited human support—no live chat or access to human financial advisors. It also charges an ongoing 0.25% annual fee and has limited IRA account options: Traditional, Roth, simplified employee pension (SEP), and rollover. All that said, it does a great job building and managing retirement portfolios without you needing to do much more than answer a few basic questions.

Read the full Wealthfront review.

A robo-advisor that launched in 2008, Betterment can create and manage an IRA investment portfolio automatically. Betterment—which offers a traditional IRA, Roth IRA, and SEP IRA—has a user-friendly platform that makes it easy to set goals and find a portfolio that fits your investment needs. While Betterment’s technology does much of the work, the company also offers access to human advisors—as long as you have at least $100,000 in your account and pay the 0.65% premium advisory fee. If your account balance is lower, you’ll have to rely on the platform’s technology to manage your portfolio.

The balance for human advice isn’t such a high hurdle in the context of a retirement account. With time on your side, you want your retirement nest egg to hit that and beyond. If you are transferring in another account or have otherwise already hit that balance with Betterment, you can still choose to stick with the digital investment management at the lower fee structure if you’re happy there.

Not uncommon amongst other robo-advisors is Betterment’s lack of full brokerage capabilities, which means investors can’t trade individual stocks or other investments. However, you can customize the funds in your portfolio and tweak allocations within reason.

Merrill Edge, created in 2010, provides access to human financial advisors across the country, making it a top choice for those who want more help as they invest in an IRA. Because the brokerage platform is run by Bank of America, investors can meet with advisors in person at Bank of America branches. Additionally, customers can also qualify for rewards and discounts on their accounts if they bank with Bank of America. This type of all-around financial ecosystem connection is rare when it comes to evaluating brokerages.

Merrill Guided Investing, the firm's robo-advisor, can also be used to manage your retirement portfolio. The account minimum is $1,000 and it will put you in a diversified portfolio you can ride until you hit the $20,000 minimum needed to access human advice. It is important to note that the advisory fee for Merrill Guided Investing and the hybrid human and guided are higher than average at 0.45% and 0.85% respectively.

Merrill Edge also lacks advanced trading tools and access to forex, crypto, and futures. But overall, the platform is a solid choice, ranking in the top quartile of the 26 online brokers that Investopedia reviewed for our Best Online Broker awards.

Since its founding in 1975, Vanguard has built its reputation primarily by offering index funds that track markets while keeping fees low. To this day, Vanguard still offers the largest selection of mutual funds and ETFs in the industry and is a good fit for investors who want to take a long-term, buy-and-hold approach to their IRA investments. No matter what brokerage you are building your retirement portfolio at, there is a good chance that Vanguard funds are in it.

Vanguard has continued to protect its reputation as the provider of high-quality, low-cost funds by announcing in February 2025 that it completed its largest expense ratio reduction ever. The main competition to Vanguard funds are no-cost funds like those offered by Fidelity. One reason Vanguard still wins in this category is that its funds are still portable at the end of the day and you can keep them in your portfolio even if you change brokerages for some reason. Vanguard also offers Vanguard Digital Advisor to manage your IRA for you. Within the program, some of the underlying fees are credited against your management fees, so the overall fee is a minuscule 0.15%-0.20% making it one of the most competitive robo-advisors for retirement accounts.

On the other hand, Vanguard might not be a good fit for people who want to trade actively, as the user experience can be clunky and the platform is missing some of the trading features and capabilities that other brokers offer. If you are looking to take a buy-and-hold approach to your retirement portfolio, as most of us should, Vanguard offers low costs, exceptional investment quality, solid educational materials, and great customer service.

Interactive Brokers (IBKR), which launched in 1977, provides investment offerings Interactive Brokers (IBKR), which launched in 1977, provides investment offerings that aren’t often seen in other IRAs, including a wide range of global assets because it gives investors access to 170 markets across 40 countries using 29 currencies, providing faster trade execution and advanced trading tools. IBKR seems to add markets every year to the point where additions are exchanges most investors in the U.S. would likely struggle to place, like the Ljubljana Stock Exchange in Slovenia.

It’s worth noting that IBKR’s Trader Workstation is complex and can be overwhelming for beginners. But the company has other features that are more accessible to new investors, including a growing educational library and the user-friendly IBKR Desktop platform and GlobalTrader app. Investors with smaller accounts will like Interactive Brokers’ fractional investing options. IBKR offers a wider range of fractional shares than any other broker we’ve ever reviewed.

IBKR’s Pro account charges commissions on every trade. A Lite version offers commission-free traders but has slower trade execution. Despite its active trading tilt, IBKR offers more markets, more assets, more fractional shares for your IRA than any other broker.

Read the full Interactive Brokers review.