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Online Broker Reviews
Written by Sam Levine, CFA, CMT, Blain Reinkensmeyer
Edited by Carolyn Kimball
Fact-checked by Steven Hatzakis
January 23, 2024
Ally Invest has zeroed out transaction fees on mutual funds, which makes it a good choice for fund investors. Its universal accounts experience and easy-to-use website offer a convenient, attractively priced solution. Unfortunately, Ally is toward the bottom of the pack as far as trading features.
Pros & Cons
thumb_up_off_alt Pros
- As far as banking and brokerage combinations go, Ally delivers universal account access and instant money transfers between accounts. The broker ranked among our Best in Class for banking services for 2024.
- Ally offers $0 no-load mutual fund trades.
- We like Ally’s options matrix and trading ticket, especially for beginners.
thumb_down_off_alt Cons
- Ally Invest's trading tools trail (distantly) those of industry leaders TD Ameritrade, Fidelity, and Charles Schwab.
- Ally’s educational content, though strong, is hidden away. It isn’t available in the app and is hard to find on the website.
Overall summary
| Feature |  |
|---|---|
| Overall |  |
| Investment Options |  |
| Commissions & Fees | |
| Mobile Trading Apps | |
| Platforms & Tools |  |
| Research | |
| Customer Service | |
| Education | |
| Ease Of Use | |
feed Recent news
January 2024: Crypto ETFs. Ally Invest now allows trading of spot bitcoin ETFs in brokerage accounts.
Ally Invest Trading Platform Screenshots
Website:
Mobile app:
Customer service
To score Customer Service, StockBrokers.com partners with customer experience research firm Confero to conduct phone tests from locations throughout the United States. For this year's testing, 135 customer service tests were conducted over six weeks, with wait times logged for each call.
Customer service representatives were asked for assistance or details for prospective customers in several areas of broker services, including account opening, trading tools, apps, rollovers, active trading, and more. Here are the results for Ally Invest.
- Average Connection Time: <1 minute
- Average Net Promoter Score: 8.7 / 10
- Average Professionalism Score: 8.3 / 10
- Overall Score: 8.69 / 10
- Ranking: 4th of 13 brokers
What is Ally Invest?
Ally Invest is the brokerage arm of Ally Financial, which offers traditional banking services such as checking and savings accounts, mortgages, and consumer credit cards and loans.
Is Ally Invest a good broker?
Current Ally customers who are willing to accept a limited roster of features to manage most of their finances at the same firm will find Ally Invest to be, well, convenient. We were pleasantly surprised by the research available on the website.
Ally brokerage also has excellent fixed-income market access and research and offers a very wide choice of mutual funds. Short-term traders, mobile-only, and tool-hungry investors should consider other brokers.
Is Ally Invest good for beginners?
For beginners looking to bank and invest under one roof, Ally Invest could be a good place to start, especially if you already have ties to Ally.
Does Ally charge brokerage fees?
Ally doesn’t charge commissions or fees on no-load mutual funds and stock and exchange-traded funds (ETFs), except for stocks priced under $2, which have a minimum of $4.95 a trade and a maximum of 20% of the principal value. Options trades are 50 cents per contract, with no exercise or early assignment fees. Bond trades are $1 per bond. There are also incidental fees.
What is the minimum balance for Ally Invest?
Like many online U.S. brokers, Ally Invest doesn’t have a minimum balance and there’s no minimum deposit required to open an account, making it a good choice for investors who want to regularly invest in mutual funds.
How do I get my money out of Ally Invest?
Select “Transfers” at the top of the Ally Invest website to move money. Ally allows you to withdraw available cash or margin via ACH, a check, an instant transfer to your Ally account, or a wire.
Is Ally Invest good for day trading?
Ally Invest doesn’t charge stock commissions (like almost all brokers today) but is missing features many traders rely upon, such as Level 2 quotes, adjusting trades on charts, low margin rates, and detailed option data, among many others. See our five top picks in our 2024 Best Day Trading Platforms guide.
Is Ally Invest trustworthy?
Ally Invest is a member of both FINRA and the Securities Investor Protection Corporation, or SIPC, which carries protection for customer accounts in the event of a broker’s bankruptcy. It’s important to understand that, as with any broker, SIPC insurance does not protect against market losses — investing is a risky endeavor.
Is Ally Invest’s robo advisor any good?
Ally’s robo portfolios, also known as automated investing services, make it easy for investors to invest in portfolios aligned with their goals. Ally uses low-cost exchange-traded funds and rebalances them as market conditions change. The investment minimum is just $100 and Ally doesn’t charge for robo portfolios with cash allocations of 30%. Otherwise, the annual fee is 0.30% of assets under robo management.
How does Ally Invest make its money?
Ally Invest makes money in the same way that other banks and brokers do. On brokerage accounts, Ally makes money from the practice of payment for order flow, or PFOF, as do nearly all other brokers in this age of $0 trades. Read more about PFOF.
About Ally Invest
Ally Invest is the online brokerage arm of Ally Financial (publicly traded, "ALLY"), which also operates Ally Bank. Ally Financial is best known for its FDIC insured banking services through Ally Bank, which includes online banking (you can read a review of Ally’s high-yield savings account on our sister site, investor.com), auto financing, and home loans.
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StockBrokers.com Review Methodology
Our mission at StockBrokers.com is simple: provide thorough and unbiased reviews of online brokers, based on an extraordinary level of hands-on testing and data collection. Our ratings and awards are based on this data and our in-house experts’ deep authority in the field; brokers cannot pay for preferential treatment. Here’s more about trustworthiness at StockBrokers.com.
Our research team conducts thorough testing on a wide range of features, products, services, and tools for U.S. investors, collecting and validating thousands of data points in the process; this makes StockBrokers.com home to the largest independent database on the web covering the online broker industry. We test all available trading platforms for each broker and evaluate them based on a host of data-driven variables. All research, writing and data collection at StockBrokers.com is done by humans, for humans. Read our generative AI policy here.
As part of our process, all brokers had the annual opportunity to provide updates and key milestones and complete an in-depth data profile, which we hand-checked for accuracy. Brokers also were offered the opportunity to provide executive time for an annual update meeting.
Our rigorous data validation process yields an error rate of less than .001% each year, providing site visitors quality data they can trust. Learn more about how we test.
Ally Invest 2024 Results
For the StockBrokers.com 2024 Annual Awards, announced on Jan. 23, 2024, all U.S. equity brokers we reviewed were assessed on over 200 different variables across eight areas: Commissions & Fees, Investment Options, Platforms & Tools, Research, Mobile Trading, Education, Ease of Use, and Overall.
StockBrokers.com also presented “Best in Class” awards to brokers for additional categories Beginners, Options Trading, Futures Trading, Active Trading, IRA Accounts, Investor Community, Penny Stock Trading, Banking Services and Customer Service. A “Best in Class” designation means finishing in the top five brokers for that category.
For more information, see how we test. New to investing? Check out the 5 step guide on how to invest on our sister site, investor.com.
Category awards
 | Bank Brokerage | Customer Service |
| Rank #1 | ||
| Streak #1 | ||
| Best in Class | check | check |
| Best in Class Streak | 7 | 2 |
Ally Invest fees and features data
The data collection efforts at StockBrokers.com are unmatched in the industry. The following tables show a deeper dive into the offerings available at this broker. You can also compare its offerings side-by-side with those of other brokers using our Comparison Tool.
In addition to meticulous annual data collection by our in-house analyst, every broker that participates in our review is afforded the opportunity to complete an in-depth data profile. We then audit each data point to ensure its accuracy.
Trading fees
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Minimum Deposit | $0.00 |
| Stock Trades | $0.00 |
| Mutual Fund Trade Fee | $0.00 |
| Options (Base Fee) | $0.00 |
| Options (Per Contract) | $0.50 |
| Futures (Per Contract) | (Not offered) |
| Broker Assisted Trade Fee | $20 |
Account fees
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| IRA Annual Fee | $0.00 |
| IRA Closure Fee | $25.00 |
| Account Transfer Out (Partial)info | $50.00 |
| Account Transfer Out (Full)info | $50.00 |
| Options Exercise Fee | $0.00 |
| Options Assignment Fee | $0.00 |
Margin rates
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Margin Rate Under $25,000 | 13% |
| Margin Rate $25,000 to $49,999.99 | 12.75% |
| Margin Rate $50,000 to $99,999.99 | 12% |
| Margin Rate $100,000 to $249,999.99 | 10.75% |
| Margin Rate $250,000 to $499,999.99 | 9.75% |
| Margin Rate $500,000 to $999,999.99 | 9.25% |
| Margin Rate Above $1,000,000 | 8.5% |
Investment options
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Stock Tradinginfo | Yes |
| Margin Trading | Yes |
| Fractional Sharesinfo | No |
| OTC Stocksinfo | Yes |
| Options Tradinginfo | Yes |
| Complex Options Max Legsinfo | 4 |
| Futures Tradinginfo | No |
| Forex Tradinginfo | Yes |
| Crypto Tradinginfo | No |
| Crypto Trading - Total Coinsinfo | 0 |
| Mutual Funds (No Load)info | 13000 |
| Mutual Funds (Total)info | 14000 |
| Bonds (US Treasury)info | Yes |
| Bonds (Corporate)info | Yes |
| Bonds (Municipal)info | Yes |
| Advisor Servicesinfo | Yes |
| International Countries (Stocks)info | 0 |
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Order types
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Order Type - Marketinfo | Yes |
| Order Type - Limitinfo | Yes |
| Order Type - After Hoursinfo | Yes |
| Order Type - Stopinfo | Yes |
| Order Type - Trailing Stopinfo | No |
| Order Type - OCOinfo | No |
| Order Type - OTOinfo | No |
| Order Type - Broker Assistedinfo | Yes |
Beginners
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Education (Stocks)info | Yes |
| Education (ETFs)info | Yes |
| Education (Options)info | Yes |
| Education (Mutual Funds)info | Yes |
| Education (Bonds)info | Yes |
| Education (Retirement)info | Yes |
| Retirement Calculatorinfo | No |
| Investor Dictionaryinfo | Yes |
| Paper Tradinginfo | No |
| Videosinfo | No |
| Webinarsinfo | No |
| Webinars (Archived)info | Yes |
| Progress Trackinginfo | No |
| Interactive Learning - Quizzesinfo | No |
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Stock trading apps
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| iPhone Appinfo | Yes |
| Android Appinfo | Yes |
| Apple Watch Appinfo | No |
| Trading - Stocksinfo | Yes |
| Trading - After-Hoursinfo | Yes |
| Trading - Simple Optionsinfo | Yes |
| Trading - Complex Optionsinfo | Yes |
| Order Ticket RT Quotesinfo | Yes |
| Order Ticket SRT Quotesinfo | No |
Stock app features
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Market Movers (Top Gainers)info | Yes |
| Stream Live TVinfo | No |
| Videos on Demandinfo | No |
| Stock Alertsinfo | No |
| Option Chains Viewableinfo | Yes |
| Watch List (Real-time)info | Yes |
| Watch List (Streaming)info | No |
| Watch Lists - Create & Manageinfo | Yes |
| Watch Lists - Column Customizationinfo | No |
| Watch Lists - Total Fieldsinfo | 21 |
Stock app charting
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Charting - After-Hoursinfo | No |
| Charting - Can Turn Horizontallyinfo | Yes |
| Charting - Multiple Time Framesinfo | Yes |
| Charting - Technical Studiesinfo | 17 |
| Charting - Study Customizationsinfo | No |
| Charting - Stock Comparisonsinfo | Yes |
Trading platforms overview
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Active Trading Platforminfo | N/A |
| Desktop Trading Platforminfo | No |
| Desktop Platform (Mac)info | No |
| Web Trading Platforminfo | Yes |
| Paper Tradinginfo | No |
| Trade Journalinfo | No |
| Watch Lists - Total Fieldsinfo | 21 |
Trading platform stock chart features
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Charting - Adjust Trades on Chartinfo | No |
| Charting - Indicators / Studiesinfo | 117 |
| Charting - Drawing Toolsinfo | 36 |
| Charting - Notesinfo | Yes |
| Charting - Index Overlaysinfo | Yes |
| Charting - Historical Tradesinfo | No |
| Charting - Corporate Eventsinfo | No |
| Charting - Custom Date Rangeinfo | No |
| Charting - Custom Time Barsinfo | No |
| Charting - Automated Analysisinfo | Yes |
| Charting - Save Profilesinfo | Yes |
| Trade Ideas - Technical Analysisinfo | Yes |
| Charting - Study Customizationsinfo | 5 |
| Charting - Custom Studiesinfo | No |
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Day trading features
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Streaming Time & Salesinfo | No |
| Streaming TVinfo | No |
| Direct Market Routing - Stocksinfo | No |
| Ladder Tradinginfo | No |
| Trade Hot Keysinfo | No |
| Level 2 Quotes - Stocksinfo | No |
| Trade Ideas - Backtestinginfo | No |
| Trade Ideas - Backtesting Advinfo | No |
| Short Locatorinfo | No |
| Order Liquidity Rebatesinfo | No |
Investment research overview
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Research - Stocksinfo | Yes |
| Research - ETFsinfo | Yes |
| Research - Mutual Fundsinfo | Yes |
| Research - Pink Sheets / OTCBBinfo | Yes |
| Research - Bondsinfo | No |
| Screener - Stocksinfo | No |
| Screener - ETFsinfo | Yes |
| Screener - Mutual Fundsinfo | No |
| Screener - Bondsinfo | Yes |
| Misc - Portfolio Allocationinfo | No |
Stock research features
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Stock Research - PDF Reportsinfo | 2 |
| Stock Research - Earningsinfo | Yes |
| Stock Research - Insidersinfo | Yes |
| Stock Research - Socialinfo | Yes |
| Stock Research - Newsinfo | Yes |
| Stock Research - ESGinfo | No |
| Stock Research - SEC Filingsinfo | Yes |
ETF research features
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| ETFs - Strategy Overviewinfo | Yes |
| ETF Fund Facts - Inception Dateinfo | Yes |
| ETF Fund Facts - Expense Ratioinfo | Yes |
| ETF Fund Facts - Net Assetsinfo | Yes |
| ETF Fund Facts - Total Holdingsinfo | Yes |
| ETFs - Top 10 Holdingsinfo | Yes |
| ETFs - Sector Exposureinfo | No |
| ETFs - Risk Analysisinfo | Yes |
| ETFs - Ratingsinfo | Yes |
| ETFs - Morningstar StyleMapinfo | No |
| ETFs - PDF Reportsinfo | Yes |
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Mutual fund research features
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Mutual Funds - Strategy Overviewinfo | Yes |
| Mutual Funds - Performance Chartinfo | Yes |
| Mutual Funds - Performance Analysisinfo | Yes |
| Mutual Funds - Prospectusinfo | No |
| Mutual Funds - 3rd Party Ratingsinfo | Yes |
| Mutual Funds - Fees Breakdowninfo | Yes |
| Mutual Funds - Top 10 Holdingsinfo | Yes |
| Mutual Funds - Asset Allocationinfo | No |
| Mutual Funds - Sector Allocationinfo | Yes |
| Mutual Funds - Country Allocationinfo | No |
| Mutual Funds - StyleMapinfo | No |
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Options trading overview
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Option Chains - Basic Viewinfo | Yes |
| Option Chains - Strategy Viewinfo | Yes |
| Option Chains - Streaminginfo | Yes |
| Option Chains - Total Columnsinfo | 8 |
| Option Chains - Greeksinfo | 1 |
| Option Chains - Quick Analysisinfo | Yes |
| Option Analysis - P&L Chartsinfo | Yes |
| Option Probability Analysisinfo | Yes |
| Option Probability Analysis Advinfo | No |
| Option Positions - Greeksinfo | Yes |
| Option Positions - Greeks Streaminginfo | No |
| Option Positions - Adv Analysisinfo | Yes |
| Option Positions - Rollinginfo | Yes |
| Option Positions - Groupinginfo | Yes |
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Banking features
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Bank (Member FDIC)info | Yes |
| Checking Accountsinfo | Yes |
| Savings Accountsinfo | Yes |
| Credit Cardsinfo | No |
| Debit Cardsinfo | Yes |
| Mortgage Loansinfo | Yes |
Customer service options
| Feature | |
|---|---|
| Phone Support (Prospect Customers)info | Yes |
| Phone Support (Current Customers)info | Yes |
| Email Supportinfo | Yes |
| Live Chat (Prospect Customers)info | Yes |
| Live Chat (Current Customers)info | Yes |
| 24/7 Supportinfo | Yes |
Compare Ally Invest
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About the Editorial Team
Sam Levine, CFA, CMT
Sam Levine has over 30 years of experience in the investing field as a portfolio manager, financial consultant, investment strategist and writer. He also taught investing as an adjunct professor of finance at Wayne State University. Sam holds the Chartered Financial Analyst and the Chartered Market Technician designations and is pursuing a master's in personal financial planning at the College for Financial Planning. Previously, he was a contributing editor at BetterInvesting Magazine and a contributor to The Penny Hoarder and other media outlets.
Blain Reinkensmeyer
Blain Reinkensmeyer has 20 years of trading experience with over 2,500 trades placed during that time. He heads research for all U.S.-based brokerages on StockBrokers.com and is respected by executives as the leading expert covering the online broker industry. Blain’s insights have been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and the Chicago Tribune, among other media outlets.
Carolyn Kimball
Carolyn Kimball is managing editor for Reink Media and the lead editor for the StockBrokers.com Annual Review. Carolyn has more than 20 years of writing and editing experience at major media outlets including NerdWallet, the Los Angeles Times and the San Jose Mercury News. She specializes in coverage of personal financial products and services, wielding her editing skills to clarify complex (some might say befuddling) topics to help consumers make informed decisions about their money.
Steven Hatzakis
Steven Hatzakis is the Global Director of Research for ForexBrokers.com. Steven previously served as an Editor for Finance Magnates, where he authored over 1,000 published articles about the online finance industry. Steven is an active fintech and crypto industry researcher and advises blockchain companies at the board level. Over the past 20 years, Steven has held numerous positions within the international forex markets, from writing to consulting to serving as a registered commodity futures representative.
