eToro Review

Rating – 4.3
Min. Deposit: $10
Max. Leverage: 30:1
Headquarter: Tel Aviv, Israel
Products: Forex, Indices, Commodities, Stocks, ETFs, Crypto

Our Take

eToro is a market-leading, multi-asset online brokerage and social trading network that enables you to seamlessly buy and sell leading cryptocurrencies and copy the trades of experienced crypto traders on the platform. eToro stands out with its intuitive user interface, providing a beginner-friendly trading experience.

Introduction

In addition to its cryptocurrency trading offering, eToro also allows you to invest in stocks, ETFs, and other securities, with the number and types of assets depending on your location. U.S. citizens can trade 21 digital currencies and tokens, over 3,000 stocks, more than 270 ETFs, and options contracts on a range of assets.

eToro was founded in 2007 as a forex trading platform in Tel Aviv by brothers Ronen Assia and Yoni Assia and co-founder David Ring. In 2010, eToro launched its flagship social trading feature that allows users to copy the trades of successful traders on the platform. Next, in 2013, eToro added stock trading to its forex and commodity trading offering and became one of the first brokers to support Bitcoin (BTC). In 2017, eToro expanded its crypto trading business by adding more assets and entered the U.S. market with its crypto trading offering the following year.

Today, eToro enables its more than 25 million customers from 140 countries to trade a variety of assets, including crypto, stock, ETFs, and more, making it one of the most popular online trading platforms in the world.

Pros & Cons

Pros

Established, global platform
Broad range of tradable crypto assets
Innovative and easy-to-use social trading experience

Cons

Only available in 47 U.S. states
Margin trading not available in the U.S.
Lacks advanced trading tools and features

Usability

eToro has a straightforward, simple user interface that makes it easy for traders to find what they’re looking for. The mobile app and web-based user experience provide similar functions and features, so users can seamlessly transition to trade through their preferred version.

eToro’s flagship CopyTrader feature allows you to quickly and easily search for and copy the crypto trades of popular traders on the platform, making it incredibly easy to get started.

The platform’s News Feed highlights eToro’s social trading network aspect, providing a social media-like experience, with users sharing their insights on what’s happening in the markets. That enables users to get to know the thought process behind many of the successful traders on the platform, making the choice of whether to copy these traders a lot easier.

Trade Experience

eToro provides a streamlined onboarding process with a self-guided questionnaire that asks for some personal information to help set up your account. The platform supports a wide variety of financial institutions that you can link up to eToro to make deposits into your account. Getting up and running doesn’t take long and you can start trading quickly. It is also easy to set up an eToro Options account, which lets you trade options in the eToro Options app.

On the eToro platform, a “Trading” tab lets you view prices and buy, sell, or convert crypto, ETFs, or stocks. Prices are provided in real time. eToro offers 21 cryptocurrencies, over 3,250 stocks, and more than 270 ETFs, covering the most important assets and securities. However, its list of tradable assets is not as vast as some of its peers. Additionally, users won’t find many order types beyond basic market and limit orders, which prevents more advanced traders from getting the most out of the system.

The flagship CopyTrader and Popular Investor Program features are arguably the highlights of the platform, enabling users to copy the trades of successful traders while the most successful traders earn rewards when their trades are being copied. These offerings, combined with the site’s interactive nature, can make the user experience feel more akin to a social media platform than a traditional brokerage service.

Custom watchlists can be synced between the mobile and web platforms, allowing users to keep track of their interests regardless of which version they use to access eToro. Watchlists can be customized to add volatility alerts that send notifications directly to your phone.

Mobile Trade Experience

eToro’s mobile app is user-friendly, with a simple, uncluttered design. The beginner-friendly user interface combined with the feel of a social media app makes for an innovative, creative user experience. The app is built with interactive functionality so you can engage with other traders and navigate to popular investor profiles.

Beginner investors may feel more comfortable with the app’s familiar feel since eToro is not modeled on other traditional brokerage offerings. Experienced traders looking to execute orders without the social feel may find eToro to be a bit of an adjustment, but overall the mobile app is very intuitive.

Range of Offerings

eToro provides a much wider range of offerings on international versions of the experience. The U.S. platform has very limited offerings compared to competitors. There are no mutual funds, futures contracts, or forex on eToro’s U.S. platform, and all trading is limited to long positions only—there is no short selling.

On eToro U.S., you have access to:

24 cryptocurrencies
3,250+ stocks
270+ ETFs
Crypto copy trading through CopyTrader
Options trading
Cash management through eToro Money
Portfolio automation through Smart Portfolios
Fractional share investing

Order Types

eToro only offers a narrow range of order types on its platform. They include market order, limit order, stop-loss order, and take-profit order.

Trading Technology

eToro doesn’t disclose order execution quality statistics, but it has a best execution policy and has a very low level of payment for order flow, suggesting that the broker follows it.

eToro’s Smart Portfolios lets you select from diversified automated portfolios so you don’t have to allocate your money yourself. You can invest in a wide variety of portfolios that focus on everything from private equity and infrastructure to technology and health care while blending the allocation of ETFs, stocks, and cryptocurrency. An investment team monitors the portfolio offerings to ensure that they continue to match thematic elements and risk parameters. These portfolios are particularly appealing to beginner investors.

The trading technology associated with ETF, stock, and crypto trading is relatively straightforward. Charting capability is included with all asset types, but no backtesting capabilities are included on the platform. Beyond that, screening tools and other more robust trading functionalities are largely absent. The CopyTrader product and social trading element remain the focus of eToro’s trading experience.

Costs

eToro’s fees are in line with most other online brokerages and crypto trading platforms.

Crypto trading incurs a 1% fee for the amount of crypto bought or sold. This fee is added to the bid-ask spread.
A fee is applied when you transfer your crypto assets from your eToro trading account to your eToro Money crypto wallet.
There are no fees or commissions for ETFs and stocks (ETFs may have their own internal costs).
There is a $5 withdrawal fee and a $30 withdrawal minimum. However, this withdrawal fee does not apply to Platinum, Platinum+, and Diamond Club members.
Withdrawals and deposits are conducted in USD, and any non-USD transaction fee will incur a conversion fee. Depending on the currency and payment method, the fee can range from 1.5% to 3.0% per transaction.
A $10 monthly inactivity fee is applied for users who have been inactive for more than a year.

How This Broker Makes Money From You and For You

eToro makes money by taking the difference between bid and ask prices. This practice is a typical way for brokers to price trades and collect fees, even if a platform notes fee-free or commission-free trading.16

Cryptocurrency: eToro charges a 1% fee for the amount of crypto assets bought or sold.
Other platform fees: eToro also charges fees for withdrawals and account inactivity.
Interest on uninvested cash: On Nov. 29, 2023, eToro announced the launch of an interest on cash feature. Available to eToro Options account holders, the new opt-in program offers 4.9% APR on cash balances and is free for eligible users with an at-rest cash balance of $5,000 or more. Users who opt into the program and maintain a cash balance of less than $5,000 in their account will still benefit from the offering but may be charged a small monthly fee.
Payment for order flow: Many brokers generate income by accepting payment from market makers for directing orders to those trading venues. This is called payment for order flow (PFOF). eToro’s PFOF agreement is with a clearing firm called Apex, although a February 2022 F-4 filing with the SEC states eToro does not practice PFOF.1819 The simple translation of the filing is that Apex may collect PFOF and share a portion with eToro, but the broker is focused on execution quality and not PFOF.
Price improvement: While eToro has a best execution policy, the company does not provide information on the actual statistics of this program.

Account and Research Amenities

eToro’s beginner-friendly platform enables users to search for and filter assets on its trading dashboard. Stock investors have the option of a simple stock screener, while crypto traders can browse from a menu of available coins or view portfolios of other investors and decide whether to use the CopyTrader feature to automatically copy popular traders.

eToro lacks many of the tools, calculators, and detailed trading functionality that most sophisticated investors would find necessary to carry out advanced trading techniques.

Stock Screener

eToro offers a simple stock screening tool that allows you to filter stocks by a range of criteria. The platform also offers a volatility tracker where you can view the biggest movers.

ETF Screener

While users can sift through a list of eToro’s available ETFs based on proprietary social inputs, there is no option to customize their search with helpful technical or fundamental indicators.

Mutual Fund Screener

Currently, there are no mutual fund screener tools are available, as this asset class is not offered on the platform.

Options Screener

Currently, eToro does not offer the ability to screen option contracts.

Crypto Screener

No crypto screener tools are available. Only the biggest movers of the day and trending assets are highlighted on the platform.21

Fixed Income Screener

Currently, there are no fixed income screener tools are available, as this asset class is not offered on the platform.

Tools and Calculators

eToro has no tools or calculators of note. Goal and financial planning tools are not offered.

Charting

eToro provides charting capabilities through a professional-grade technical tool, ProCharts. This charting feature helps you analyze an asset’s history and performance by providing line, bar, and candle charts. ProCharts also lets you view two or more charts on the same screen, enabling you to compare their performance.

ProChart users can filter their data by time interval or price. Some more sophisticated tools are available from the chart screen as well, including Fibonacci retracement and accumulative swing index. Users can place trades directly from the desktop chart.

Trading Idea Generators

CopyTrader provides the extent of trading idea generators at eToro. Users can search for, follow, and copy trades of investors that match their interests and goals. This feature is only available for crypto.

Education

An online educational portal is accessible through eToro Academy. While many of the articles provide information on cryptocurrency, other materials focus on products like the Smart Portfolio and trading strategies like technical indicators.

A filter lets you quickly toggle the educational library between beginner and advanced material so that you can customize the experience to your skill level. A variety of educational formats are available as well, with long-form articles and videos as options.

Customer Service

eToro provides a help center that has a large volume of FAQ articles that address a range of potential inquiries. Outside of this self-serve option, more traditional customer support options are limited. Phone and email support is available, but the contact information is not readily available for you to find. Chat functionality is provided through the help center so you can chat directly with an agent. You can also open a support ticket online.

Security and Reliability

Two-factor authentication (2FA) and biometric fingerprint entry
Equity assets like stocks and ETFs covered by the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC), which protects securities customers of its members up to $500,000 (including $250,000 for claims for cash)

In addition to SIPC insurance, eToro’s clearing partner, Apex, also added supplemental insurance, protecting eToro customers with up to $37.5 million in securities and $900,000 in cash per individual.

A digital wallet, known as the eToro Wallet, is provided by eToro to store cryptocurrency. Users can transfer cryptocurrency from eToro’s platform to their own digital wallet, but they should note that coin transfers are one-way—which means any coins transferred can’t be transferred back to the eToro trading platform.

Transparency

eToro generally has a transparent platform in terms of pricing but is lacking when it comes to execution statistics. Crypto pricing is explicitly laid out at 1% of all trades. There are no fees for stock and ETF trading, although some ETFs may carry additional expenses on their own. Spread pricing and payment for order flow (PFOF) information is available as well. The inability of users to transfer coins from the wallet back to the eToro trading platform may not be immediately obvious to clients.

Available Account Types

Individual brokerage and options accounts are the only types of accounts that can be opened with eToro in the U.S. Joint accounts, retirement accounts, trust accounts, and custodial accounts are not available. Just as notable, eToro doesn’t support margin accounts. This aspect can be a severely limiting factor for users looking to open accounts that are better suited for a wide variety of goals.

The Bottom Line

eToro is one of the most established online brokerages offering crypto trading services in the United States. The user-friendly interface, available on the web and mobile, provides easy access to a range of crypto assets. The platform’s CopyTrader and SmartPortfolios features further expand on the beginner-friendliness of the platform, making the crypto asset market more accessible for newcomers.

In addition to crypto trading, eToro users can also invest in stocks, ETFs, and options, providing a suite of products to choose from. However, the list of tradable assets across all supported asset classes is not as long as at some eToro’s competitors. Moreover, the lack of advanced trading tools, in-depth research, and margin trading makes eToro less suitable for experienced traders looking to deploy advanced trading strategies.

eToro is best suited for beginners and less experienced traders looking to trade the most popular cryptocurrencies (and other assets) as well as make use of the platform’s flagship copy trading feature. However, advanced traders looking to trade cryptocurrency may want to look at popular crypto exchanges to fulfill their crypto needs.