The Robo Ranking

Highlights

• SoFi Automated Investing wins Best Overall Robo, combining strong performance with a low minimum, competitive pricing, and a feature-rich platform.
• The winners of Best Robo for Digital Financial Planning, Empower and Wealthfront, serve as an example of simple yet effective online planning.
• Fidelity Go won Best Robo for First-Time Investors due to its low fees, accessible digital platform, and live operational support.

Wealthfront wins Best Robo for Performance at a Low Cost, offering a low fee and robust returns for budget-conscious investors.

Performance scores are based on Sharpe ratios using 5-year returns and standard deviations as of 12/31/2024.

Best Overall Robo Advisor

• Winner: SoFi Automated Investing
• Runner up: Fidelity Go

SoFi Automated Investing earns the top spot thanks to a feature set that feels purpose-built for everyday investors. A $50 account minimum and a straightforward 0.25% advisory fee invite newcomers, while fractional-share trading puts every dollar to work from day one. After a short goals-based questionnaire, SoFi builds one of three portfolio themes it markets as Classic (core stock/bond ETFs), Classic with Alternatives (adds real-estate, private-credit and multi-strategy ETFs) and Sustainable (ESG-focused). Portfolios are monitored daily and automatically rebalanced when they drift more than 5% from target. Financial planning is a strength for SoFi Plus members, who can schedule unlimited 30-minute sessions with a CFP-credentials planner, but the digital tools are limited. Deeper retirement or what-if analysis is handled during consultations with SoFi’s CFP-credentialed planners. While planners can build and deliver complex plans outside of the main portal, its basic goal-tracking and projection charts live in the same web and mobile dashboard that also shows SoFi Checking & Savings, the SoFi Relay credit-score monitor, and any SoFi loans, giving members a consolidated view of their finances. Users can also link external bank, credit-card and brokerage accounts so balances outside SoFi appear alongside SoFi accounts. Add in weekday chat and phone support and the ability to set recurring deposits, and SoFi delivers a retail-friendly robo experience without skimping on professional touches.

SoFi Automated Investing’s strong performance metrics also contribute to their placement. Over the trailing five years, SoFi produced a 9.28% annualized return, topping its normalized benchmark by 0.83% and posting a Sharpe ratio of 0.59. Municipal bond exposure benefited it over the prior five years as municipal bonds outperformed corporate bonds, and their overweight to large-cap growth captured the outperformance of that style over this time period. SoFi’s underlying ETF expense ratio averages 0.13%, among the highest in our survey and nearly triple the 0.04% charged by some index-heavy rivals. Their advisory fee of 0.25% is in-line with other low-cost providers like Wealthfront and Betterment. Taken together, strong risk-adjusted returns, accessible pricing, and a growing planning ecosystem make SoFi Automated Investing our Best Overall Robo Advisor in the 2025 Summer Ranking.

Fidelity Go is our runner-up for Best Overall Robo in this year’s Robo Ranking Winter Edition. It stands out for its competitive fees and robust features. The platform charges no management fee for balances below $25,000 and imposes a 0.35% fee only once the balance reaches $25,000 or more. There’s no minimum balance required at the base level, but a $25,000 balance is needed to access live advisors. This cost efficiency makes it an attractive option for investors seeking a low-cost robo advisor. Fidelity Go also offers access to live operational support and licensed advisors (series 66 or 65), providing significant advantages to users. While Certified Financial Planners (CFPs) and dedicated advisors are not available at the base tier, the platform excels in financial planning, offering tools to build single and multi-goal financial plans, model various “what-if” scenarios, and determine retirement spending needs. The inclusion of Social Security estimates and the ability to incorporate pension income further enhance its comprehensive approach to retirement planning. Additionally, Fidelity Go delivers a superior customer experience with educational materials, a fully integrated digital advice portal, a mobile app, chat support, and account aggregation for a holistic financial picture.

Fidelity Go is the runner-up for Best Overall Robo in this year’s Robo Ranking Summer Edition. Fidelity Go stands out for its competitive fees and robust features. The platform charges a management fee of just 0.35%, with no minimum investment requirement at the base level and a $25,000 minimum, and no cost for accessing live advisors. This cost efficiency makes it an attractive option for investors seeking a low-cost robo advisor. Fidelity Go also offers access to live operational support and licensed advisors, providing significant advantages to users. While Certified Financial Planners (CFPs) and dedicated advisors are not available at the base tier, the platform does well in financial planning, offering tools to build single and multi-goal financial plans, model various “what-if” scenarios, and determine retirement spending needs. The inclusion of Social Security estimates and the ability to incorporate pension income further enhance its comprehensive approach to retirement planning. Additionally, Fidelity Go delivers a superior customer experience with educational materials, a fully integrated digital advice portal, a mobile app, chat support, and account aggregation for a holistic financial picture.

Fidelity Go achieved exceptional performance scores, making it one of the top performers in our tracked universe. The platform’s significant allocation to municipal bonds and its positioning with a bias towards large caps have contributed to its strong returns and risk-adjusted performance. Over the trailing five-year period, Fidelity Go’s portfolio managed to outperform its normalized benchmark by 0.78%, showcasing its effective investment strategy. Despite the challenges faced by equities and fixed income in 2022, Fidelity Go’s strategic asset allocation mitigated the effects of the broader market sell-off, resulting in solid performance. Overall, Fidelity Go is an excellent choice for investors, offering a blend of low fees, robust financial planning tools, strong performance, and user-friendly experience.

Best Robo for Performance at a Low Cost

• Winner: Fidelity Go
• Runner-up: Wealthfront

The Best Robo for Performance at a Low Cost category is designed for investors seeking the best performing portfolio. We measure performance based on total portfolio performance compared to the Normalized Benchmark and the portfolio’s Sharpe Ratio. For the five-year period ending June 30, 2025, Fidelity Go and Wealthfront emerged as top performers. This period encompassed some of the post-Covid recovery, as well as elevated inflation, rising geopolitical tensions, and rapidly increasing interest rates.

Fidelity Go’s equity positioning is typically market-neutral concerning its growth and value split. However, they allocate more to large caps on average, at 77% of the equity portfolio, compared to about 70% on average across all tracked robos over the trailing five-year period. This allocation greatly benefited performance as large caps were the best-performing size among equities over this period. On the fixed income side, Fidelity Go allocates all fixed income holdings to municipal bonds, one of the better-performing fixed income classes over the past five years. Wealthfront also maintains holdings in municipal bonds and TIPS, which have performed well relative to other fixed income classes over the past five years.

Wealthfront benefited significantly from its dedicated energy holding, which was advantageous during the prolonged inflation period and amid the disruption of energy markets following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. From the start of 2021 through the end of 2022, the energy sector, represented by the Vanguard Energy ETF, posted an average annual return of nearly 60%, compared to just 2.6% annualized for the S&P 500 during the same period. The outperformance of the value-tilted energy sector tracked the overall trend of value outperforming growth during that time.

Best for First-Time Investors

• Winner: Wealthfront
• Runner-up: Fidelity Go

Wealthfront is the winner in the Best Robo for First Time Investors category. Although it requires a $500 minimum, Wealthfront’s transparent 0.25% fee is competitive, and it offers one of the most advanced digital platforms in the robo space. The service’s intuitive planning features, particularly its free, in-depth planning tool, let users model different life events, plan for retirement, and even integrate external accounts for a holistic financial overview. Wealthfront’s streamlined, tech-forward approach, paired with automated portfolio management (including tax-loss harvesting for taxable accounts), makes it a strong option for beginners who are comfortable with a fully digital experience.

Fidelity Go takes the runner-up spot due to a combination of low costs, an accessible digital platform, and impressive long-term returns. Fidelity Go users will benefit from low fees through a combination of no-cost Fidelity Flex funds, as well as no management fee on the first $25,000 invested, making it especially attractive for investors with smaller amounts of money to start with. This combined with strong long-term performance due, in part, to its bias towards large-cap equities makes Fidelity Go a great option for first-time investors.

Best Robo for Digital Financial Planning

• Winner: Empower
• Runner-up: Wealthfront

The most significant effect that robo advisors have exerted on the financial advice industry is the democratization of expertly managed portfolios. Robo advisors have not just facilitated widespread access to advised accounts, but they have also enabled high-caliber financial planning to become available to anyone equipped with an internet connection and the readiness to invest the time into building a plan.

The winners of this category offer the best digital planners among the robos we track. The two winners of this category, Empower (formerly known as Personal Capital) and Wealthfront, offer their digital plans to anyone without the need to open an account. These platforms offer the ability to build a holistic financial plan by combining multiple goals into a single plan, while also aggregating outside accounts so investors can get a view of their full financial picture. They make planning for the future easy by enabling users to model future life events, such as Social Security and other retirement income, as well as life events such as windfalls and other custom inputs, all while presenting it in an easy-to-use manner and offering it in the standard, free versions of their services.

Empower remains at the top of our list when it comes to financial planning tools. The robo enables users to plan for retirement, home purchase, education, and general saving among other goals with a plethora of in-depth tools. The retirement fee analyzer looks at your portfolio’s holdings and estimates what portion of your portfolio will be lost to expense ratios, while the planner allows you to set up multiple spending goals along with projected future income and calculates a probability of success in the stated goals. The planner also allows you to map out a plan to pay down debt alongside your current savings, as well as an emergency fund. It will aggregate outside accounts and present you with a consolidated display of your monthly cash flows, overall net worth, and other views of your finances in a single dashboard. The robo offers a feature called Investment Checkup that explains how and why you should be rebalancing your portfolio, while taking into account your age, risk tolerance, and portfolio composition. Through its ability to aggregate outside accounts, it is also able to analyze positions held elsewhere. Overall, Empower continues to be our top pick for robos related to financial planning due to its in-depth planning tools offerings, including a multi-goal financial plan and the ability to customize inputs specific to the investor.

Wealthfront’s digital planning tools are representative of their digital-first philosophy, eliminating the need for human advisors and the higher fees attached to them. The planning tool allows for goals specific to retirement, education, home buying, and travel, with the home buying module utilizing Redfin data. While it is a little more complex than Empower’s, the planning tool comes with a high degree of customization like projecting retirement income such as Social Security, windfalls, real estate, and other details, allowing for users to build out complex plans. It also utilizes a feature called Self-Driving Money, which is a set of automated or semi-automated features that enable users to invest excess cash held in their bank accounts. This allows for users to integrate their spending and saving habits with their long-term goals. Wealthfront’s planner continues to be a premier example of innovation among robo advisors.

Best Robo for Complex Financial Planning

• Winner: Vanguard
• Runner-up: Empower

While some digital planning tools do a good job modeling complex situations, those with complex planning needs may still benefit from access to live advisors alongside robo planning, or a hybrid model. Vanguard wins the title for Best Robo for Complex Financial Planning. Their hybrid advice model allows access to a live financial advisor at a minimum investment of $50,000 for just 0.30% in management fees. For a $500,000 investment, investors get access to a dedicated adviser, available for the same low fee. This allows investors to model multiple financial goals and get a comprehensive view of their assets at a price point far below the 1% management fee typically charged by a traditional financial advisor.

Empower, the runner-up for Complex Financial Planning combines access to a live planner with one of the best digital planning platforms on the market. Empower has a high minimum investment at $100,000 and a high management fee at 0.89% but offers some stand out features. Aside from its planning tools, Empower offers investment options such as an SRI portfolio, and direct indexing, and for those with more than $5,000,000 on the platform, alternative investments like private equity are also available. Empower also offers a feature called Smart Withdrawal which simplifies the process of determining where to withdraw retirement spending funds, and how to do so in a tax efficient manner. This feature can assist with more complex decisions, like whether tax gain harvesting should be considered, or if a Roth conversion may be beneficial. These features combine to make Empower one of the best robo options for complex financial planning, even with its higher fees.