Robinhood vs Public.com — which broker is better?

Pros

• Equity and ETF options carry no commission and no per-contract fee — only about USD 0.04 per contract of pass-through, against USD 0.65 at Schwab and Fidelity
• USD 0 commission on US stocks and ETFs, fractional orders from USD 1, and no account minimum
• Among the lowest retail margin rates in the US market, 5.25% on balances up to USD 50,000 on a standard account as well as on Gold (rates as of 16 September 2026), with the first USD 1,000 of margin interest-free for USD 5/month Gold subscribers
• Robinhood Gold pays 3.35% APY on eligible uninvested brokerage cash with no cap and no minimum — far above Schwab's default sweep
• Retirement accounts with a 1% contribution match, rising to 3% for Gold members — no other major US broker matches IRA contributions at all
• Futures at USD 0.75 per contract per side (USD 0.50 for Gold), plus index options at USD 0.50 (USD 0.35 for Gold)
• The mobile app is the benchmark for the category, with 90+ technical indicators and genuine feature parity with the web platform
• Around 22 cryptocurrencies alongside equities in the same account, plus prediction markets — an unusually broad retail shelf for one login

Cons

• Four significant regulatory settlements since 2020 — SEC USD 65m in 2020, FINRA USD 57m in 2021, NYDFS USD 30m in 2022 and FINRA USD 26m plus USD 3.75m restitution in 2025 — covering order-flow disclosure, supervision, AML and reporting failures
• USD 100 to transfer your account out, versus USD 0 at Fidelity — a deliberate exit cost, and one of the most common complaints on public review sites
• No bonds, no mutual funds, no international exchange access and no forex; the equity universe stops at US listings and ADRs
• Research is thin: no economic calendar, no sector heat maps, no yield curve tools and limited fundamental data, with AI Digests reserved for Gold
• Support has no direct phone line for prospective clients and no branches — it runs on in-app chat and callback requests, which is a poor fit for anything urgent
• No conditional order types or backtesting on any platform

Pros

• Options Rebate Program pays USD 0.06–0.18 per stock or ETF contract, typically more than the roughly USD 0.05 per contract of regulatory fees — a net-negative transaction cost that no competitor here matches
• Cheapest margin of the three: 5.15% base (Fed Funds Target Rate + 1.15%, with FFTR at 4.00% as of 17 September 2026), tiering to 4.20% above USD 50 million
• A real bond desk — fractional corporate bonds at 0.35%–0.50% of par, Treasuries at 0.10%–0.25%, plus customisable Treasury ladders and a 6-month T-bill account from USD 100
• Genuinely multi-asset in one login: stocks, ETFs, options, bonds, Treasuries, 60+ crypto assets, IRAs, Crypto IRAs and a high-yield cash account quoted at 3.30% APY in mid-2026
• Free ACH in and out, free incoming wires and free incoming ACAT transfers, with no minimum deposit
• Transparent, well-maintained public fee schedule — the version used for this record was updated 17 September 2026 and states every line item including the awkward ones
• Index options at USD 0.35 per contract for every customer, plus the exchange fees Public passes on

Cons

• US residents only — no international entity, so European, UK or DACH investors cannot open an account
• USD 100 to transfer securities out, plus USD 115 per security for a DRS transfer; both are the highest in this comparison
• No futures, no spot forex, no mutual funds and no desktop application — active traders will find the charting and depth-of-market shallow next to Webull or moomoo
• The options rebate is funded by payment for order flow, so you are accepting a routing model in exchange for the payment; the free Wholesale route is the default, and choosing Smart Order or Lit-Exchange routing costs USD 0.003 per share
• A USD 3.99 monthly inactivity fee applies to accounts under USD 70 with no six-month activity, and there is no paper-trading environment to practise in