Best Roth IRA accounts of 2026

Roth IRAs and traditional IRAs are both tax-advantaged retirement accounts that are independent of your workplace. They both allow investments to grow over time, both have annual contribution caps and both come with rules about early withdrawals.

The biggest differences between the two are when your contributions are taxed and income limits that may affect your eligibility to contribute to a Roth IRA.

To determine which Roth IRAs are best, CNBC Select compared more than 20 accounts offered by national banks, investment firms, online brokers, and robo-advisors. Our top Roth IRA selections require no (or low) minimum deposits, offer commission-free trading of stocks and ETFs, provide a variety of investment options and have educational resources or tools that account holders can access.

See our methodology for more information on how we chose the best Roth IRAs.

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Who's this for? A Roth IRA at Charles Schwab is ideal for experienced investors because you can make after-tax contributions, buy and sell stocks, mutual funds and ETFs, and avoid paying taxes on qualified withdrawals. There are no monthly service fees and no account minimums. To open a Roth IRA at Charles Schwab, you'll need your Social Security number, your employer's name and address, if applicable, and any date of birth for inheritance recipients.

Standout benefits: For retirees-to-be, Schwab offers all the tools and resources to ease the transition, including planning calculators and expert market insights.

Who's this for? When opening a Roth IRA at Fidelity Investments, you can choose whether to have Fidelity pick and manage your investments (the Fidelity Go^® Roth IRA option) or to do it yourself. Either way, there's no minimum required to open your account.

Standout benefits: Newbie investors ready to dive in can rely on Fidelity's robust planning tools, support from Fidelity representatives, helpful explainer articles, personalized quizzes and even free educational webinars and events.

Who's this for? Betterment users can get guidance from Betterment's financial experts for a fee. The popular robo-advisor creates a retirement plan for you by estimating your future income needs and it has tools to help you figure out how much more money you need to save. You can set up recurring deposits into your retirement account and Betterment's technology makes sure that you don't contribute beyond the annual Roth IRA limits.

Standout benefits: Betterment will rebalance your portfolio automatically, notify you of any external accounts you may want to roll over, recommend deposit amounts to stay on track and provide automated tax-saving tools. Its Roth IRA offers multiple investment options, including "Innovative Technology" and "Climate Impact."

Who's this for? The Ally Invest Roth IRA allows beginner investors to dip their toes into the market in a DIY way through its Self-Directed Trading option. There's no account minimum to get started, plus no monthly maintenance fees or commission fees on stocks, ETFs or options.

Standout benefits: Ally offers plenty of articles on investing and banking, as well as inspirational personal finance stories from real investors

Who's this for? Wealthfront is a popular robo-advisor that offers the option to invest for retirement in a Roth IRA through automated index investing — meaning Wealthfront will build and manage your retirement portfolio for you so you can be totally hands-off. To do so, Wealthfront will ask questions about your financial goals, your investment preferences and questions to calculate your risk level before showing you a personalized portfolio.

Standout benefits: You can make portfolio adjustments as you'd like and choose to take on exposure to new opportunities, like tech and clean energy. Over time, Wealthfront's software will automatically rebalance your investments.

A Roth IRA is a retirement account invested in the market where you pay taxes upfront by contributing after-tax dollars, and later in retirement, your withdrawals are tax-free (as long as your account has been open for at least five years). Generally, Roth IRAs are best if you're in a lower tax bracket today than you think you'll be in when you retire.

Roth IRAs work by you contributing to your account consistently. Your money grows thanks to compound interest, which essentially pays interest on top of interest. Even when you aren't making contributions, the investments in your Roth IRA earn dividends or interest that get added to your balance. That interest earns more interest and so on.

To choose a Roth IRA, look for one that offers low fees and/or commissions, a variety of investment options to choose from, and tools to help you plan your retirement. The top picks on this list do just that. Note that not all investment options are the same everywhere you go. You can find Roth IRAs at both banks and online brokers.

With both Roth and traditional IRAs, you make consistent contributions that are invested in the market, where they grow over time.

However, Roth IRAs have a few features that set them apart:

• As long as your Roth IRA has been open for at least five years and you are age 59½ or older, qualified withdrawals in retirement are generally tax-free. Withdrawals from a traditional IRA are typically taxed as ordinary income.
• Contributions to a Roth IRA are made with after-tax dollars, so they won't reduce your taxable income for the year. Your finances may take a short-term hit, but your investments will grow tax-free.
• Roth IRAs are not subject to required minimum distributions during the original owner's lifetime..
• Eligibility to contribute to a Roth IRA depends on your tax filing status and income. As your modified adjusted gross income (MAGI) approaches the upper end of the IRS phaseout range, the amount you can contribute may be reduced or eliminated altogether.

A traditional IRA lets you defer paying taxes until you withdraw funds. Contributions are tax-deductible, up to certain limits, so they reduce your taxable income the year you contribute.

With a Roth IRA, taxes are paid on contributions upfront, so you're not taxed when you withdraw money from retirement (as long as your account has been open for at least five years).

A good rule of thumb when choosing between the two is to consider your tax bracket:

• Choose a Roth IRA if you expect to make more money in your later years and end up in a higher tax bracket.
• Choose a traditional IRA if you expect to be in a lower tax bracket when you begin withdrawing funds.

Many people have both a traditional IRA and a Roth IRA to diversify their tax exposure in retirement.

If you withdraw from a traditional IRA before age 59½, you'll be taxed and incur a 10% early withdrawal penalty.

With a Roth IRA, you can withdraw after-tax contributions at any age without paying taxes or penalties. Any earnings you withdraw early will incur the 10% penalty (and may be subject to income taxes). There are some exceptions, including withdrawals for first-time home purchases, college expenses and costs associated with a birth or adoption.

At CNBC Select, our mission is to provide our readers with high-quality service journalism and comprehensive consumer advice so they can make informed financial decisions. Every Roth IRA list is based on rigorous reporting by our team of expert writers and editors with extensive knowledge of retirement and investment accounts. While CNBC Select earns a commission from affiliate partners on many offers and links, we create all our content without input from our commercial team or any outside third parties, and we pride ourselves on our journalistic standards and ethics. See our methodology for more information on how we choose the best Roth IRAs.

To determine which Roth IRAs are the best for those looking to save for retirement, CNBC Select analyzed and compared Roth IRAs offered by national banks, investment firms, online brokers and robo-advisors. We narrowed down our ranking by only considering those that offer commission-free trading of stocks and ETFs, as well as a variety of investment options so you can best maximize your retirement savings.

We also compared each Roth IRA on the following features:

• $0 minimum deposit: Most of the Roth IRAs on our ranking don't have minimum deposit requirements.
• Low fees: We considered each Roth IRA's fees, commission trading fees and transaction fees.
• Bonus offered: Some Roth IRAs offer promotions for new account users.
• Variety of investment options: The more diversified your portfolio, the better. We made sure our top picks offer investments in stocks, bonds, mutual funds, CDs and ETFs. Most also offer options trading.
• A hub of educational resources: We opted for Roth IRAs with an online resource hub or advice center to help you educate yourself about retirement accounts and investing.
• Ease-of-use: Whether accessing your Roth IRA via your laptop at home or on your smartphone while on the go, it's important to have an easy user experience. We noted when an investment platform excelled in usability.
• Customer support: Every Roth IRA on our list provides customer service available via telephone, email or secure online messaging.

After reviewing the above features, we focused our recommendations mostly on their appeal to beginner investors who are likely just starting out in their careers, since Roth IRAs are the most effective retirement savings vehicles if you're in a lower tax bracket today than you'll be in retirement. For the purposes of this ranking, we focused only on Roth IRAs, though the best providers often overlap with those that offer the top traditional IRAs — read our list of the best traditional IRAs here.

Your earnings on contributions to a Roth IRA depend on any associated fees, the contributions you make to your account and the fluctuations of the market.

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