With the help of our comprehensive comparison calculator, you can find the best current broker offers for your needs at any time.
We would like to point out that when you open an account with one of these brokers, you are not making a contract with DieKleinanleger.com, but with the respective custodian bank – we therefore only offer our comparison calculator as an advisory tool.
Finding the right stock broker and online broker
No private investor can do without a broker – regardless of whether he or she trades in shares, certificates, funds or warrants. Even those who invest in ETFs definitely need a broker. The broker is consequently the most important link between the stock market and the trader – therefore, one should pay close attention to the selection of a suitable broker.
Not every broker is equally well suited for everyone. In this article, we will therefore explain which points you should pay particular attention to when choosing a broker – and how choosing the right broker can be done most easily.
Brokers and fees
If you just briefly compare several brokers, the first thing you will notice is that the fees for individual brokers can vary considerably.
These differences can be significant in the long run – and can significantly affect your overall trading performance. Higher fees than necessary will significantly reduce your profit in the long run, and this fact is often underestimated.
Finding a “cheap” broker, however, is not that easy: It mainly depends on what you trade with, where you preferably trade and to what extent you trade.
High discount scales are especially useful for frequent traders – for the occasional trader and the private investor, who only buys a few shares here and there, high discount scales usually do not pay off.
A day trader, on the other hand, has completely different requirements for a broker, which are primarily aimed at fast order execution – fees play a subordinate role here, if the broker regularly carries out orders too slowly, low order fees are of no use at all.
The growing number of private ETF traders will then have completely different demands in terms of fees, especially if ETFs are purchased through savings plans. On the subject of ETFs, there are also many critical voices which are discussed in this article.
There is no such thing as “the best broker” – each broker has a different focus and directs its offer primarily to a specific group of customers. Frequent traders, beginners, day traders, ETF savers and investors who are active in several areas – for each group of traders, there are a number of brokers who are particularly suitable and also offer the lowest fees in this field.
What you should always pay attention to when choosing a broker
No matter if broker or online broker: Safety is the main priority. For this reason, you should always choose brokers that have their headquarters in the EU and are therefore subject to EU regulations. This ensures protection for you as an investor as well as sufficient deposit protection.
Again and again, it has been assured that brokers can hardly become insolvent – but the past has shown that this can happen from time to time. However, you can at least rule out such risks for your money.
Another important point that should always be kept in mind is whether the broker supports the trading forms that you want to use. Many brokers have specialised in specific areas of trading and offer, for example, CFD trading or Forex, while others focus on warrant trading or OTC trading and disregard other areas. If possible, always choose the broker that offers the widest range of options for your preferred trading form – in this case, the fees are also usually the cheapest. You should also make sure that the trader you choose is active on the trading venues where you prefer to trade.
The next point to keep in mind is whether there is good quality support in your (native) language. Service and support lines should be available as quickly as possible and should be able to give you fast and understandable information in case of technical problems or questions. This quality criterion is unfortunately all too often overlooked – although some online brokers would deserve 5 out of 5 stars for their support. In some situations, such support is worth a lot of money, especially for beginners and newcomers, but also for professionals in trading.
If you are new or relatively new to trading, you should also make sure that your chosen broker offers a free demo account where you can practice and test all functions. Unfortunately, this is not the case with every broker.
For beginners, the amount of the minimum deposit often plays a role – some brokers often set the minimum deposit very high in order to attract serious and professional traders. As a newcomer or occasional trader with low order volumes, you will usually not be too happy with such brokers – in this case, it is better to look for other brokers.
What private investors that want to trade more professionally should pay attention to
Those who want to trade more professionally and on a larger scale should definitely take a close look at the trading platforms of the individual brokers. The range of functions can vary greatly between brokers – some offer simple and uncomplicated handling, but this is often at the expense of the range of functions.
Over time and with increasing trading experience, one usually develops preferences for certain platforms, uses certain functions regularly or needs certain charts for personal trading strategies. Anyone who has specific needs or wants specific functions should definitely clarify in advance whether a broker can offer those.
The speed of order execution often plays an important role, especially for day traders, as well as the so-called slippage. The slippage is the difference between the target price for an execution and the actual price during execution. For those who trade primarily in highly volatile market phases, a high slippage can mean considerable losses. With some brokers, the slippage is often above average – such brokers should best be avoided.
Those who mainly trade with high stakes or a high number of orders will also find that fees play an important role. This brings us to one of the most important points: the order fees.
Comparing broker fees
Of course, nobody wants to pay more fees than necessary. In order find the broker with the lowest fees, however, one must spend some time on comparing the different options.
The first point to compare are the custody fees. If you want to trade, you need a custody account. Many online brokers offer custody account management free of charge, but by far not all of them.
The second point gets a little more complicated: the order fees.
Usually, the order fees consist of a fixed and a variable component. In addition, there are fees for the respective trading venue or transaction fees. The individual fees vary from broker to broker. There are also different minimum and maximum fees for orders, which are also different for each broker.
This situation makes comparison very difficult – you can basically only compare the total price for a particular order because the fixed and variable portions can vary from order to order, resulting in a different total price for each broker.
In order to complicate matters even further, many brokers do not always charge the same fixed fees, but rather vary them according to the number of orders. If you place more orders, you will receive a lower price per order. Individual brokers also offer a certain amount of free orders or flat rates for specific areas.
The easiest way of finding the ideal broker
However, there is a fairly simple way of finding a suitable broker for your specific needs.
We have made a lot of effort to carefully compare the fees of the many online brokers and to check the individual conditions. The result: our broker comparison calculator which you can use to easily find the cheapest broker for your needs.
We have made a rough classification: beginners (Einsteiger), frequent traders (Vieltrader) and ETF savers (ETF-Sparer)
If you can clearly allocate yourself to one of these groups, simply click on the corresponding button and you will receive a detailed overview of the cheapest brokers for beginners (Einsteiger), frequent traders (Vieltrader) or ETF savers (ETF-Sparer) with the special features of each trader and the order and custody fees.
For beginners (Einsteiger), we take 10 orders per year and a trading volume of 3,000 euros as a basis. For frequent traders (Vieltrader), we base our calculations on 30 orders per year and an order volume of 6,000 euros. With a click on the cog wheel icon, you can always adjust these values according to your personal trading habits and then receive results adjusted to your specifications.
Those using ETF savings plans (ETF-Sparer) can specify the savings rate and payment method (monthly, bimonthly, half-yearly or yearly) and find the best broker for their individual payment requirements.
Finding the ideal broker couldn’t be easier 🙂