Name: Schwab Intelligent Portfolios
Brand: Schwab Intelligent Portfolios

Tax savings, $0 management fees, paychecks in retirement, oh my! If any of those perks sound good to you, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios has you covered. Schwab Intelligent Portfolios is an affordable robo-advisor with standout perks and unbeatable pricing. Keep reading our Schwab Intelligent Portfolios review below to find out if it's a good fit for you.

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios could be a good fit for you if:

You want a robo-advisor with no management fee.
You're interested in a robo-advisor that shrinks your tax payments.
You'd like to generate a paycheck from your investments.

Ratings Methodology

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios

Our Rating:

Rating image, 4.5 out of 5 stars.

4.5/5

Bottom Line

With perks like automatic rebalancing and tax-loss harvesting, this robo-advisor could be a great choice if you're looking to invest at least $5,000.

Fees:

$0 per trade, $0 mgmt fee, 0.00% to 0.19% expense ratio

Account Minimum:

$5,000

Alternatives to consider

We believe in comparing options before committing. Here are two robo-advisors we recommend highly for you to compare side by side with Schwab Intelligent Portfolios when deciding which robo-advisor is right for you:

Offer	Stash	M1 Finance
Rating	Rating Rating image, 4.0 out of 5 stars. 4.0/5 Our ratings are based on a 5 star scale. 5 stars equals Best. 4 stars equals Excellent. 3 stars equals Good. 2 stars equals Fair. 1 star equals Poor.	Rating Rating image, 4.5 out of 5 stars. 4.5/5 Our ratings are based on a 5 star scale. 5 stars equals Best. 4 stars equals Excellent. 3 stars equals Good. 2 stars equals Fair. 1 star equals Poor.
Commissions	Commissions None	Commissions No commission, trading, or management fees for self-directed accounts. Platform fee of $3 monthly.
Account Minimum	Account Minimum $0	Account Minimum $100 for individual account, $500 for retirement account
Learn More	Learn More for Stash On Stash's Secure Website. Read Full Review	Learn More for M1 Finance On M1 Finance's Secure Website. Read Full Review

M1 is not a robo-advisor and only offers self-directed brokerage services.

Full Schwab Intelligent Portfolios review

Charles Schwab is one of the largest brokerage firms in the world, and it offers a variety of investment, wealth management, and other financial services. In this Schwab Intelligent Portfolios review, we'll take a deeper dive and look at the pros and cons of this robo-advisor platform.

Our ratings methodology

At Motley Fool Money, brokerages are rated on a scale of one to five stars. We primarily focus on fees, available assets, and account types; however, we also take into account features like research, education, tax-loss harvesting, and highly rated mobile apps. Our highest-rated brokerages generally include low fees, a diverse range of assets and account types, and useful platform features.

See our full methodology here: Ratings Methodology

Show More [ + ]

Show Less [ - ]

Top perks

No management fee

As a company, one of Charles Schwab's main goals is to bring low-cost investment solutions to the masses, and that is certainly reflected in Schwab Intelligent Portfolios. Investors are not charged any advisory fees, although there are small ongoing management fees for the underlying investment options. These fees (expense ratios) range from 0.00% to 0.65% of invested assets, although most of the investment funds Schwab uses in client portfolios are on the lower end of this spectrum. Schwab Intelligent Portfolios' overall weighted average ETF expense ratios range from 0.02%-0.19%.

Automatic rebalancing

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios offers automatic rebalancing to help maintain clients' ideal asset allocations.

Tax-loss harvesting

The platform also offers tax-loss harvesting, which can be a big perk for clients with larger account balances or who are in the higher tax brackets. In a nutshell, tax-loss harvesting is a strategy in which investments that have declined in value are strategically sold to help offset taxable capital gains from other investments.

Income strategies

Schwab offers its robo-advisor clients access to its Schwab Intelligent Income feature at no additional cost. This allows retirees and other income-seeking investors to generate a monthly "paycheck" from their account, and provides guidance on topics like safe withdrawal rates, required minimum distribution (RMD) guidance for traditional IRAs, and more.

Account types

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios offers a wide variety of account types. The platform supports standard brokerage accounts, IRAs (traditional, Roth, and rollover), SEP-IRAs, SIMPLE IRAs, trusts, UGMA/UTMA accounts, and more.

TIP

Buying your first stocks: Do it the smart way

Once you’ve chosen one of our top-rated brokers, you need to make sure you’re buying the right stocks. We think there’s no better place to start than with Stock Advisor, the flagship stock-picking service of our company, The Motley Fool. You’ll get two new stock picks every month, plus 10 starter stocks and best buys now. The average stock pick inside Stock Advisor is up 819% — more than 4x that of the S&P 500! (as of 10/21/2024). Learn more and get started today with a special new member discount.

What could be improved

Minimum deposit

One big negative factor that's likely to turn off many potential customers is the platform's requirement of a $5,000 minimum initial deposit. This is by far the highest required minimum among our favorite robo-advisors, and could make Schwab Intelligent Portfolios inaccessible for new and younger investors.

Access to human advisors

There's also no access to human financial advisors unless clients pay for the premium version, which we'll discuss later on.

How it works

How Schwab Intelligent Portfolios works: Schwab Intelligent Portfolios lets investors put their money to work in a portfolio of exchange-traded funds, or ETFs. These allow for diversified exposure to stocks, bonds, and other asset classes, and with a bare minimum of expense. Schwab uses just over 50 different ETFs in its automated portfolios, many of which are Schwab's own funds.

Basically, investors complete a short questionnaire that helps Schwab determine their risk tolerance and investment objectives, and the robo-advisor does the rest.

Services offered

When it comes to services and features, Schwab is among the best robo-advisors.

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios offers:

Automatic rebalancing
Free and automatic tax-loss harvesting
Automatic tax-friendly withdrawals

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios monitors client accounts daily and automatically rebalances as needed. In other words, if your initial questionnaire determines that you should have 50% of your money in stock-based ETFs and another 50% in bond-based ETFs, the platform will periodically buy and sell investments on your behalf to maintain this desired allocation.

Schwab is also one of the few robo-advisors that offer free and automatic tax-loss harvesting to clients. This is only offered to clients with $50,000 or more of invested assets, but can be a major benefit to investors with large accounts or who are in high tax brackets.

In addition, Schwab's Intelligent Income feature is a big differentiator, especially for clients who are at or near retirement age. This helps clients set up a recurring monthly withdrawal and automatically makes these withdrawals in the most tax-friendly manner possible. It also provides guidance on how much a client can safely withdraw and how much they need to withdraw from retirement accounts to satisfy required minimum distribution (RMD) rules.

Pricing and fees

As mentioned, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios is among the cheapest robo-advisor platforms. With no account management fees and minimal investment expenses, investors get to keep more of their returns than they would with some of its rivals.

Service/Item	Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Cost
Account Management Fee	0%
Investment Fund Fees	0.00%-0.65%
All-in Fees	0.00%-0.65% (portfolio weighted average fees range from 0.02% to 0.19%)
Other Account Charges	None (see premium discussion below)

Data source: Charles Schwab (as of Feb. 27, 2024).

It's worth noting that Schwab also has a premium version of its robo-advisor platform, known as Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Premium, which does have management fees. Premium clients pay an initial financial planning fee of $300 as well as an ongoing $30 monthly advisory fee, and there's a minimum balance of $25,000. Compared to the costs of hiring a financial planner, this is certainly a competitive offer. But it is also more expensive than the premium offerings from other leading robo-advisors.

However, you get what you pay for. Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Premium clients get unlimited one-on-one guidance from a Certified Financial Planner™, a customized financial plan to help meet their goals (such as buying a house or saving for college), and access to online financial planning tools. Premium clients can also link accounts from other financial institutions so they can view their entire financial picture in one place.

Customer service

There are two types of support that robo-advisor clients could need -- investment advice and help with technical issues. So let's take a look at how Schwab Intelligent Portfolios stacks up.

When it comes to investment advice, it isn't the best. Unless clients pay for the company's premium service, which costs $300 upfront plus $30 per month, there's no access to human financial advisors.

On the other hand, technical support is an area where Schwab Intelligent Portfolios shines. Customers have access to 24/7 U.S.-based support from real-live people.

This device is too small

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Review: For (Lazy) Active Investors