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T. Rowe Price and Vanguard are similar in that they both focus on long-term investing through their own funds. In addition to their funds, however, both of these firms offer online brokerage accounts for investors looking to build up portfolios. T. Rowe Price and Vanguard are largely focused on their own financial products, so neither brokerage platform is particularly strong compared to some of the leading online brokers that are solely brokerages rather than extensions of fund firms. That said, they do provide the ability to trade stocks, ETFs, mutual funds, and fixed income, and can be a solid, affordable fit for investors with simple tastes in terms of investing.
We’ll look at some of the key differences between Vanguard and T. Rowe Price to help you determine which one is the right fit for your investment needs.
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- Account Minimum: $2,500 ($1,000 for IRAs)
- Fees: No commissions online or by mobile app for stock and ETF trades; $0 or $35 for mutual fund trades; further fees apply for options and broker-assisted trading
- Best For: Those looking for full-service wealth management
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- Account Minimum: $0
- Fees: $0/stock and ETF trade, $0 plus $1 per contract for options
Usability
The account opening process was slow at Vanguard and requires several days of waiting. T. Rowe Price allows you to open an account and start trading in 10 minutes. While Vanguard’s platform has been updated, it is still not as easy to navigate as more modern interfaces. That said, it can be customized for investors’ interests.
T. Rowe Price’s platform has an awkward two-tiered process that initially brings you to a homepage showing balances for mutual funds and the brokerage account, with an additional link to the brokerage platform powered by Pershing LLC. While neither broker’s platform was best in class, Vanguard’s was a bit more intuitive and flexible, and had more consistent menus between online and mobile platforms. Vanguard has also been making a push to modernize its overall look and feel, creating better dashboards, streamlined trading, and better educational experiences.
Usability Verdict: Vanguard
Vanguard has the edge on usability, but neither of these brokers will wow you with their look and feel.
Trade Experience
Desktop Trade Experience
Vanguard and T. Rowe Price both have web platforms while lacking separate desktop applications. The web portals are standard fare with real-time data streaming as you choose investments. You can also access dashboard views of your holdings and compile watchlists. While Vanguard’s website is built in-house, T. Rowe Price uses Pershing to clear and provide their online brokerage platform.
T. Rowe Price only allows for basic orders such as market, limit, stop, and stop limit orders, and only has limited options trading capabilities. Vanguard essentially mirrors this, and its platform is not the greatest for complex options trading. Neither Vanguard nor T. Rowe Price allow for conditional orders, trailing stops, or multiple order entry.
Desktop Trade Experience Verdict: Tie
Both platforms are designed for long-term buy and hold investors, so their platforms obviously fall short for active/frequent traders. The desktop trading experience on both platforms is a tie, with neither system impressing.
Mobile Trade Experience
Consistent with platforms not designed to cater to active traders, we continue the trend of not impressing with mobile trading. On Vanguard, quotes are again delayed quotes until order entry, and there is no other data, such as the day’s change.
Further, Vanguard does not offer any charting on its mobile app. Vanguard does allow users to customize their “My Feed,” which displays account information, news, blogs, transaction history, and performance. Vanguard doesn't offer any mobile trading of options, fixed income, and non-Vanguard mutual funds on the app.
T. Rowe Price provides basic charting on their mobile app, which works fine for basic orders. Otherwise the app suffers from the same limitations of only handling basic orders without the ability to handle contingent orders, trailing stops, or complex options strategies. That said, we appreciated that they included all the asset types in the app.
Mobile Trade Experience Verdict: T. Rowe Price
Because T. Rowe Price’s mobile platform provides basic charting and a full range of assets, we give it a slight edge over Vanguard’s mobile app.
Range of Offerings
T. Rowe Price and Vanguard offer the same products, including equities, ETFs, equity options, and fixed income. T. Rowe Price allows the trading of OTC and pink sheet stocks while Vanguard suspended this in the spring of 2022. Neither brokerage company offers futures, options on futures, foreign exchange, or cryptocurrencies.
Range of Offerings Verdict: Vanguard
While the range of offerings for Vanguard and T. Rowe Price are just about equal, Vanguard has a better depth of assets for the more part and also allows for fractional share purchases.
| Compare Range of Offerings | ||
|---|---|---|
| Criteria | Vanguard | T. Rowe Price |
| Short Sales | Yes | Yes |
| Number of No-Load Mutual Funds | 191 Vanguard funds, 9,978 third party | 150 |
| Available Assets | Stocks, Mutual Funds, ETFs, Bonds, CDs, Options | Stocks, Mutual Funds, ETFs, Bonds, CDs, Options |
| Max Number of Options Legs | 2 | 2 |
| Robo Advisory | Yes | Yes |
| Number of International Exchanges | None | None |
| Fractional Share Trading | Yes | No |
| Fractional Dividend Reinvestments | Yes | Yes |
Order Types
Vanguard and T. Rowe Price both support the same limited order types, consisting of market, limit, and basic stop/stop-limit orders. Neither platform offers conditional orders or trailing stops.
Order Types Verdict: Tie
The order types available at Vanguard and T. Rowe Price have the two brokerage companies tied in this category, too.
Trading Technology
While Vanguard’s order routing technology is basic, they report price improvement on stock orders of $1.70 per 100 shares over the National Best Bid and Offer. Additionally, 95% of Vanguard ETFs are traded at the midpoint. Vanguard does not receive payment for order flow.
In contrast, T. Rowe Price clears through Pershing, whose website only speaks about their obligation to provide the most favorable terms for their clients, without specific information on order improvement and execution. Pershing routes orders and receives payment for order flow.
Trading Technology Verdict: Vanguard
We feel Vanguard is stronger in this category because they don’t accept payment for order flow and are more transparent about cost savings.
Costs
Although T. Rowe Price and Vanguard both offer free online trading of equities and ETFs, they are both priced at the high end of online brokers we have reviewed in terms of commissions. Vanguard is of course famous of low-cost funds, but that's not what we're talking about here.
There are some differences in cost between Vanguard and T. Rowe Price. Options trading is more expensive at T. Rowe Price, as Vanguard charges $1 per options contract, while T. Rowe Price charges $9.95 + $1 per contract for account with at least $250,000 in the account, and $19.95 + $1 per contract for smaller accounts. So a trade for fifty options would cost $50 at Vanguard and $59.95 or $69.95 at T. Rowe Price depending on account size.
In fixed income, there is no cost on new issues, but Vanguard charges $1 per $1,000 face amount with a maximum of $250 for CDs, U.S. agency issues, corporate, and municipal bonds in the secondary market, with a $35 per trade cost for mortgage-backed securities and unit investment trusts. U.S. Treasuries are commission-free. T. Rowe Price charges $1 per $1,000 bond for US Treasury and Agency issues, but $5 per $1,000 bond for corporate and municipal bonds, subject to a $35 minimum and $250 maximum.
Vanguard’s margin rates range from 13.75% for accounts with balances up to $19,999 to 11.75% for accounts with balances nearing $500,000. T. Rowe Price charges the Pershing lending rate plus an additional interest charge. With Perishing at 11.375%, T. Rowe Price would charge slightly less than Vanguard at 13.125% for a balance of $19,000.
T. Rowe Price charges a $30 account maintenance fee for accounts with less than $50,000, while Vanguard charges $25 for accounts under $5 million who have not opted in for e-delivery, but both companies will waive the fee under certain conditions.
Costs Verdict: Vanguard
Overall Vanguard has the edge when it comes to costs. Vanguard's fees did see a jump in 2024 with the addition of an account closure fee and increases to the account maintenance fee, but the fees are still lower than T. Rowe Price's in many situations.
| Compare Costs | ||
|---|---|---|
| Vanguard | T. Rowe Price | |
| Volume-Based Options Discounts (Upon Meeting a Threshold) | No | No |
| Recurring Investment Fees | Yes | Yes |
| Options Price Cap (Upon Meeting a Threshold) | Yes | No |
| Option or No Base Commission for Trading Penny Stocks | N/A | Yes |
| Option for No Base Commission for Stocks and ETFs | Yes | Yes |
| Inactivity Fees | No | No |
| Cost Per Stock Trade | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Cost Per Options Contract | $1.00 | $19.95 + $1 per contract |
| Cost Per Futures Contract | N/A | N/A |
| Broker-Assisted Trade Fee | $25.00 | $25.00 |
| Base Commission for Options | No | Yes |
| Account closure fees | Yes ($100) | Yes ($50) |
Account and Research Amenities
With their focus on long-term investing, neither Vanguard nor T. Rowe Price has strong account amenities. That said, T. Rowe Price customers do gain access to T. Rowe Price research. Vanguard offers daily market reports and research as well. Both Vanguard and T. Rowe Price have stock screeners. Both platforms have ETF/mutual fund and fixed income screeners, and neither have an options screener.
Both Vanguard and T. Rowe Price’s tools and calculators were sparse on the brokerage side, but there are a number of helpful tools on the mutual fund side, including calculators for retirement planning and college savings as well as risk profile questionnaires that recommend a model mutual fund portfolio.
While both platforms have charts, they are not impressive on either platform as they lack drawing tools. T. Rowe Price offers functional news and marketing information. Vanguard does not offer real-time streaming news, but does offer news articles.
Accounts and Research Amenities Verdict: T. Rowe Price
Overall, T. Rowe Price has a small edge over Vanguard for their overall account and research amenities offerings.
| Compare Account and Research Amenities | ||
|---|---|---|
| Vanguard | T. Rowe Price | |
| Portfolio Margin Available | No | Yes |
| Ability to Choose and Offer Shares Held Long to a Loan Program | No | No |
| Interest Earned on Uninvested Cash | Varies, currently above 5% | 1.31% or 1.34% |
| Uninvested Cash Automatically Swept into a Money Market Fund | Yes | Yes |
| Screeners Offered | Stocks, Preferred stocks, ETFs, Mutual Funds, Fixed Income (ETF and mutual fund screeners contain filters for ESG strategies) | Stock, ETF, Mutual Fund, Fixed Income |
| Ability to Build Custom Screen | Yes | Yes |
| Ability to Screen Based on Technical Indicators | No | Yes |
| Ability to Save Custom Screens | Yes | Yes |
| Access to Proprietary Research | Yes - with no additional cost | Yes - with no additional cost |
| Access to Third Party Research | Yes - with no additional cost | Yes - with additional cost |
| Ability to Turn Screen Results Into a Watchlist | No | Yes |
| Trading Idea Generator Offered | N/A | N/A |
| Daily Market Research Reports Offered | Yes | Yes |
Portfolio Analysis
T. Rowe Price does not offer much portfolio analysis for brokerage accounts beyond a sector allocation monitor. The T. Rowe Price portfolio page shows composition, realized and unrealized gains, and projected cash flows, and your personal rate of return.
Vanguard provides reports and analysis in real time on the website, and this is customizable and allows aggregation of holdings from outside accounts. Vanguard's sector allocation analysis will take external holdings into consideration. Vanguard has also upgraded its dashboards and tools recently.
Portfolio Analysis Verdict: Vanguard
Because of this wider account integration with its portfolio tools, Vanguard gets our nod for better portfolio analysis.
Education
Vanguard and T. Rowe Price have long provided educational tools for their long-term investor clients, so the focus of their content is setting financial goals and creating a plan of action for reaching them. Both platforms also have a glossary of investing terms. Neither platform goes deeper into educational tools because their focus is on customers with a long time horizon that are not as likely to use complex options and other trading strategies compared to some of the online brokerage platforms catering to more active traders.
Education Verdict: Vanguard
We found Vanguard to have a bit more to offer, so it has a small edge over T. Rowe Price.
Customer Service
Customer support is comparable at T. Rowe Price and Vanguard. Vanguard offers customer service from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. EST and T. Rowe Price offers customer service hours from 8 a.m to 6 p.m. EST. The companies don't offer live chat or chat bots.
Customer Service Verdict: Tie
Neither broker holds any edge on customer service.
Security
Vanguard and T. Rowe Price both offer multi factor authentication and neither has suffered a recent platform outage or significant data breach. Assets with both brokers are protect by the Securities Investment Protection Corporation (SIPC) should the company go bankrupt or assets be missing.
Furthermore, both carry private insurance that protects customers beyond the limits of SIPC coverage with T. Rowe Price's policy being from Lloyd's of London.
Security Verdict: Tie
Once again, we find the two platforms to be comparable, with neither having an edge over the other.
Available Account Types
Here again, T. Rowe Price and Vanguard are evenly matched. They both have all the commonly used account types, including:
- Individual and joint taxable accounts
- Traditional individual retirement accounts (IRAs)
- Roth IRAs
- Rollover IRAs
- Simplified employee pension (SEP) IRAs
- SIMPLE (Savings Incentive Match Plan for Employees) IRAs
- Individual and small business 401(k)s
- Uniform Gifts to Minors Act (UGMA) and Uniform Transfers to Minors Act (UTMA) accounts
- 529 plans
- Trusts
Available Account Types Verdict: Tie
The main difference in accounts is that Vanguard has a dedicated organization investment account type. Overall, however, investors will find all the account types they need with either broker.
The Bottom Line
Vanguard and T. Rowe are both companies that compete for long-term investors. If you are looking for anything beyond buy-and-hold, like day trading or frequent options, neither broker is set up to serve you. As T. Rowe Price and Vanguard are both pursuing the same investors, this naturally means their brokerage platforms are very similar, from product offerings to technology platforms to cost. This focus is unfortunately one of the reasons neither broker appears in our Best Online Brokers and Trading Platforms for 2024. Although they can be excellent for the buy-and-hold crowd, they don't have much to offer outside that specific group of investors.
Overall, however, we give a very small edge to Vanguard over T. Rowe Price because their platform was a bit easier to use, their pricing was slightly more competitive, and their analytics and education offerings were also better than T. Rowe Price.
What this review doesn't touch on is the quality of the funds that make up a lot of the holdings their customers are likely to use in building portfolios on either platform. Vanguard owns the low-cost passive indexing space and T. Rowe Price remains a leader in actively managed funds, so picking between the two depends on investor risk tolerance and the purpose of the portfolio.
How We Picked the Best Online Brokers and Trading Platforms
Providing readers with unbiased, comprehensive reviews of online brokers and trading platforms is a top priority for Investopedia. We combined our industry research, subject matter expertise, and investor survey data to guide the research and weightings for our 2024 online broker awards. To collect the data, we sent a digital survey with 110 questions to each of the 26 companies we included in our rubric. Additionally, our team of researchers verified the survey responses and collected any missing data points through online research and conversations with each company directly. The data collection process spanned from Feb. 19 to March 19, 2024.
We then developed a proprietary model that scored each company to rate its performance across 11 major categories and 89 criteria to find the best online brokers and trading platforms. The score for each company’s overall star rating is a weighted average of the criteria in the following categories:
Additionally, during our 2024 research, many of the companies we reviewed gave us live demonstrations of their platforms and services via video conferencing methods and also granted our team of expert writers and editors access to live accounts so they could perform hands-on testing.
Through this all-encompassing data collection and review process, Investopedia has provided you with an unbiased and thorough review of the top online brokers and trading platforms.
Learn more about how we review online brokers.
