Investing in stocks has become increasingly accessible, with beginners able to open an account with little money through a brokerage’s website or mobile app.
A stock represents an ownership stake in a company and, over time, stocks have historically been one of the primary ways investors build long-term wealth. That potential reward comes with risk, however. Stock prices can move sharply in the short term, especially during periods of economic uncertainty or excitement around fast-growing themes like artificial intelligence.
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For beginners, the goal shouldn’t be to predict every market move. Instead, aim to build a portfolio that fits your goals, time horizon — or how long until you’ll need the money you’ve invested — and risk tolerance, and plan to stick to your strategy regardless of market turbulence.
Here’s how to start investing in stocks from square one:
— Where to start investing in stocks.
— How much money should you start investing in the stock market?
— How to choose which investments to make.
— Have an investing strategy, especially during market volatility.
— Invest on your own or with a financial advisor?
— Should you use AI to help you invest?
Where to Start Investing in Stocks
The first step is to open a brokerage account. This gives you access to investments like stocks, mutual funds and exchange-traded funds, known as ETFs. Many major brokerage firms, including Fidelity, Vanguard and Charles Schwab, let you open an account for free with no minimum investment requirements.
Robo advisors are another option if you don’t want to deal with choosing your own investments. They often charge a minimal annual fee to create and manage a portfolio for you. Most use ETFs rather than individual stocks, but this just means you get to invest in more companies with each dollar. You won’t get as many investment options when using a robo advisor versus an individual brokerage account, but you also won’t be on your own when choosing funds.
You could also ask other professionals you work with — like your accountant, attorney or estate planner — for referrals for financial planners, suggests Daniel Beckerman, president of Beckerman Wealth in Ocean Grove, New Jersey.
“Online search platforms can be useful, but the best planners may not be the ones with the flashiest website or largest marketing budget,” he says.
[Read: 10 of the Best Stocks to Buy for 2026]
How Much Money Should You Start Investing in the Stock Market?
The amount you invest will depend on your budget, goals and time horizon. You should generally only invest funds that you won’t need for at least five years. This gives you time to ride out any market dips that may occur along the way. You also want to ensure you have enough cash for near-term expenses. And if you have any high-interest debt, it may make sense to pay that off first.
Ultimately, thanks to fractional shares and commission-free investing, no amount is too small to start investing. The most important thing is consistency: Start with what you have and build from there.
How to Choose Which Investments to Make
When choosing investments, you want to keep your personal goals, risk tolerance and time horizon in mind. For example, if early retirement is your goal, you may want to skew your portfolio toward more growth-oriented investments, like tech or small-cap stocks, in an effort to generate the highest return possible. But if you’re working toward a goal that’s closer at hand, such as buying your first house, you’re better off with a more moderate portfolio that may use investments like dividend-paying stocks, utilities or consumer staples companies, so there’s less risk of your investments losing value when it’s time to make the purchase.
When choosing individual stocks, it’s important to look beyond a stock’s recent performance. You want to consider the company’s valuation, growth prospects, management quality and competitive positioning.
Beckerman says that company metrics can give insight into whether a stock or sector may be overpriced. “For example, when price-to-earnings or price-to-sales ratios are elevated, we can get some sense as to when certain stocks or industries are priced in bubble territory,” he says.
That can be especially important when investing in popular themes, such as artificial intelligence. “Of course, we want our clients to benefit from growth trends, but investors need to be careful about chasing stocks after a major run,” Beckerman says. He points to the dot-com boom, when many once-promising companies were later disrupted or failed to live up to expectations.
For trends like AI, investors should ask which companies can turn that growth into durable profits, defensible competitive advantages and long-term shareholder value, and “which are vulnerable to disruptive competition,” Beckerman says.
“Avoid stocks that are speculative in nature with no historical performance on growth and management expertise,” says Alex Vela, a portfolio manager at FBB Capital Partners. This can include viral and meme stocks you might see on social media that don’t have fundamental value or an earnings track record.
“That is a bad way to start your investing journey because it can encourage speculation over discipline and expose you to unnecessary risk before you have built a meaningful portfolio,” he says.
Instead, he says to target companies with at least a five-year track record and a management team that has clear goals and objectives.
If researching individual stocks sounds daunting, you might prefer stock index funds or exchange-traded funds instead. Low-cost index funds that track the broader market are often a good option for beginner portfolios.
Index funds and ETFs can also help investors diversify. A single fund can provide exposure to hundreds or even thousands of companies, something that would take far more money and effort to build from scratch. You can also choose funds that focus on specific sectors, such as energy, financials or healthcare, or funds that target factors like company valuation, profitability or lower downside risk.
Have an Investing Strategy, Especially During Market Volatility
It’s normal for the stock market to experience bouts of volatility. During those periods, stocks, even ones considered relatively safe, experience price fluctuations. This can happen when there is uncertainty in the markets, and it tends to be short-lived.
“Over the long run, we have seen a 10% or greater downturn in the stock market more frequently than once every two years (on average),” Beckerman says. You should prepare to stay the course during these rough periods if you want to give your portfolio the best chance of long-term success. Remember, downturns are often short-lived and can be followed by periods of strong market performance.
Volatility can certainly be concerning, especially if you are a beginner who hasn’t experienced it before. That said, you should put your money in companies that can generate growing revenue and profits over a long period. That way, you have confidence in the company despite the stock’s price swings.
“We consider a company’s ability to fend off competition,” Beckerman says. “If a company is hard to compete with, they will be less likely to run into trouble with falling revenue and profits in the future. They are also more likely to be in a position to be able to raise their prices in an inflationary environment, as we have experienced.”
Volatility can also be your friend. Bear markets, like the recent dip caused by the breakout of the Iran war, have historically been great buying opportunities, according to Beckerman. If you have conviction in a company and its stock price falls, you could see this as an opportunity to buy more of the stock at a better price.
“The tricky part is that we don’t know the date that a bear market is going to end,” Beckerman says. “However, if we take an average of the previous 10 bear markets, the stock market tends to provide positive returns of over 14% a year after having entered the bear market.” After the recent downturn associated with the Iran conflict, the stock market has put on a historic display of resilience, consistently hitting record highs.
One common approach to mitigate the anxiety of feeling like you need to pick the perfect time to buy is to use dollar-cost averaging. This involves investing a fixed amount on a regular schedule, regardless of the stock’s current price. It will naturally result in buying more shares when the stock’s price is lower and fewer when the price is higher.
That said, if you have the cash available to invest, the best strategy is usually to put it into the market sooner rather than later. Your greatest asset as an investor is time: The longer you can give your investments to grow, the more opportunity they have to grow.
[READ: Can AI Pick Stocks? 4 AI Investing Apps to Try]
Invest on Your Own or With a Financial Advisor?
Before investing in stocks, you should determine what type of investor you are. Do you want to take a do-it-yourself approach, use a robo advisor or work with a professional financial advisor who can offer more tailored guidance?
A financial advisor may be especially helpful if you’re unsure how much of your portfolio to allocate to stocks, want help managing risk, or have more complex financial planning needs or questions regarding taxes, estate planning, trusts or retirement.
That guidance comes with a cost, however. Financial advisors often charge a fee that’s a percentage of the total assets you have with the advisor, called an assets under management, or AUM, fee. This can be well worth the service provided, but if you are just starting out, a simpler, lower-cost approach like investing in funds or using a robo advisor may be fine.
There is another cost to consider when choosing whether to work with a financial advisor: the cost of your time. How much time are you willing to put into managing your investments? If the answer is slim to none, then you should seriously consider working with a professional, be it through an individual financial advisor, robo advisor or using funds.
Should You Use AI to Help You Invest?
Artificial intelligence isn’t just reshaping the stock market. Some investors are also using tools like Claude, Gemini or ChatGPT to research companies, summarize financial information or answer basic investing questions.
AI tools can be useful for education, brainstorming and organizing information, but be cautious about relying on them for personalized investment guidance.
“Much of what large language models do is to aggregate and regurgitate a lot of information that is already available,” Beckerman says. “In areas such as tax law, expected returns, estate planning and investment strategy, small mistakes can have meaningful consequences.”
One challenge is that AI platforms can present answers with confidence even when the underlying information is incomplete, outdated or drawn from less reliable sources. It may be pulling information from Facebook but conveying it to you as if it’s straight from the Securities and Exchange Commission. For that reason, you should verify important details against primary sources, such as company filings, brokerage research or the SEC itself, and avoid using AI as a substitute for personalized financial advice.
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How to Invest in Stocks for Beginners originally appeared on usnews.com
Update 06/03/26: This story was previously published at an earlier date and has been updated with new information.
