About Acorns
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Acorns is an investment app that lets you easily invest your spare change from purchases made on linked credit or debit cards. This money can go into investment accounts that match your risk tolerance. Acorns only offers managed portfolios of ETFs (exchange-traded funds) for investing, but it also provides checking accounts and bonus investments for shopping with over 12,000 brands.
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Pros
- Automatically invests spare change
- Earn bonus investments for shopping
- Sustainable portfolios available
- Bitcoin-linked ETF available
Cons
- Can only invest in ETFs
- $50 ETF transfer fee
Bottom Line
The Acorns app makes it simple for you to invest automatically. Additional perks, like checking accounts with smart deposits, can help you earn more. However, you might want a more robust platform for serious investing.
What is Acorns?
Acorns strives to make investing more accessible through automatic micro-investing and related services, like providing FDIC-insured checking accounts and bonus investments for shopping at certain stores.
Users can create investment accounts with diversified ETF portfolios, and Acorns offers both traditional and sustainable portfolio options. You can also invest up to 5% of your overall portfolio in a bitcoin-linked ETF or invest your money in one of Acorns’ child- or retirement-focused investment accounts.
If you want to add to your earnings, Acorns partners with ZipRecruiter to help you find a new job, and you can earn bonus investments for shopping from select brands.
You can also learn more about investing through the company’s educational resource library, which covers money and micro-investing basics, and its digital magazine.
How does Acorns work?
At its core, Acorns is essentially a robo-advisor that invests your money into managed portfolios of ETFs that reflect your investment risk tolerance.
One of the company’s main selling points is that you can automatically invest your extra change from purchases on linked cards or your Acorns checking account. However, you can still invest as little as $5 on a recurring or one-time basis into your portfolio of ETFs.
The company then diversifies your investments across over 7,000 stocks and bonds, making sure to keep within your target allocations by automatically rebalancing your portfolio.
You can also set up recurring contributions for your retirement account. The app analyzes your goals, income and employment to recommend your best IRA plan.
Acorns products
Acorns offers a few different products and features to help you manage, save, earn and invest your money.
- Investing
Acorns has several investment programs:
- Acorns Invest provides pre-built ETF portfolios based on your investment style: conservative, moderately conservative, moderate, moderately aggressive or aggressive. Depending on the portfolio, you might be investing in a blend of companies, bonds and markets in traditional or sustainable portfolios. Sustainable funds are chosen based on factors like ESG rating and environmental business practices.
- Acorns Later offers three types of retirement accounts: traditional, Roth and SEP (simplified employee pension) IRAs. You can fund these accounts through recurring or one-time contributions.
- Acorns Early lets you open a UTMA/UGMA account to invest in your child’s future. Because it’s a custodial account, your child can’t access the funds until they’re an adult. The account works the same as Acorns Invest.
It’s not a stand-alone investment program, but Round-Ups is a feature that automatically rounds up purchases in each active account to the nearest dollar, saving the difference each time. When your Round-Ups balance reaches $5, Acorns invests the money into your ETF portfolio.
- Banking
- Acorns checking accounts, provided through Lincoln Savings Bank, function like traditional checking accounts but have Acorns products, like Invest and Later, built in. Other features include a metal debit card, direct deposit and FDIC protection.
- Earning
- With Acorns Earn, shopping with one of Acorns’ retail partners earns you bonus investments that are put into your Acorns Invest account. The amounts can be fixed or a percentage of your purchase. Under Acorns Earn, you can also browse job listings to help you earn more money in a new occupation.
Acorns plans
Acorns offers two membership tiers: Personal and Family.
The Personal tier provides access to an automated investment account with features like Acorns’ signature Round-Ups program for spare change investing as well as recurring investments and bonus investments when you shop with any of over 12,000 brands. You also get access to a retirement account and a checking account with a metal debit card, automatic investing and up to 10% bonus investments. Checking accounts have no low-balance or overdraft fees, plus access to over 55,000 no-fee ATMs in the Allpoint network.
The Family tier provides all the benefits of the Personal tier, plus investment accounts for kids with automatic recurring investments, no added cost for multiple children, exclusive bonus investments, family financial advice and potential tax savings.
Acorns fees
Acorns charges $3 per month for its Personal membership tier and $5 per month for its Family membership tier.
While Acorns’ monthly fees are reasonable, they may actually be a better deal for investors with larger balances. If you don’t have much to invest initially, you may pay less with other investment platforms that charge a percentage of your assets. Acorns only starts charging fees based on assets when your accounts total over $1 million.
Acorns also charges relatively steep fees to transfer investments when closing your account — $50 per ETF. If you have four ETFs, that’s a $200 fee. Other platforms may charge lower flat rates to transfer out all your investments.
Acorns FAQ
What does Acorns invest in?
Acorns lets you invest in diversified ETF portfolios it puts together. You can choose from various portfolio types based on your risk tolerance and see breakdowns of each portfolio type on Acorns’ website.
Has anyone made money on Acorns?
Acorns doesn’t specify any dollar amounts or averages its members have made by investing through its platform. However, the company has been around since 2012 and claims it has had over 9 million people sign up. So, while no investment platform can guarantee you’ll make money, Acorns’ growth and popularity signal that there are likely some users who have benefited financially.
Does Acorns cost money?
Acorns’ monthly membership fees are either $3 or $5 per month, depending on your chosen tier. There’s no minimum to open an Acorns account, but you need at least $5 to start investing.
Is Acorns FDIC-insured?
Acorns’ checking accounts and debit cards are FDIC-insured for at least $250,000 since they’re issued by Lincoln Savings Bank, but this doesn’t apply to investment accounts.
Is Acorns investing safe?
It depends on what you mean. Acorns has several features that make its products safer from unauthorized access, including FDIC-insured bank accounts, SIPC-protected investment accounts, SSL encryption, account alerts, bank-level physical security and account safeguards. However, all investments have some risk, depending on the market.
Is Acorns worth it?
Acorns’ robo-advising platform makes automatic investing simpler, even if you don't have large sums of money, advanced investment knowledge or a personal broker to act as a go-between. However, its monthly fees can be pricey for smaller account balances, and its ETF transfer fee is pretty high. Regardless, Acorns can still be a worthwhile option if you want hands-off investing for yourself or your family.
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If you wouldn't believe I am pushing a decade of trying to get them to cancel my account, I wouldn't blame you. Every time they tell me it is canceled they simply stop charging me for a couple months and then begin again. It takes a couple years for me to notice the $3 charge. AND HERE WE GO AGAIN. I can not explain in words how terrible this company is. I have already told them I would rather them throw every dollar I have in that account into a fire than have to continue trying to cancel it. Still fighting this battle. Maybe my great great grandkids will get the account cancelled.
I have made numerous attempts to close this account. The customer service representatives make promises but don’t follow through on their word. I’ve been told no less than three times that my account is closed. I have proof in emails. They give instructions how to close the account yourself, I follow through the prompts. Their site gets glitchy and doesn’t allow you to fully close it so then you have to call customer service who tells you not to worry that they’ve got it all taken care of and then your account get debit again the three dollar fee for subscription, and then they take out the investments - to go towards a closed account. I am livid! Guess I have to go to my bank to put a stop payment so that they stop this once and for all, and I have lost faith that I will get these subscription bogus fees refunded. Look at all the other reviews here and on Better Business Bureau. Wish I did in advance.
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Even if you have used the service for years and have paid the monthly $3 fee that goes to who knows what, if you try to move money into your Acorns account for the first time in a while, your account will get locked. It's not as simple as calling them up to unlock it. They want you to EMAIL them a bank statement from your checking account and a screenshot of your checking account showing the transaction to Acorns.
Until then, you cannot access your money or close the Acorns account or cancel the transaction. You would think they would have a more secure way to send this information or a better method than this. The service has gone to trash ever since it went public, and I plan to close it once I can get my account unlocked. Google "Acorns locked account" to see the nightmare others have had to deal with. When you call customer service, they tell you the same thing. When you ask for a supervisor, they refuse, and repeat the same information. Avoid, if possible, cancel if not.
Absolutely no control over investment funds, can't find my account number anywhere, and can't download statements, I contacted customer service for help and they could not help me with anything at all! While this was happening I started looking on the site for the company contact information and they don't have an address, phone number, or email listed on the site at all! Very Fishy! Beware!
I have been using Acorns investing for my kids for about 4 years, and also the debit card feature. I have always used the same account to transfer money into account. Acorns recently locked my account because I transferred money into it. Their reasoning was because it was too large of a transfer (it was not that large). They sent me an email to send in a pdf of my bank statement of the account I was transferring the money out of, and a screenshot of the money leaving my account.
I have never heard of this type of security before and thought it was a scam! What business locks an account because you transferred money into it. Nevertheless I did as they asked and still have not gotten my account unlocked. This has been going on for over 2 weeks with multiple calls, chats and emails to Acorns. I feel like they have the upper hand and there is nothing I can do. This is the worst feeling when they have a chunk of your money and will not provide service to resolve the issue. I would really consider going with a different company so hopefully this does not happen to anyone else. Hopefully I can get this issue resolved because I plan on closing ALL of my Acorns accounts.
A few weeks after I opened an account, Acorns locked it and won't allow me to have access to it. I have repeatedly asked them to cancel the account and return my money. I can never talk to anyone but some foreign phone service that does nothing to help me. In the meantime, they continue to charge for the subscription. Frankly, this is theft. This is easily the worst company for customer service I have ever dealt with. Avoid this company.
They distributed all of my $2400 dollars to fraudulent person and bank that was not on my account and or profile. They continue to ignore and refuse to take accountability for their incompetence. Called every week for the past 6 months. Been promised contact from internal team members, whatever that means, but not has happened as of this date and time.
I have been with Acorns for a few years. I deposited a check on 6/16/22 for $3,600. Acorns froze my entire account including money not related to the check. I have no funds to get to work or eat. No warning or statement on their website says they will do this. I am a travel nurse. I am out of gas and I can’t access my own money. They say they will be in touch by 6/27/22 which is 2 weeks away. I will be unemployed by that time for missing work. I have reported to FDIC and FINRA. Sham of a company. Stay far away!!
I opened a checking account with Acorns about a year ago, attracted by their "no fees" advertising. (False, by the way, you're charged $5 a month.) Within my first year, I had to order a new card twice due to mysterious, unexplained data compromises. It took them more than a week to ship me a new card, during which time I had no access to the cash in my checking account. The second time they shipped me a new card, their explanation for the long wait time was that the special steel card had to be "etched" and customized. They still took 10-14 business days to send the card... and it was plastic.
The FINAL straw was Acorns placing a 90-day freeze on any check deposits into my checking account, without even bothering to notify me. I made an incorrect payment to a credit card company, and the payment was returned. After correcting the amount with my credit card company, I retried the payment and it went through. Little did I know that because of that returned payment, Acorns placed a hold on my account accepting any new check deposits for THREE MONTHS. I was never notified. I only found out when attempting to deposit a large check, which was mysteriously rejected. No explanation from Acorns until I called their extremely unhelpful, untrained, and unknowledgeable customer service. The woman placed me on hold for 20 minutes just so she could LOCATE the rejected check transaction. Horribly disorganized. She refused to explain or lift the 90-day freeze on my account.
In another instance, I requested Acorns put a stop payment on an incorrect bill statement. They assured me over the phone that the payment would be stopped. It went through anyway, and was declined. I called again and told them to stop the payment, and not let a second attempt go through. I was assured no second attempted payment would go through. Lo and behold, the payment went through a second time, and was declined. I incurred a fee for the two failed payments from the vendor, which Acorns declined to reimburse me for.
I am in the process of closing my account and moving all of my assets to Chase. Horrific company. Irresponsibly managed. Customer service has close to no training, are all overseas, and can barely communicate in serviceable English. This is a joke of a "bank" and I advise all against trusting them with your money.
Acorns robbed me of a deposit of $100.00 and a $2,000.00 totaling to $2,100.00. After the $2,000.00 USD deposit, my account was froze and I was asked to show proof of ownership of my primary/linked account via email by requesting a pdf file of my bank statement. The requested was fulfilled and checked completely out all this confirmed. After a bank call and documents via email, the customer service rep then proceeded to inform me that the request to urgently unlock my account within one business day.
The A.M. of the business day I received an email stating that they Acorns/Lincoln Banking has decided to permanently close my account. In which my deposits will be transferred back to my original/primary/linked account etc. Within 1-3 business days I'm on my third business day, a closed account, and absolutely nothing in my linked/primary account. No answers, different stories. I was informed twice that the deposits did and were showing and available in my Acorns' account!
Acorns Company Information
- Company Name:
- Acorns
- Website:
- www.acorns.com
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