When you need to find the perfect stock for your investment strategy
Individual investors are often advised to leave stock picking to the professionals. They have the resources and a deep bench of analysts to help them search the vast universe of stocks and sort through mountains of data. It’s probably good advice unless you have access to a quality stock screener that can do the work for you.
A quality stock screener can sift through the thousands of stocks in the U.S. or the tens of thousands listed worldwide, and in a matter of seconds, identify those that meet your specific criteria and suit your investment strategy. The more you work with a stock screener, the better you become at narrowing down your choices to the best investment opportunities. Here are our picks for the best.
Best Stock Screeners of 2021
- Best Overall: TC2000
- Best Free Option: ZACKS (NASDAQ)
- Best for Day Trading: Trade Ideas
- Best for Swing Traders: FINVIZ
- Best for Global Investing: TradingView
- Best for Buy and Hold Investors: Stock Rover .
BEST OVERALL: TC 2000
After more than 25 years of refinement, the TC2000 stock screening package is as robust and powerful as you will find, making it our top pick as the best overall stock screener.
Pros
- Wide selection of fundamental and technical screening criteria
- Nearly three decades of refinement and improvement
- Ease of use
- Screening for ETFs and options
- Interactive charts with chart drawing tools
Cons
- Only works with U.S. and Canadian exchanges
The only downside of TC2000 is it is limited to U.S. and Canadian exchanges. That aside, the powerful TC2000 stock screener, coupled with its solid customer support, makes it hard to beat.
BEST FREE OPTION: ZACKS (NASDAQ)
Pros
- Well-equipped free stock screener
- Hundreds of fundamental metrics
- Extensive stock database
- Extensive EPS metrics
- Low cost paid plan
Cons
- Limited technical screening
Not All but some of its more advanced features are available on the free plan.
BEST FOR DAY TRADING: Trade Ideas
Pros
- Stock screener with AI functionalities
- More than 800 filters
- Integration with brokerages
- Customizable screens
- Live trading room
Cons
- Only works with U.S. and Canadian stock exchanges
As you might expect, having access to proprietary, high-end technology doesn’t come cheap. But, for the edge that traders seek, $118 a month is a worthwhile investment. A standard plan is available for $89 a month without full access to AI technology. Trade Ideas typically offers discounts of 15% to 25% at any given time.
BEST FOR SWING TRADERS: FINVIZ
- Highly visual approach to screening
- Ease of use
- Good selection of fundamental and technical screening criteria
- Access to global stocks
- Free version is sufficient for many swing traders
- Fewer fundamental metrics than other screeners on this list
- Can only track stocks on one exchange at a time
FINVIZ is short for Financial Visualizations—a reference to the unique and compelling way it presents information, making it easy and fun to navigate. For instance, users can access a stock’s chart simply by hovering over the stock symbol in the screener.
BEST FOR GLOBAL INVESTING: TradingView
- Excellent selection of fundamental screening criteria
- Extensive charting capabilities
- Expansive selection of global stocks
- Interactive trading room
- 30-day free trial
- Light on historical data
TradingView is the innovative brainchild of a group of traders and software developers intent on creating a trading platform for the masses—effortless, powerful, and accessible to everyone.
BEST FOR BUY AND HOLD INVESTORS: Stock Rover
- Vast selection of fundamental screening criteria
- Hundreds of value, growth, and dividend screeners
- 10-year historical fundamental database
- Integrates with most brokerages
- Stock scoring system
- Limited day trading functionalities
- Only works with U.S. and Canadian exchanges
Stock Rover was founded in 2008 by software engineers who have a passion for investing. They created an advanced web application to simplify the way investors can research, select, and track investments.
Final Verdict
Day traders and stock investors need access to complex data analysis to be able to sift through the tens of thousands of stocks in the U.S. and global markets. To do that, they need access to high-quality stock screeners.
The best stock screeners combine ease of use with flexibility without sacrificing data accuracy or quantity. The best screeners have a broad range of stocks in their database that can be filtered with precision using both preset and custom criteria. The interface should be intuitive, even for beginners.
If you are testing the stock-picking waters as a beginner, you can start with any of the stock screeners that offer a free service. Most do, but many are very limited in their capabilities. That’s not the case with Zacks stock screener, which gives you access to hundreds of metrics.
As the best overall stock screener, TC2000’s powerful screening, scanning, and filtering software can accommodate any trading or investing style with its best-in-class tools.