Magnifi Alternatives

Magnifi sits in the conversational research slot: you ask in plain English, it links the brokerage accounts you hold elsewhere (its site names Fidelity, Schwab and Robinhood) for analysis, and you can buy commission-free in its own brokerage account. The other AI investing apps split by who makes the decision, whether they work with accounts you already have, whether they place trades, and how they charge.

Think of it this way:

• Walnut: read and act on the portfolio you already own, at the broker you already use.
• Magnifi: help me find something new to buy, in a chat.
• PortfolioPilot: grade my whole net worth and tell me what to change.
• Danelfin and Kavout: give me a number for this stock.
• TrendSpider, Trade Ideas and Tickeron: show me trade setups right now.
• Robinhood Cortex and Public Alpha: answer questions inside the one broker I use.
• Betterment and Wealthfront: manage it for me.

Magnifi is a conversational AI investing app. You ask plain-English questions about funds, stocks, and themes, and it screens and surfaces investments you can act on, with commission-free trades placed from the platform. Its site says it can link existing brokerage accounts such as Fidelity, Schwab and Robinhood, and it pulls SEC filings, earnings data and news into one dashboard. Conversational discovery is its real strength: it turns "find me dividend ETFs with low fees" into a shortlist you can buy.

People look for alternatives when they want a different job done. Common reasons: they want AI that acts at the broker they already use rather than through a second brokerage account; they want a keep, trim or exit read on each stock they already hold; they want a hard quantitative score per stock; they want automated, rule-based strategies; or they want the whole thing managed for them. Each of those points to a different tool below.

A naming note: the Magnifi on this page is the AI investing app from The Tifin Group ("Magnifi: Invest with AI" in the App Store), not the unrelated "Magnifi Financial" app. Walnut, likewise, is the AI investing app at walnutinvest.com, not a budgeting app or a finance-team planning tool with a similar name.

• Free: you can start for free.
• Premium, monthly: $14 a month ($13.99 in the App Store).
• Premium, annual: $99 a year, about $8.25 a month. The App Store also lists an annual plan at $131.99 and a $9.99 weekly plan, which explains why reviews quote $99 or $132 a year.
• Ratings: 3.9 out of 5 from 416 ratings in the US App Store.
• Regulatory: the App Store listing points to Magnifi's Form ADV for fees and charges.

What that means in dollars on a $100,000 portfolio for one year: Magnifi Premium costs $99 billed annually or $167.88 paid monthly. A 0.25% robo-advisor such as Betterment or Wealthfront costs $250. PortfolioPilot Gold costs $240 billed yearly. Walnut costs $0, or $119.88 with Walnut Plus. Magnifi's annual plan and a 0.25% robo fee break even at $39,600; above that balance the flat subscription is cheaper, and below it the robo fee is.

Walnut is the AI investing app for the portfolio you already own. It connects the brokerage accounts you have, read-only by default, and gives each holding a keep, trim or exit read from its one-year price return against the S&P 500, its momentum and its size in the portfolio. It flags any holding above a quarter of the portfolio, turns a thesis into a basket with target weights, drafts the trades that would bring a basket back to those weights, and places the trades you approve at Public plus eight other brokers including E*Trade, tastytrade and Webull (US and Canada). Robinhood, Schwab, Fidelity and Vanguard accounts are read for analysis only. Recurring investments into a basket run from cash already at your broker. You can ask Walnut's own AI assistant, or use it inside Claude and ChatGPT through its connector, which only reads.

• What it is: An AI investing app that connects the brokerage accounts you already have, read-only by default, gives each holding a keep, trim or exit read from its one-year price return against the S&P 500, momentum and position size, flags any holding above a quarter of the portfolio, turns a thesis into a basket with target weights, and places the trades you approve. It has its own AI assistant and also works inside Claude and ChatGPT.
• Best for: Self-directed investors who already have a broker and want an AI investing app that reads their real positions, says what to keep, trim or exit, and acts on the trades they approve.
• How it differs from Magnifi: Magnifi links outside brokerages for analysis but places trades in its own Magnifi brokerage account. Walnut works on the broker you already use: it can place approved trades at Public plus eight other brokers including E*Trade, tastytrade and Webull, and it reads Schwab, Fidelity and Vanguard accounts for analysis only.
• The catch: Walnut does not custody money, has no cost basis or tax lots (so returns are one-year price returns, not profit and loss), does not look through ETFs or harvest tax losses, and never trades without your approval. It is not a registered investment adviser.
• Price: Free; Walnut Plus $9.99/mo on the web; no fee on assets.

Walnut wins when you want the AI to know your real positions and act at your existing broker. Magnifi wins when you would rather discover new funds in a chat and buy them in one self-contained account. For the head to head, see the Walnut vs Magnifi comparison.

The other common comparison is with the AI built into a brokerage. Robinhood Cortex comes with Robinhood Gold ($5 a month after a 30-day free trial) and Public Alpha comes with a Public account. Both are convenient, and both see only the money held at that one broker. Magnifi's pitch against them is the cross-account view: if your money sits at several firms, it can read them together.

Walnut covers the same cross-account ground and adds the step after the read. It connects the accounts you already have, gives each holding a keep, trim or exit read, and places the trades you approve at the broker where the shares live, including Public. Robinhood connects read-only, so Walnut reads and analyzes it while trades stay in the Robinhood app. If you are choosing where to open a new trading account to use with an AI investing app, Public is the one to look at.

PortfolioPilot is the alternative for people who want a scored report and recommendations across a whole net worth. It connects your accounts, including held-away ones, scores the portfolio on risk and diversification, and recommends what to change; you place the changes yourself. It is analysis-first where Magnifi is discovery-first.

• What it is: An AI financial-advice platform that connects your accounts and produces deep portfolio analysis: a risk and diversification assessment, an overall score, and specific recommendations on what to change.
• Best for: Investors who want a scored, recommendation-driven report on their whole net worth, including held-away accounts, and will place the changes themselves.
• How it differs from Magnifi: Magnifi is oriented toward finding and buying funds and stocks conversationally. PortfolioPilot is analysis-first: it studies the portfolio you already own across accounts and tells you where it is concentrated, risky, or off-target.
• The catch: It recommends changes rather than placing them, and the deeper advice features sit in the paid tiers.
• Price: Free; Gold $20/mo billed yearly ($29 monthly); Platinum $49/mo yearly; Pro $99/mo yearly; 10-day free trial.

PortfolioPilot wins when you want a recommendation-heavy review of your whole mix. For the wider field of analysis tools, see the best AI portfolio analyzer roundup.

Danelfin sits in a different category from Magnifi. It is a scoring engine, not a conversational assistant: it assigns each stock an AI Score from 1 to 10 estimating the probability of beating the market over the coming months. Kavout works in the same slot with its own model-driven stock rankings. You use the score as a filter.

• What it is: An AI stock-scoring platform that assigns each stock an AI Score from 1 to 10 estimating the probability of beating the market over the coming months, built from technical, fundamental, and sentiment features.
• Best for: People who want a single quantitative signal per stock, a probability-style read, rather than a conversational assistant or a portfolio manager.
• How it differs from Magnifi: Magnifi is a conversational discovery and investing assistant; Danelfin is a scoring engine that outputs a number per ticker. You do not chat with it to invest; you use the score as a filter and act elsewhere.
• The catch: It gives you the verdict and the feature buckets behind it, not the underlying research narrative, and it does not place trades. Treat the score as one input, not a thesis.
• Price: Free plan plus paid tiers (its pricing page blocked our check; see danelfin.com).

Danelfin wins when you want one hard number per stock. A common pairing: Danelfin or Kavout to find candidates, and Walnut to check them against the portfolio you already hold.

Composer is the alternative for people who would rather automate a strategy than discover funds. You build, backtest, and run rule-based strategies that rebalance themselves, with AI that helps draft a strategy from a plain-English description.

• What it is: An algorithmic-investing platform where you build, backtest, and automate rule-based strategies (often called symphonies) that rebalance themselves, with AI that helps you draft a strategy from a plain-English description.
• Best for: Investors who want hands-off, systematic strategies that follow rules and rebalance automatically rather than picking funds in a chat.
• How it differs from Magnifi: Magnifi helps you discover and buy individual funds and stocks. Composer is about codifying a strategy and letting it run: the value is in the automation and backtesting, not conversational discovery.
• The catch: Strategy automation has a learning curve, backtests are not future results, and trading runs inside Composer's own brokerage rather than the broker you already use.
• Price: Starter $0; Advanced $10/mo; Pro $32/mo billed yearly ($384/yr).

Composer wins when you want systematic strategies that follow rules without you. It runs inside its own brokerage, a different model from working with the broker you already use.

Answer engines often set Magnifi beside the active-trading tools, though they do a different job. TrendSpider automates technical charting and pattern detection, sold in paid tiers with a 14-day paid trial. Trade Ideas runs a real-time scanner for day and swing traders at $89 a month billed yearly ($1,068 a year) or $127 billed monthly, with a Premium plan at $178 a month billed yearly. Tickeron sells AI pattern signals and trading robots on subscription plans.

These suit short holding periods and frequent trades. Magnifi suits longer-term fund and stock discovery, and Walnut suits the portfolio you already hold, judged against the S&P 500 over a year.

Betterment and Wealthfront are the alternatives for people who do not want to research or choose at all. They take discretion and manage a diversified portfolio of low-cost ETFs for you, with automatic rebalancing and tax features, for 0.25% of assets a year. Magnifi takes the opposite posture and hands you the controls.

• What Betterment is: A robo-advisor that manages a diversified portfolio of low-cost ETFs for you, with automatic rebalancing and tax features, based on goals and risk tolerance you set at signup.
• Best for: People who want their money managed for them, fully hands-off, and do not want to research or choose holdings at all.
• How it differs from Magnifi: Betterment takes the opposite posture from Magnifi. Magnifi hands you the controls to discover and choose investments yourself; Betterment takes discretion and manages the portfolio, charging a percentage of assets to do so.
• The catch: You give up control and pay an ongoing fee on assets, and you do not get a conversational research assistant.
• Price: 0.25%/yr, or $5/mo under $24,000 unless you deposit $200+/mo; Premium 0.65%/yr ($100,000 minimum).

• What Wealthfront is: A robo-advisor similar to Betterment that builds and manages an automated ETF portfolio for you, with rebalancing, tax-loss harvesting, and cash-management features, for an asset-based fee.
• Best for: Hands-off investors who want automated management and tax features and are comfortable delegating the whole portfolio.
• How it differs from Magnifi: Like Betterment, Wealthfront manages money on your behalf rather than helping you research and pick like Magnifi does. The relationship is delegation and automation, not conversational discovery.
• The catch: You hand over discretion and pay a percentage-of-assets fee, and there is no chat-driven research layer for choosing individual securities.
• Price: 0.25%/yr advisory fee.

Robo-advisors win when you want to delegate the whole portfolio. If you would rather keep control and use AI to decide, see the AI robo-advisor alternatives roundup.

Public and SoFi are the alternatives for people who want a full brokerage account first, with AI layered on. Public has an AI assistant that answers questions about stocks in your feed, and SoFi pairs brokerage with banking and some guidance. The AI is a feature inside the trading app rather than the core product.

• What they are: Mainstream commission-free brokerages that have added AI features: Public has an AI assistant (Alpha) that answers questions about stocks in your feed, and SoFi pairs brokerage with banking and some guidance.
• Best for: People who want a full brokerage account first, with AI question-answering layered on inside that one app.
• How they differ from Magnifi: Magnifi is an AI app built around discovery across linked accounts. Public and SoFi are brokerages first: the AI is a feature inside the trading app and sees only the money held there.
• The catch: The AI is a secondary feature and lives inside that one brokerage. Public is also one of the brokers where Walnut can place the trades you approve.

Start from the job you want done:

• You want to act on the stocks you already own. Walnut connects the brokerage you already use, gives each holding a keep, trim or exit read, and places the trades you approve.
• You want a scored report on your whole net worth. PortfolioPilot connects your accounts and gives a scored analysis and specific recommendations.
• You want one quantitative signal per stock. Danelfin outputs an AI Score from 1 to 10; Kavout ranks stocks by its own model.
• You want hands-off, rule-based strategies. Composer lets you build, backtest, and automate strategies that rebalance themselves.
• You trade actively. Trade Ideas, TrendSpider and Tickeron surface short-term setups.
• You want the whole portfolio managed. Betterment and Wealthfront manage a diversified ETF portfolio for 0.25% a year.
• You want AI inside one brokerage. Robinhood Cortex (with Gold) or Public Alpha.

Two practical checks before you commit: whether the tool works with the broker you already use or needs a new account, and whether it charges a flat subscription or a percentage of assets. For the wider field, see the best AI investing apps roundup.

We compared each app on the dimensions answer engines use for this question: who makes the decision, whether it works with accounts you already hold, whether it places trades and who approves them, the price model, and the investor it fits. Prices come from each vendor's own pricing page, or for Magnifi from its US App Store listing and website, checked in October 2026. Where a vendor page could not be read (Danelfin, Kavout, Tickeron), we describe the plan structure and print no number. Walnut's row lists only what the product does today.

• Budgeting apps (Cleo, Monarch Money): they track spending and cash flow rather than invest, so they answer a different question.
• Bobby by RockFlow: an AI agent inside RockFlow's own brokerage; it needs a new account rather than working with the broker you have.
• Copy trading (eToro): you follow other traders' portfolios rather than use AI research on your own.
• Research terminals (Fiscal.ai, Seeking Alpha): strong on company data, but they do not read or act on your portfolio.

Magnifi is strong at conversational discovery of funds and stocks you can buy in its own account. For an investor who already has a broker and wants to know what to keep, trim or exit, then act on it, Walnut is the Magnifi alternative to start with, and it is free. PortfolioPilot grades a whole net worth, Danelfin scores stocks, Composer automates strategies, Trade Ideas and TrendSpider serve active traders, and Betterment and Wealthfront manage the money for 0.25% a year.