FINVIZ Review – A Beginner-Friendly Stock Screener
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FINVIZ is a web-based stock screener and trading tool that gives you a birds-eye view of the stock market and a plethora of real-time data to make wise investing decisions.
8/10
Cost
10/10
Features
8/10
Ease of Use
7/10
Add-ons
7/10
I typically invest in mutual funds and index funds just because it’s simple. I spent a lot of time researching funds to invest in. Then I put them on a set-it-and-forget-it schedule. This has worked well for me, but it’s kind of boring. I’ve dabbled in real estate investing to diversify. That’s worked out well, but since I use a property manager, that is primarily hands-off.
I’ve always been a bit fearful of individual stocks; a lot of financial gurus warn against them. But armed with a tool like FINVIZ and some basic financial knowledge, I think most people can find stocks to invest in depending on their investing philosophy.
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What is FINVIZ?
FINVIZ is a web-based stock screener and trading tool that gives you a bird's-eye view of the stock market and a plethora of real-time data to make wise investing decisions.
FINVIZ saves investors valuable time by allowing them to filter stocks based on various criteria. If you have a free registered account, you can create (and save) filters to search for stocks that meet your own criteria and even save them for future use.
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How does FINVIZ work?
FINVIZ is free to use for anyone. You won’t get all of the features of the FINVIZ registered and Elite accounts, but you’ll have access to the basic features, including the heat map, filtering metrics, and the news aggregation feed.
I see no reason you wouldn’t want to upgrade to the FINVIZ registered account. It takes less than two minutes; you only need your name and email address.
Once registered, you can save up to 50 stock screener preset settings. With financial visualizations, chart patterns, drawing tools, and daily charts, you can do some serious technical analysis of stocks on your watch lists.
Upgrading to FINVIZ Elite is just as easy, and when you buy an annual membership, you get significant savings.
Once you’re on the FINVIZ website, you’ll notice it looks a bit like Christmas with the red and green boxes on the heat map. The heat map is a neat tool that changes daily as stock prices change. When you hover over a box, you’ll get the stock’s name and price.
There are three types of filters you can use. Fundamental filters show data like insider ownership and EPS growth. The descriptive filter can help you find stocks based on sector, analyst recommendations, and dividend yields. With the technical filter, you can filter by data points like candlestick patterns, averages, and performance stats.
The Forex page shows nine currency pairs plus gold, Bitcoin, and crude oil prices. Click on the charts to see their performance. The cryptocurrency page is set up similarly. Only 15 pairs of cryptocurrencies are tracked, so this isn’t a great resource for someone serious about investing in crypto.
How much does FINVIZ cost?
FINVIZ has three tiers, but since two of them are free plans, you really only have to decide whether you want to pay for the service or not. Both free versions have ads, but I’ve only seen one per page, and they were easy to ignore.
FINVIZ free version without registration
Just go to the FINVIZ website and start using it. It’s as simple as that.
FINVIZ free version with registration
Registration simply consists of entering your name and email address. Then, you create a password, type it a second time, and you’re all set. Use your new credentials to log in, and you can save your settings.
FINVIZ Elite
A monthly subscription to FINVIZ Elite is less than many people’s monthly coffee budget. The monthly price is $39.50, but when you pay annually, the price drops by more than 35%. Annually, you’ll pay $299.50, which works out to $24.96 per month.
FINVIZ features
Screening
Perhaps the most commonly used feature of FINVIZ is that you can screen any company on the stock market with the free version of the FINVIZ stock screener. With a few clicks of your mouse, you can access the market data according to your chosen metrics. With the registered free version, you can save up to 50 settings to make checking up on your stock charts easy. With the Elite plan, you can save up to 100 custom screeners.
Heat map
The heat map is made of squares and rectangles that show a stock's size relative to its industry. You can choose an industry or filter it by a certain time period to get an easy-to-see overview of the sector as a whole. As you hover over each individual block, a popup appears with that stock at the top, its price, and the daily change.
Groups
The Groups page compares the performance of all industries. The data is viewable in a bar chart, tab form, chart, or grid view. You can filter the data by Order or Group. Within the Group filter, choose from sector, industry, country, or capitalization options. You can filter results by preselected time periods ranging from one day to one year.
Insider sales tracking
Get the inside scoop on potential upcoming price changes by keeping tabs on the insider trading list. You can see who’s buying or selling, the stock they’re trading, the value, and how many shares they pick up or drop.
Email alerts
This feature only in FINVIZ Elite gives you instant notifications to your inbox when changes to your saved portfolios and individual stocks occur. You can set custom alerts to trigger emails when price changes, a new ticker fits your criteria, or ratings and news come out about a certain portfolio.
News aggregation
A news junkies' paradise, this section of the website aggregates news stories from sites like Bloomberg, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, CNBC, CNN, Fox Business, Market Watch, and more. Zero Hedge, Calculated Risk, and Market Realist are the blogs that are included. The feeds are updated about every ten minutes all day long.
Backtesting
This is another FINVIZ Elite feature, which alone might be worth the cost. You can compare your investing strategies to the market before you apply them in real-time. You can compare it with the SPY benchmark, 24 years of historical data, and 100 technical indicators.
Use Motley Fool's Stock Advisor To Invest
- Over 100 Stock Picks with 100%+ Returns
- Averaged Stock Pick Return over 593% (vs. 165% for the S&P)
- 2 New Stock Picks Every Month
- Investment Community With 700,000+ Loyal Members
- 30-Day Membership-Fee-Back Guarantee
- Joy Wallet Reader Deal: The Motley Fool is offering 50% off its top stock-picking service for new members (Limited Time)
Who is FINVIZ best for?
FINVIZ is popular with both new and seasoned traders. Many like to use it with other tools to create more advanced charts.
Day traders
Day traders will appreciate FINVIZ because it easily allows them to find stocks that increase in trading volume. Being among the first to know will give them an advantage. The list of insider transactions is also a favorite of day traders because they can see what
Momentum traders
With the tracking features, you can determine which stocks have performed well historically and make future trades based on this.
Swing traders
The stock market scanner helps swing traders see which stocks are overbought or oversold. Using this knowledge, they can create and try out new trading strategies.
Who shouldn’t use FINVIZ?
FINVIZ is free, so why would anyone not want to use it? Well, it’s a great tool offering real-time data, but two groups of investors may not find it as robust of a tool as others.
Crypto traders
Since FINVIZ is geared more towards the stock market, investors of cryptocurrencies may not find what they’re looking for here. The major currencies are represented, but the smaller, lesser-known ones are not.
Traders who are happy with their current trading tools
As the saying goes, if it’s broken, don’t fix it. Those satisfied with another paid or free stock screener should continue using it. There’s nothing to lose by trying the free versions of FINVIZ, but if you’re happy with what you’ve set up, there’s no reason to abandon it.
Pros and cons
FINVIZ isn’t the only trading tool available for investors; it has pros and cons like others.
Pros
- Registration is free and simple. It takes less than two minutes to fill out the form with your email address and a password. Once that’s done, you’re in!
- The free versions are good. New traders or those trying to find the best stock screener should definitely give the free versions a try. They are easy to use yet robust enough to give you all the data you need to get started trading.
- The news feed helps keep you up to date on the market. I found the news feed to be helpful in scanning the most recent headlines. This could easily remove extra steps from your day, by having all the top news feeds at your fingertips.
Cons
- No auto-save function. When you use the free registered users and Elite users of Finviz, you’ll have to remember to save your settings because it won’t happen automatically.
- No mobile app. In today’s mobile world, not having an app is a drawback for many users. I feel that the features and data that you see on your desktop screen couldn't be contained in an app.
- Limited tracking of cryptocurrencies and Forex. This may be a drawback for traders of cryptocurrency and Forex. There’s enough functionality that beginners and dabblers in these markets will be satisfied.
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- Over 100 Stock Picks with 100%+ Returns
- Averaged Stock Pick Return over 593% (vs. 165% for the S&P)
- 2 New Stock Picks Every Month
- Investment Community With 700,000+ Loyal Members
- 30-Day Membership-Fee-Back Guarantee
- Joy Wallet Reader Deal: The Motley Fool is offering 50% off its top stock-picking service for new members (Limited Time)
Finviz vs. competitors
Product | Cost | Web-based or mobile app | Good for |
FINVIZ | $0 to $39.50/month | Web | Free, reliable stock screening |
TC2000 | $9.99 to $59.99/month | Web and app | Accessibility |
Trade Ideas | $127 to $254/month | Web | Day traders |
TC2000
TC2000 has helped investors track their investments for nearly two decades and test trade ideas with stock charts, screening tools, and custom indicators. Real-time stock options and premarket scanning are among the most popular features. Screening and charting are available for the U.S. stock market, ETF, and Options markets.
Users pay anywhere from $9.99 to $59.99 monthly for access to TC2000. Another feature that sets it apart from competitors is that it has a mobile app for training on the go. Trading is easier if you use the TC2000 Brokerage because you can complete trades directly through the platform, saving you time, which, in trading, equals more money!
Trade Ideas
A useful tool for day traders, Trade Ideas has been helping investors with their picks for American and Canadian stocks since 2003. Three AI-powered bots scan the stocks, helping you look for unique trading opportunities. The HollyAI bod tests 70 strategies on stocks to help you find your winning trades.
Trade Ideas is not cheap; a monthly subscription costs between $127 and $254 per month, depending on the features you want to access. You can integrate Trade Ideas with your eTrade account to make transactions even easier.
FAQs
Is FINVIZ Elite worth it?
Serious stock traders, both beginner and intermediate, can benefit from the extra features of FINVIZ Elite. When paid annually, the cost is less than $1 a day, which makes it a great deal considering there’s potential to earn way more than that in profits by using the tools. Should you decide that the Elite version isn’t for you, there’s a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Are stock prices updated in real-time?
No, there is a short delay in the quotes you see on FINVIZ. There’s a 15-minute delay for
NASDAQ and a 15-minute delay for both AMEX and NYSE.
Is there a FINVIZ mobile app?
No, FINVIZ does not have a mobile app. The FINVIZ stock screener website is movie friendly and you can use it on a tablet easily. Due to the nature of the website, viewing it on a desktop or laptop with a larger screen is easier on the eyes and allows you to see more data.
The bottom line
Every budding stock market investor should try at least the free registered version of FINVIZ for its functionality and price. You can’t beat getting targeted data for $0. Before deciding to upgrade, I would spend more time using the features to their full potential and deciding if upgrading is worth it. While reasonable, paying monthly for something you don’t use is expensive.
Seasoned investors who already have a favorite stock scanning platform may be happy with their current setup. However, I think it would be worth spending time playing around with FINVIZ to see how it compares to what you have and if something is better.
This is also a great site for kids investing in stocks because it won’t cost them anything. They can stay occupied for hours learning and analyzing the market before investing (with parental permission). And who knows, maybe you’ll discover you're raising the next Warren Buffet!
Use Motley Fool's Stock Advisor To Invest
- Over 100 Stock Picks with 100%+ Returns
- Averaged Stock Pick Return over 593% (vs. 165% for the S&P)
- 2 New Stock Picks Every Month
- Investment Community With 700,000+ Loyal Members
- 30-Day Membership-Fee-Back Guarantee
- Joy Wallet Reader Deal: The Motley Fool is offering 50% off its top stock-picking service for new members (Limited Time)
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Writer
Charlotte Edwards is an educator-turned-freelance writer based in Beijing, China. She writes personal finance and parenting content for both digital and print publications around the world.
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