Start Trading Today • Benzinga

A solid online forex broker can help you get started as a retail forex trader. Your broker will serve as your primary access point for the foreign exchange market, so it’s to make sure it offers the services and currency pairs you require, as well as dealing spreads competitive enough for your trading strategy. 

Ready to start trading forex? Learn more about which forex brokers are best for beginners. 

Since your online forex broker will likely be your main interface with the forex market, make sure you choose wisely. 

Your ideal choice for a forex broker should be well-regulated in its local jurisdiction, accept clients from your country, have tight dealing spreads and a sufficient variety of currency pairs and other assets to suit your trading needs. 

FOREX.com ranks No. 1 as our choice for the best forex broker for U.S.-based traders. The broker is strictly regulated by the NFA and CFTC, while its subsidiaries are overseen by 6 other major regulators around the world. 

You need just $100 to open a trading account that allows you to start taking positions in 80 currency pairs. All traders can use FOREX.com’s proprietary Advanced Trading Platform, while non-U.S. clients can use the MetaTrader suite that includes a mobile trading option.

IG Markets lets clients trade CFDs on over 17,000 different assets, including 80 forex currency pairs, as well as equities, commodities, indices, bonds, exchange traded funds (ETFs) and short-term interest rates. The broker requires a minimum deposit of $250 to get started and allows U.S. clients to use a maximum leverage ratio of 50:1. 

Like any good online forex broker, IG Markets keeps clients’ money in accounts segregated from its own. IG Markets has a proprietary trading platform and also supports MT4 and ProRealTime. It lets clients automate their trading via its application programming interface (API).

Excellent for beginners, CedarFX offers a free demo and live accounts on the MetaTrader 4 platform. You can work on your strategy and acquaint yourself with the platform when you’re first getting started by observing identical market conditions so you can go live for the first time.

You can trade on any mobile device, tablet or desktop by downloading the MT4 App or using Web Trader.

CedarFX offers 2 account types — 0% commission accounts and Eco Accounts. You pay $1 commission per lot traded and all commissions support environmental causes through Ecologi. All other aspects of the account, such as spreads, leverage and instruments, are identical.

If you experience any type of problem or have any questions, you can contact CedarFX’s 24/7 customer support team. Reach the company through live chat, email or by requesting a phone call.

Copy trading involves selecting an experienced trader whose trades you copy automatically in your own account. eToro specializes in social trading accessed via its CopyTrader tool and offers an excellent social trading network. This trading option seems ideal for beginners since you can sit back and let expert traders with a proven track record direct the trades in your account. 

The multi-asset broker lets you trade in more than 2,000 different assets, including cryptocurrencies, and you can start off with a minimum deposit of just $50. eToro accepts clients from most U.S. states.

eToro provides excellent educational resources beginners will find useful, and its highly intuitive trading platforms and apps can be quickly picked up by a trading novice. On the downside, eToro does not support the popular MT4/5 platforms from MetaQuotes. 

Interactive Brokers is our pick for the best online broker if you want to trade actively in many different markets and asset classes. The broker offers some of the lowest transaction costs around, including a $0 commission for U.S.-listed equities and ETFs. 

IBKR offers access to 150 markets and up to 26 currencies (Available currencies vary by Interactive Brokers affiliate.) IBKR does not charge inactivity fees and does not require minimum deposits.

Interactive offers its top quality proprietary trading platforms, including the Client Portal, Trader WorkStation (TWS) and mobile apps, which have received high customer ratings. If you plan on trading actively in many markets and are looking for a sophisticated broker to grow into, then IB would make an excellent choice. 

Retail forex brokers are financial institutions that act as an intermediary between individual trader clients and the forex market. These forex brokers have an online presence in the form of an official website, and they target smaller traders who wish to operate in the forex market on a margin basis. 

Online forex brokers generally allow traders to execute forex deals largely using their supported electronic trading platforms. In addition to offering their own proprietary trading software, many online forex brokers support popular 3rd party forex trading platforms like MetaTrader 4 and 5 (MT4/5)  from MetaQuotes.

Some forex brokers also offer very useful educational information for beginners you can use to increase your knowledge about trading. They might also provide access to expert forex market analysis and financial news feeds to help you make better trading decisions.

If you want to get started trading forex today, select a well-regulated online broker and visit its website to begin the process of opening a margin account. You should expect to fill out an online form and provide proof of your identity and address. 

As a beginner, you’ll probably also want to open a demo account funded with virtual money so you can practice using your chosen broker’s trading platform. You can also use a demo account to test your trading strategy in a real-time trading environment before implementing it in a live account. 

Keep in mind that forex trading involves a significant risk of loss, so only fund your live trading account with risk capital that you can afford to lose in its entirety.