I don't get this fascination with their UI. The charts are terrible (other than looking cool) and the current holdings list sucks. It is as if it is written for people allergic to information density.
I don't understand what you mean about their charts, my regular broker has no real time charts at all, and the charts they do provide leave a lot to be desired. RH chart's also allows you to jump between day/week/3 month/etc and get a summary of performance within those ranges (which would normally be tabular data). Plus you can mouse hover over the history to get spot pricing on that date.
High information density has a place, but when it directly results on me needing two different screens to get the information I need on one screen then it is a real problem. For example my regular broker's order flow requires me to have two tabs, one to order, and one to show my existing position's cost basis. That's broken.
I think the situation speaks more to just how terrible existing broker's UI/UX is, rather than RH inventing something novel. They just make an interface that was basically solid, which is oddly rare for brokers.
Google's homepage has better stock charts than my regular broker for example (and RH's charts are better than Google's).
On the iPhone app their charts look like this retrowave sci-fi garbage, with no axis labels or meaningful markings
And your regular broker doesn't do real time charts? Uhh.... I don't know who you're talking about but if my broker lacked this I'd strongly consider switching to someone better (but not RH)
It's simple, fast, and at least back when I used it, was reasonably consistent.
I'm all for information density, but using Schwab, Vanguard, whatever results in slow to load pages which refresh every time I click a button. Half the pages look completely different than the other half of the pages, I use ctrl-f to find any buttons to click, and sometimes pages just don't load because they don't feel like it.
Banking websites are horribly broken and outdated on a technical level, even if I don't consider the design aesthetic.
Schwab executes my trades as they should and I don't have to worry about them lying about liquidity problems. Vlad was a complete disaster during the congressional testimonies.
He got obliterated on his suggestion that they have suicide support (A rep called the support hotline and it went straight to voicemail). He said "I admit to always improving". Was extremely shady if there was no wrongdoing.
Chamath said "I remember when I met the @RobinhoodApp founders when they were raising their Seed, Series A and Series B. I passed. Why? Optimize for integrity whenever possible because integrity compounds and assholes will fuck you." [1]
I think we'll find out a lot more about Vlad and his operation in the near future. I do not wish them luck on their IPO.
I think a lot of what people are talking about when they say "Robinhood UI" is buying/selling, instant deposits, etc. Purchasing fractional shares on Schwab requires depositing money, waiting for it to clear, and clicking through several different pages. Robinhood making every account a margin account to allow purchases before deposits a gamechanger. That said, I agree that the charts are useless and viewing all of your holdings is a chore.
High information density has a place, but when it directly results on me needing two different screens to get the information I need on one screen then it is a real problem. For example my regular broker's order flow requires me to have two tabs, one to order, and one to show my existing position's cost basis. That's broken.
I think the situation speaks more to just how terrible existing broker's UI/UX is, rather than RH inventing something novel. They just make an interface that was basically solid, which is oddly rare for brokers.
Google's homepage has better stock charts than my regular broker for example (and RH's charts are better than Google's).