Thinking of opening a trading and demat account between Groww and ICICIDirect but confused which one to choose then Groww Vs ICICI Direct review and comparison will certainly guide you to choose the best amongst both stockbrokers.
If we talk about both these both stockbrokers, Groww is a discount broker whereas ICICI is a full-time broker, so to be honest comparing both on one scale can’t be the right thing to do.
However, they both are in same business and industry and functioning among same group of people, therefore a comparison can be made on the different services offered by them in every segment.
Moreover, before we start the comparison let me tell you active clients details as per latest data available on NSE, according to which Groww have more than 26,51,472 active client whereas (2.6 million) whereas ICICIDirect is at third with about 3.9 million ,39,56,887 clients, they have been replaced recently last year by Upstox from holding the 2nd position in India in terms of active client base.
One must know that Groww established just 5.8 years ago i.e. 2016 first as a mutual fund distributor and in 2019 they made debut in stock broking. This is the best they could have done, which by the way is not an easy task at all.
For reference there are more than 315 stockbrokers in India at present being in the best stockbrokers list requires a lot of hard work and smart decision for any startup.
Having said that, there are many other banks in India who offers the broking services, but ICICI Direct is at the top amongst them due the major changes they do internally time to time.
Therefore, this is going to be very interesting to see which of them between Groww Vs ICICI Direct is better and in which sense.
I mean, how intuitive and user friendly is trading platforms, the lowest brokerage structure, what kind of service other than trading and investing in stocks are available such as IPO, NFO, SGB, ETF, Gold, SIP, etc. does the broker have good customer support service.
All in all everything which can make trading and investing experience more pleasant and worthy enough is what makes them best stockbrokers.
By the way you can read the separate detailed review of Groww and ICICI Direct Here.
Just to let you know this review guide is going to be long, you can switch from table of contents to look for the relevant info you want to know.
However below is overall comparison points between Groww Vs ICICI Direct to tell you in short about who is best.
So without further delay, let us start first with Groww Vs ICICIDirect overall review in 16 brief points by which you can make instant decision to open account instantly. Later below you can check them in detailed guide if you want.
Groww Vs ICICIDirect Overall Comparison:
I have already used both their services as well as wrote the reviews about them in detailed way separately, based on my experience and facts below are things you can consider before opening an account with them.
- Groww is a discount broker not full time so do not expect stock recommendation or market research reports as of now, may be in the future they come up with this things.
- ICICIDirect is a full time broker, you may enjoy stock recommendation as well as market reports for depending upon the addon plan you take.
- ICICIDirect have better trading platform in terms of user interface, technical and fundamental analysis as well as ease of placing orders while trading in comparison to groww.
- Recently ICICIDirect have also Integrated with Sensibull which is useful for options trading for applying different strategies similarly Groww have also tied up with Tickertape, Smallcase for portfolio based options.
- Groww and ICICIDirect both has option for you to make investment in US stocks such as Apple, Google, Amazon, etc.
- Groww and ICICIDirect brokerages are equal when comparing. ICICIDirect NEO Plan charging Rs.20 per executed order unlimited whereas Groww charging Rs.20 or 0.05% (whichever is lower).
- Groww and ICICIDirect both offers brokerage or say commission free mutual funds investment and platform for its users.
- With Groww you can also make investment in Gold, Fixed deposit.
- ICICI Direct is much better for people who not only do intraday trade but make other investments, such as investment in ELSS, PPF, SIP’s, FD, RD, ETF’s etc., or looking for Loans or credit cards, Insurance etc.
- As of now you can only trade and invest in stocks (equity) and FNO segment at groww, Commodity, Currency segments are yet to be launched, whereas with ICICIDirect you can trade and invest in all segments.
- Other than this you can make investment in Initial Public Offerings (IPO), Sovereign gold bonds (SGB), Exchange Traded Fund (ETF), with both stockbrokers.
- If we talk about Margin at Groww vs ICICIDirect, after SEBI Rules on Intraday margin every stockbroker is giving same margin 5x throughout India, hence this does not matter anymore.
- Having said that you can also get margin of up to 5X for delivery based trades at ICICIDirect, this service is not available at groww as of now.
- ICICIDirect, there is no AMC (Annual Maintenance charges) for Demat Account for the first Year. However, charge of ₹700 (excluding taxes) is levied from 2nd year onwards.
- For a limited time period you can open a Free trading/demat account with ICICIDirect, although they do charges one time account opening fee of Rs.975.
- With Groww there are no charges for opening account as well as AMC for a limited time period.
- Overall ICICIDirect is much better than Groww as of now while comparing every service.
Now, it is up to you to decide which one you choose as both have everything that is needed to trade and invest in stock market hassle free online.
I mean if you all by yourself and do not need any guidance while trading and investing i.e. to say advisory or recommendation as well do not want to make investments in other financial instruments as mentioned above apart from stock market such as PPF, RD,FD, etc. than go with Groww other wise choose ICICIDirect without any doubt.
You can Open a free Groww trading/demat account WITH Zero AMC
Now, let us go dive deep to cover all different services and features of Groww and ICICIDirect step by step and see who is best between both stock brokers by doing in depth analysis.
About Groww Vs ICICI Direct:
Before we dig deeper to understand the various services offered it becomes utmost import to know in brief about ICICI Direct and Groww history.
Harsh Jain is the Co-Founder & COO of Groww, he was also the product manager earlier with flipkart. Groww is based in Bangalore, Karnataka, Here is interesting fact about groww very few people know, the company use Groww as a brand name although it is registered by name Nextbillion Technology Private Limited.
Groww operates as an online investment platform and offers mutual funds, tax planning, investment management, and financial information services. As of now you can trade and invest in only stocks (equity), derivatives i.e. FNO, Commodity, Currency segment is not available yet.
Moreover, groww also offers Digital gold, US Stocks, and Fixed Deposit as other investment options apart from stock broking. Groww has partnered with CDSL to provide the depository services to clients.
Groww offers trade execution facilities for equity cash segments on BSE and NSE.
Groww founded in 2016, and had initially started as a direct mutual fund investment platform for users. By the time they have crated immense popularity among users in the mid-2020s, Groww expanded its product offering to include Equity trading.
As of April 2021, Groww had partnered with 40 mutual fund houses and more than 6000+ mutual funds were available on the platform. As of Sep 2020, the company had raised $59 million in venture capital an now have more than 11 million users on its platform.
This year on 7, April 2021, Groww has raised $83 million in a Series D funding round led by Tiger Global, making the online investment platform the latest entrant in Unicorn list.
Groww is also backed by some of the well know investor companies such as Ribbit Capital, SEQUOIA, Combinator etc.
ICICIdirect.com is a part of ICICI Securities and offers retail trading and investment services in India. ICICI Direct was founded in the year 2000 and as of now, ICICI Direct have more than 1.1 million active and around 4.8 million in total clients.
ICICI direct has a wide range of financial products and services related to investment banking, institutional broking, retail broking, private wealth management etc.
ICICI Direct has facility to invest in Equity, Derivatives, Commodity, Currency Futures, Mutual Funds, IPOs along other services like Fixed Deposits, Loans, Tax Services, New Pension Systems, and Insurance etc.
ICICI Securities has more than 280 offices across 80 cities in India and they provide trading in both exchanges NSE BSE as well as MCX.
Recently in September 2020 , ICICI direct has partnered with MCX (Multi commodity exchange) to offer commodity derivative trading, however as of now there is only facility to trade in commodity futures and not options but may be in coming days you would see the options trading in commodity segment to start.
Update: (options commodity trading started as well with ICICIDirect)
They are depository participant (DP) for both NSDL and CDSL. Apart from this they have also won Outlook Money Awards for Best Retail Broker of the year 2018,’16,’15 ,Best e-Brokerage house of the year 2014,’13,’12,’11,’09,’07 and many more.
Groww Vs ICICI Direct Margin Comparison:
Margin in stock market refers to buying/selling of securities (shares) by borrowing money from your broker. This is very much similar to taking loan for short period of time. This helps traders in buying or selling more with less money in intraday trading.
If you are an active trader or a beginner who knows what exactly going on with recent changes brought by SEBI, Higher Margin won’t be a factor anymore, now the competition among the broking industry is in terms of better trading platforms and lower brokerages plans.
The upfront margin collection in cash segment has been kept at flat 20%, which means now the leverage for all stocks would be 5x also the penalty provision for short-collection/ non-collection of upfront margin in cash segment.
This means regardless of any broker you won’t get more than 5X times margin in equity cash segment and in FNO you need to have the full margin span+exposure to take any position.
You can read more about it here.
Therefore, the margin or leverages offered will be equal irrespective of the stock brokers in India going forward. Keep in mind this also applies to Currency and commodity derivatives as well.
For example: if there is a 20% margin requirement on a particular stock, then you will have to pay only Rs.20 to buy a stock of Rs.100. Another way to look at it is that if you have Rs.100, you will be able to buy five stocks instead of one.
Hence, the margin requirement will be same for all brokers including Groww and ICICI Direct for intraday trading in equites and derivatives.
One need to understand taking more margin means more risk and chances of your money getting wiped out is even more, so it is always advisable to use it in limited way.
So going forward please choose stock broker not in terms of margin or leverage as it is same for all brokers through out India.
Groww Vs ICICI Direct Brokerages Comparison:
Brokerage is the most important factor when you trade and invest, both ICICIDirect and Groww have quite decent brokerages structure.
Let us know brokerage for both brokers one by one.
Groww Brokerage Structure:
At groww the brokerage charges are Rs.20 or o.o5% (whichever is lower) on every order executed.
What they mean is, suppose you bought stock xyz priced at Rs.100, quantity 100 on intraday basis,
so the total turnover would be bought 100, sold 100 (100*200)= 20,000 on this amount they will charge either whichever amount is lower as 0.05% of 20000, is Rs.10 so they will charge that instead of flat Rs.20. Below is the screenshot taken from Groww brokerage calculator for intraday trading.
Whereas brokerage charges if you do investment i.e. taking delivery of the stocks to your demat account or doing Buy today sell tomorrow (BTST) trades the brokerage charges are same as of above.
Brokerage Structure of ICICIDirect:
Let us now move on check the brokerage at ICICI.
ICICIdirect have listened to the people demands and have slashed the brokerage in every segment. They have come up with new brokerage plan termed as NEO, Here is the new brokerage structure as per ICICIdirect
Apart from above segments i.e. equity intraday, Future and options they have also reduced the brokerage in Commodity and Currency segments:
The New ICICIdirect NEO Brokerage In Currency Segment (FNO):
New brokerage would be @ ₹20 per order only. There would not be any brokerage on lots.
The New ICICIdirect NEO Brokerage In Commodity Segments (FNO):
New brokerage would be @ ₹20 per order only. There would not be any brokerage on lots.
So, overall if we compare the brokerage at Groww and ICICI Direct Groww is not charging flat Rs.20 per order instead Rs.20 or 0.05%, Hence Groww can be counted as winning the race in charging less brokerage from it’s customers.
Groww Vs ICICI Direct Account Opening Charges:
No, it was not always the case, Icici direct used to charge for trading and demat account opening, however after facing tough competition from Zerodha and Upstox, they have decided to lure the customers with free 3 in 1 account, which is great by the way.
ICICI Direct offers 3-in-1 accounts which includes ICICI bank account, ICICI trading account, and ICICI demat account. The 3-in-1 trading account gives you the convenience of opening a demat, trading & bank account.
You can seamlessly trade in Shares, Futures & Options, Currencies, commodities, invest in Mutual Funds, IPOs and Life Insurance.
»» Trading Account Opening Charges: Free for a limited time period
»» Trading Account AMC: Free for a limited time period
»» Demat Account Opening Charges: Free for a limited time period
»» Demat Account AMC: Rs 700 PA (Waived for 1st year) Excluding taxes
However, if the Demat account is under Basic Service DEMAT Account (BSDA), no AMC is levied for holding value up to 50000.
Get additional benefits with ICICI Direct now:
If we talk about Groww,
To open a trading/demat account at Groww there are no charges Rs.0 if you open an account through this link for a limited time period, Whereas the Annual Maintenance charge (AMC) is also kept at Zero.
Moreover there is 0% commission charges for investing mutual funds through Groww Platform.
As compare to other stock brokers, they may charge some AMC charges for maintaining the account yearly, whereas Groww is not charging anything, this makes them apart for sure.
Groww Vs ICICI Direct Broker Account Opening Process Online:
The account opening process is online and it’s very seamless and smooth. Here is what you need to do:
To open an account with Groww online for free, you can sign up using your mobile number through this link.
Similarly, To open an account with ICICIDirect online for free, you can sign up using your mobile number through this link.
You will receive an OTP to your number and you can get started with the process.
You will be required to enter your PAN, Bank account details and personal details to continue with the sign-up.
Once you sign up you need to upload certain documents listed below:
1. Your PAN card
2. Your Aadhaar
3. To complete the e Sign process, you will have to authenticate it with an OTP. So, make sure you have the number linked to your Aadhaar handy. If not, you will not be able to complete the process.
If the number linked to your Aadhaar is inactive, or if you don’t have any number linked, then you can visit your nearest Aadhaar Seva Kendra to get it updated.
4. A photo or scanned copy of your signature proof will be required to be uploaded.
6. Income proof – It is mandatory to submit income proof if you wish to trade in Futures and options – Equity, Commodity, and Currency.
You can submit one of the below documents.
- Form-16
- Income tax returns acknowledgment
- 6-month Bank statement
- Latest salary slip
- Demat holding statement, or
- A CA certifying your net worth
Note: The documents mentioned are for a Resident Individual Account.
Groww Vs ICICIDirect Trading Platform Comparison:
The most important part of any trading platform is the tools and resources it has for technical and fundamental analysis. If we talk about Groww first below is what you can expect as an trader and investor:
The trading platform seems to provide in-depth financial as well as technical analysis. There are 2 platform available at groww.
- Groww Web based Trading Platform
- Groww Mobile App for Android and OS
There are no downloadable version for desktop available for trading as of now with groww. Having said that let us review both stock broker trading platform separately to see more.
Groww Web Based Trading Platform:
The web based version at groww is quite clean and well designed, as the UI (user interface) looks dynamic and smooth.
Talking in terms of what is unique about the platform specially in respect to trading and investing, Groww platform offers great financial analysis for every stocks including the one listed in US (Nasdaq).
Checkout the image below to know more:
As, you can see in above image on left they have given the space for seeing charts sowing current trading price of stock in market, which includes candlestick charts with volumes patterns overtime,
You can see the historical data for up to 5 Years or more. On the right side of the screen you can easily place the intraday or delivery trades in a click.
If you go downwards you can see other great financial insights such as performance of stock, other different brands of that company, About the company and lot more.
company statistics such as, Profit & loss, balance sheet of company, cash flows, P/E ratio (price to earning), P/B ratio (price to book) Book value etc. are one click away on groww web based trading platform.
Now, I understand that Groww first being a investment platform for users have great financial information for users moreover if you are someone who loves doing intraday based trading it does requires technical indicators, tools and other resources, which at groww web based version is also available.
So, If you are someone who do trading and investing for short, medium or long term, Groww has everything in place for you. You will see more new features gets added and also the downloadable trading platform version in future.
ICICI Direct have three trading platforms for users:
- Web based trading platform : Trade Racer web
- Desktop based trading platform : Trade Racer
- Mobile trading platform: ICICI Direct mobile
Trade racer web as well as the downloadable software have similar functionalities. Let us know more about them:
Seamless convenience with Market Scanners, spot real time trading opportunity conveniently by customizing your preferred technical parameters.
Trend Scanner – Easily view all trending scrips in a single window
Trend Scanner is tool based on pre-defined Technical parameters, which tracks Intra-day Price Movement for finding Trending Scrips.
Bullish- Bearish
- Pivot : Based on Pivot levels
- Miscellaneous
Bullish
Live Scanner – Instantly identify stocks making new highs / lowsLive Scanner is tool which tracks New Highs and New Lows for Stocks with Price Movement.
Live Scanner helps you to identify Scrips making :
- New Day High/Low
- New Weekly High/Low
- New 1 Month High/Low
- New 3 Month High/Low
- New 1 Year High/Low
Take Complete control with Market Tracker
Now spot real time trading opportunity conveniently by customizing your preferred technical parameters.
Snap View
Snap View gives a complete picture for any scrip with following information.
- Quote/Market Depth
- Pivot Levels (Resistances & support level)
- Peer Group
- Chart
- Bulk and Block Deals
- Gross Delivery data
- Corporate Announcements
Market at fingertips
Equity @ finger tips is a flexible tool which would fetch the scrips on the basis of following predefined search :
Sr. No. |
Predefined Search |
1. |
Stocks with high price momentum |
2. |
Bargain Buys |
3. |
Highest – yielding Stocks in Sensex |
4. |
Poor Man’s Stocks |
5. |
Distressed Stocks |
6. |
Estimated Earnings Upgrade/Downgrade |
7. |
Momentum Stocks |
8. |
Year’s Top Performers |
9. |
Top Tech Companies |
10. |
Top Revenue Companies |
11. |
Top Profitable Companies |
12. |
Medium and Large Cap Stocks with high dividend yield but low P/E ratios. |
13. |
Delisting Candidates |
14. |
FII Favorites |
Bulk and Block DealsBulk deals refers to transactions where the total quantity traded in a stock ( whether bought or sold) is more than 0.5% of the number of equity shares of the company listed on the stock exchange. The quantity bought or sold could be through single trade or multiple trades.
Block deals is a trade with a minimum quantity of 500,000 shares or minimum value of Rs. 5 crores, executed through a single transaction on a special “Block Deal Window” The window is opened for 35 minutes in the morning trading hours.
SEBI rule states that block deal orders should be placed for a price not exceeding +1 percent to -1 percent of the previous day’s closing or the current market price.
Advance Decline ratio
Advance Decline ratio is market-breadth indicator used in technical analysis to compare the number of stocks that are trading positive with the number of stocks that are trading negative with respect to their previous day’s closing prices.
This widget shows the Advance-Decline Ratio for all NSE & BSE Indices. It shows a color coded bar in which Blue depicts Advances, Red depicts Declines and Grey Depicts No change.
Heat MapHeat Map is a Tabular representation of stocks for a Group/Index in ascending order of their price movement with respect to yesterday’s closing price. The table is color coded where the negative stocks are displayed in Red background and positive stocks are displayed in Blue Background.
Moving AveragesMoving Averages means the average price of a security over a specified time period. The most commonly used are 3, 5, 13, 20, 50, 100, 200 days.
Moving Averages are used in order to spot pricing trends by flattering on large fluctuations. This is perhaps the most commonly used variable in technical analysis. Its data is also used to create charts that show whether a stock’s price is trending up or down.
Global IndicesIt keeps your informed about Major American, European and Asian Market Indices.
Gross Delivery DataGross delivery of shares is the ratio of deliverable quantity of shares to the total quantity of shares traded in the exchange on that trading day.
For Example:
Quantity Traded:4,371
Deliverable Quantity (gross across client level) : 2,556
% of Deliverable Quantity to Traded Quantity : 58.48 %
You get the similar functionalities on all three trading platforms, however the downloadable platform is much better than other two in terms of seamless operation.
My Opinion On Groww Vs ICICI Direct:
I hope you have now thoroughly understood most of the services offered by Groww and ICICIDirect, if you ask me in Groww vs ICICIDirect who is better?
Groww might be new in discount broking industry, but they do have more than 5.9 years of experience in providing a rich platform for users to invest in mutual funds scheme.
As we already saw they have more than 26.5 lakh+ active clients in stock broking and 10 million + overall clients on the platform, this itself shows the trust it has developed among the users.
In my opinion they still need to to fulfill the stock broking requirements such as allowing, currency and commodity trading.
Having said that, I like their USP of allowing clients to invest in US, their strength in financial data for fundamental analysis, Free mutual funds investments.
If I have to rate Groww after looking at there breakthrough pricing model for brokerages as well as other charges and experiencing there simple yet great user interface for trading platform I would give it 8.8 out of 10.
Therefore, if you are someone who do more of investing and trading in stocks rather than currency or commodity than Groww is the perfect choice for you.
So, go ahead and open an account using this link
I am still being harsh as it is a new company particularly in stock broking, but you may see the ratings may go higher with time in my opinion.
On the other hand, If we talk about ICICIDirect
ICICIDirect is a one stop solution for trading and investing in any financial instruments in India. It has everything setup at one place, if you open account with them there is no need to look for any extra service here and there.
What makes ICICI direct different from other is the strong hold and backup from ICICI Bank, India’s top private bank. Other than this there are no charges to open an account so nothing to lose.
If I have to rate the ICICI direct in comparison with other groww, I will give 9.4 out of 10. So, go ahead and open an free account now here.
There is no better deal you can get apart from ICICIDirect as an full-time broker.
So, decide by yourself now and choose by registering from below link, as these offers run only for a limited amount of time.
If you are a beginner in trading and investing, please read this amazing guide on how share market works in India?
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