Why 8 million investors choose Simply Wall St over Seeking Alpha
TL:DR What are the key differences between Simply Wall St and Seeking Alpha?
- Simply Wall St lets you build and maintain a Portfolio using narratives - something that is not possible on Seeking Alpha
- Simply Wall St is more holistic product compared to Seeking Alpha - e.g. including comprehensive Portfolio Management
- Simply Wall St covers global markets whereas Seeking Alpha is US focused
- Simply Wall St offers a fully functional free plan unlike Seeking Alpha
Intro
Choosing the right investment research platform can make a huge difference for a retail investor. Both Simply Wall St and Seeking Alpha are popular among savvy stock pickers but they are fundamentally different, lets explore why.
Fundamental Differences
- Simply Wall St and Seeking Alpha were originally built on different philosophies. Simply Wall St is all about objective, numbers-driven analysis presented visually. In contrast, Seeking Alpha is based on crowd-sourced content – hundreds of new articles and opinions each day. However nowadays they both feature analysis and crowd-sourced content, so lets see how they compare.
- Simply Wall St is considered a holistic product - in that revolves around building a successful stock portfolio. While Seeking Alpha has some features for portfolio management, the primary focus is on stock ideas.
- Simply Wall St paid plans are more affordable compared to Seeking Alpha and they offer a fully functional free plan.
- Seeking Alpha only covers US stocks/ equities whereas Simply Wall St covers every market.
Foundational Principles
The core principles behind the two platforms influence everything about how they work. Simply Wall St’s guiding principle is to help investors make decisions based on facts and fundamentals, not hype. The platform emphasizes long-term, intrinsic value and a clean minimalist interface. All analysis is presented in a consistent format, ensuring that emotions and biases are minimized. Simply Wall St doesn’t tell you “buy this stock” – instead, it shows you the company’s financial reality (valuations, balance sheet health, growth prospects) and lets you decide. This principle of unbiased, transparent analysis is even reflected in their ethics – for example, users have noted that the company is reasonable and ethical in resolving billing issues. Simply Wall St wants to empower investors with clarity and objectivity.
Seeking Alpha’s principle, on the other hand, is “wisdom of the crowd.” It positions itself as “the world’s largest investing community,” powered by the diversity of its contributors. The idea is that by reading many viewpoints – from professional analysts to amateur investors – you can glean insights and find ideas you might miss on your own. Crowdsourcing is at the heart of Seeking Alpha. Every stock or market topic becomes a conversation with bulls and bears debating.
Stock Research Reports aka Unbiased Analysis
For any stock worldwide, Simply Wall St gives you an instant visual summary (the “snowflake” graphic) that distills the company’s fundamentals into five dimensions (value, future growth, past performance, financial health, and dividends). Key metrics and fair value estimates are right there on the page, with color-coded graphics and sliders indicating how the company stacks up. This approach lets you quickly grasp a stock’s strengths and weaknesses without reading lengthy reports. It’s a fundamentally unbiased, by-the-numbers analysis – every stock is evaluated with the same rigorous criteria and data from S&P Global. The method used by Simply Wall St is also well documented on their Github account.
Seeking Alphas Quant Rating system is an attempt to introduce objectivity (it algorithmically rates stocks Strong Buy to Sell), but even this is presented alongside author ratings and Wall Street analyst ratings as equal pillars. Seeking Alpha’s ethos is that more opinions and information are better, and it’s up to the investor to filter and interpret that firehose of content. This approach appeals to those who enjoy deep dives and lively debate, but it can be daunting if you prefer a single authoritative analysis.
The means that Simply Wall St's stock reports are a much more powerful way to get a quick snapshot of a company, and that snapshot is unbaised, always up to date and easy to compare to any other company.
We also tested the new "Virtual Analyst Report" from Seeking Alpha however this turned out to actually be an AI/ LLM generated summary of the recent articles on the company, the same as plugging articles into ChatGPT, you can see a preview below.
Relevant links
Community Ideas aka Wisdom of the Crowd
Ideas from the crowd is the bread and butter of Seeking Alpha, in fact the sheer volume of publishers can make the site slightly overwhelming for investors and authors often need to resort to click bait or bombastic claims to stand out from the crowd.
Simply Wall St has recently launched their own community initiative called Narratives.
Narratives are a way for investors to capture their research and valuation for a stock and share it with the wider community.
The key differences between the Simply Wall St and Seeking Alpha communities are:
- Authors on Seeking Alpha need to stand out from the crowd and so are incentivised to re-publish regularly and often need to make bald claims to stand out from the crowd
- Authors on Seeking Alpha are paid ~US$150 per article unlike Simply Wall St where users not paid and typically are capturing their own research or ideas
- The authors on Seeking Alpha predominantly represent newsletters, funds or companies (via IR) versus Simply Wall St where the community is mostly individual investors
- Unlike Narratives Seeking Alpha articles don't need to follow a structure and so don't always include a forecast of revenue, earnings and a fair value
- Narratives can be followed and updated, once you've selected your Narrative you can sit back and relax
Relevant links
- Example Community Nvidia Narrative on Simply Wall St
- Example Community Nvidia article on Seeking Alpha
Portfolio Management
Simply Wall St shines in portfolio management features. You can link your brokerage accounts (2,000+ supported brokers globally) or import trades via CSV/Excel, and SWS will automatically calculate your actual portfolio performance – including unrealized gains, realized gains, dividends, currency exchange impacts, and even annualized internal rate of return (IRR)simplywall.stsimplywall.st. It basically does what dedicated portfolio tracker apps do, integrated into your research tool. It also sends you weekly portfolio summary emails and alerts about your holdings (e.g. if a stock in your portfolio has a notable development like an earnings report, price drop, or new risk identified)simplywall.st. Seeking Alpha’s portfolio feature is more basic – you can create watchlists/portfolios and get article alerts for those stocks. Seeking Alpha does not calculate your portfolio returns or provide detailed analytics on your holdings beyond stock-level info. It’s mostly a way to track news and get a quick sense of overall quant ratings of your portfolio. For serious portfolio analysis and tracking, Simply Wall St is far more advanced.
Relevant Links
Stock Screener
Both platforms offer a stock screener however the differ slightly:
- Simply Wall St sends alerts on Saved Screeners - when a new stock matches you get an email
- Seeking Alpha offers a large selection of metrics to choose from, although many are paid only
- Simply Wall St offers an easier visual interface (e.g. by dragging the Snowflake)
- Simply Wall St allows you to search by keyword which allows for some unique screening ideas
Relevant Links
Market Coverage
One of the biggest differences is the scope of coverage. Simply Wall St offers truly global coverage of stocks, while Seeking Alpha’s practical coverage skews toward the U.S. (though it does include other assets too e.g. crpyto).
- Simply Wall St Coverage: Every listed company world wide, and support for portfolio in every market worldwide.
- Seeking Alpha Coverage: US listed equities (including OTC) only.
In short, global investors will appreciate Simply Wall St’s reach - all their companies are covered and any portfolio in any currency is handled.
Cost (Plans and Pricing)
Simply Wall St Pricing: Simply Wall St has a freemium model with three tiers: Free, Premium, and Unlimited.
Seeking Alpha Pricing: Seeking Alpha’s basic plan gives one article for free but afterwards is paid.
Reviews and Ratings
Lets compare ratings of the two products side by side.
Simply Wall St Trustpilot: 4.4 ★★★★☆
Seeking Alpha Trustpilot: 3.9 ★★★☆☆
Something to be careful of looking at Seeking Alpha reviews is their approach to charging credit cards and refunds:
Simply Wall St Ratings
Simply Wall St Customer Reviews
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