Teach your kids to invest with micro investing

Want to get your kids into investing early? Micro-investing is a good way to start. This clever fintech idea lets kids deposit spare change or grandma’s birthday money into an investment portfolio – and even track returns on their phone.

Major Points to Learn

• Micro-investing lets parents invest small amounts for children using regulated platforms that offer diversified portfolios.
• Because the accounts are legally in the name of the parent, hefty kid’s tax rates are avoided.
• Aussie platforms offer apps with charts, performance tracking, easy top-ups, and the ability to switch portfolios.

Why Micro-Investing Has Become a Tool for Families

Got a spare $5? For many micro-investing apps, that’s enough to start.

Platforms such as Raiz, Spaceship, Pearler Micro and CommSec Pocket ($50 minimum) are leading the micro investing trend in Australia. Kids can download an app on their phone, and literally watch their money grow.

How some apps ’round up’ small change

A handy feature of many micro investing apps is the ability to ’round up’.

Basically the way it works is that whenever you spend money – whether it’s $3.20 at a café or $74.10 at the supermarket – the app calculates the difference between what you paid and the next whole dollar. That spare change (80 cents in the first example, 90 cents in the second) is recorded as a “round-up.” Nothing is invested immediately; instead, those round-ups accumulate in the app. When the total reaches the platform’s minimum threshold, usually $5, the app transfers that amount from your bank account and invests it. The feature to ’round up’ can apply to every purchase you make from a linked bank account or car, but not all apps have this feature so it’s worth checking before signing up.

The Main Australian Players

The largest and most widely used micro-investing platforms in Australia include the following players, all of whom are regulated under Australian financial services laws.

Micro Investing apps:

• Raiz
• Spaceship
• Pearler Micro
• CommSec Pocket

Raiz, Spaceship, Pearler Micro and CommSec Pocket share one core strength: they turn investing into something kids can see, touch, and track from their phone. These apps show balances, recent activity and performance graphs at a glance. For parents using them to teach children how markets work, the visual aspect is often as valuable as the investing itself.

Raiz offers the most fully developed mobile dashboard, designed to replicate a simplified portfolio tracker. The home screen shows your total balance, the dollar amount you have personally contributed and a performance line chart. You can swipe through time periods from one day to all-time and open further screens for ETF breakdowns, dividends and projections. The round-up feature updates automatically as soon as purchases are processed, and the performance chart updates daily as the underlying ETFs update their prices. For users who like to see what is happening at a glance – including children watching their balance move – Raiz provides one of the clearest visual experiences in the market.

Spaceship takes a minimalist but highly polished approach, focusing on daily end-of-day updates. The app displays your balance at the top and uses a clean performance graph beneath it that can be toggled across different periods. When the unit prices update each business day after 11am Sydney time, the graph shifts to reflect your new portfolio value. The pared-back interface is highly mobile-friendly, reducing friction for users who want to check their performance without navigating through layers of menus. It is visually appealing, fast to navigate, and suited to young investors learning the basics of market movement without being overwhelmed by too much data.

Pearler’s experience leans more heavily into long-term investing and goal-tracking, but the mobile interface is simple and intuitive. Users see their portfolio value, their ETFs or Micro units, and a performance chart that reflects how the portfolio has grown relative to their goals. Pearler updates values daily according to underlying ETF or fund pricing, but its main emphasis is on encouraging long-term automation and consistency. The dashboard includes goal progress indicators and automated investing tools, making it ideal for parents setting up accounts intended to run quietly over years rather than being checked every day.

CommSec Pocket is the micro-investing arm of Commonwealth Bank of Australia (via its brokerage division CommSec), designed specifically for beginners and small-scale investors. You can start investing with as little as $50, choosing from ten themed ETFs (for example “Tech Savvy”, “Aussie Top 200”, “Sustainability Leaders”). The entire experience is mobile-centred: you sign up via the CommBank or CommSec apps, link a transaction account, and then browse the available ETF themes inside the app.

On the interface side, the app provides a home dashboard that displays your total investment balance and allows you to click into the chosen ETFs to view their unit price, historical performance, management fees and underlying holdings. You can also set up regular investments (monthly or fortnightly) inside the app.

The app operates on standard end‐of-day settlement and market pricing, and that you can view your investments alongside your banking app in NetBank/CommBank. Because it is oriented toward simplicity, the app gives you daily snapshots, an investment history, recurring deposit tracking and simple performance visualisation.

When we compare CommSec Pocket to platforms like Raiz, Spaceship Voyager and Pearler, a few differences stand out. CommSec Pocket leads in brand trust (being part of a major bank). If you already bank with CBA and want to keep everything under one app, CommSec pocket – which offers investing options such as “Tech,” “Sustainability,” or “Top 200″ – is a good option. The mobile interface lets you check your balance, view portfolio growth over months, and observe deposits and performance. That said, if the goal is frequent ’round-ups’, or ultra-low fees on very small amounts, then one of the other platforms may provide slightly more flexibility in those areas.

Together, these platforms demonstrate how micro-investing has become not just accessible but highly engaging. For parents, this means children can open an app on their phone and see exactly how their money has grown, how markets move, and how small, regular deposits can build into impressive balances.

How micro-investing solves the tax problem for kids

For children under 18, any money earned from investments is hit with heavy tax rates: you pay zero tax on the first $416, but then 66% tax up to $1,307, and 45% on the full amount once you go over that threshold. Basically, any earnings over $1,307, a junior must return almost half of it to the Government.

But micro investing apps have already thought about this. If the investments are owned by the parent – even if they are “for the child” – the tax is paid at the parent’s normal marginal rate. In short, you open the account in your own name, while designating it as held for a child. The investment, tax obligations and reporting technically sit with you, though the money is intended for your child.

The mechanics are simple: parents link a bank account, choose a portfolio, and set either recurring deposits or “round-ups” that sweep spare change into the investment.

What kids can invest in

Micro-investing platforms generally offer diversified baskets of exchange-traded funds rather than direct shares. These include global equities, Australian equities, bond funds or themed investment options such as technology or sustainability.

Raiz uses ETF portfolios across Vanguard and iShares, while CommSec Pocket offers themed ETF choices such as Aussie Top 200 or Global 100. Spaceship focuses on managed funds with technology and global growth themes, and Pearler Micro channels funds into broad ETFs aimed at long-term investing. The common thread is diversification and simplicity. Children learn to invest without needing to choose individual companies.

Can kids direct gifts and spare change into their account?

This is one of the core advantages of micro-investing. Because deposits can be as small as a few dollars, birthday money, pocket money, or small contributions from grandparents can be invested instantly.

Over time these small amounts compound, which demonstrates to kids the link between spending decisions and long-term savings, creating a behavioural feedback loop that traditional bank accounts hardly ever achieve.

Fees and whether they eat into returns

Fees are the most important factor for children’s micro-investing accounts, because balances are small and flat fees can erode returns in the early years. Raiz charges a flat monthly fee on most plans, which can weigh on portfolios under a few thousand dollars. CommSec Pocket charges per trade, which is a benefit for infrequent contributors. Spaceship offers percentage-based fees on higher balances, which scale more gently over long periods. Pearler Micro uses a low monthly price point.

For families, understanding the fee structure is critical. The lower the initial balance, the more damaging flat fees become. However, once the account passes a certain threshold, the impact diminishes and long-term compounding becomes more meaningful. The simplest approach is to match the platform’s fee model to the child’s expected contributions.

A Forward-Looking Perspective

For families, micro-investing is becoming more than a savings tool. It is evolving into an educational system embedded in daily life. Children no longer learn investing through textbooks, but by watching small deposits grow and fluctuate in real time. As platforms deepen their educational content and integrate with digital banking, the next generation will not only save earlier, but understand the mechanics of markets from the ground up.

The long-term gain is cultural as much as financial. When children learn that investing is not a mystery but a habit, they enter adulthood with a confidence that compounds just as powerfully as their portfolios.