QQQ vs. VGT: choose VGT for technology, QQQ for the Nasdaq-100
The Vanguard fund charges half as much, 0.09% against 0.18%, and Nvidia, Apple and Microsoft are 44.7% of it against 22.2% of the Invesco fund.
Key takeaways
For an investor who wants U.S. technology stocks, the Vanguard Information Technology ETF VGT is the better choice than Invesco QQQ ETF QQQ. It charges 0.09%, half of QQQ's 0.18%, and it holds the sector. You accept a concentrated stake: Nvidia, Apple and Microsoft are 44.7% of VGT and 22.2% of QQQ.
Nvidia, Apple and Microsoft carry twice the weight in VGT
- VGT
- QQQ
- NVDA
- VGT 17.6%
- QQQ 8.3%
- AAPL
- VGT 15.9%
- QQQ 7.8%
- MSFT
- VGT 11.2%
- QQQ 6.1%
Choose QQQ if you want Amazon, Tesla, SpaceX and the rest of the Nasdaq-100. You pay the higher fee for those companies.
These are different portfolios
VGT tracks an MSCI index of U.S. information-technology companies across large, mid and small caps. Vanguard's fact sheet listed 318 stocks as of Sept. 30. QQQ tracks the Nasdaq-100 Index, the 100 largest nonfinancial companies listed on Nasdaq.
Invesco cut QQQ from 0.20% to 0.18% on Dec. 22, 2025. On $10,000, VGT costs $9 a year and QQQ costs $18.
The funds share 38 companies. Amazon, both share classes of Alphabet, Meta, Tesla and SpaceX are 19.5% of QQQ and do not appear in VGT.
QQQ also holds Walmart and Costco. VGT adds smaller technology companies the Nasdaq-100 does not include.
The return gap belongs to the indexes
Through Oct. 22, VGT is up 25.9% on price this year and QQQ is up 14.7%, a gap of 11.2 percentage points. The extra $9 a year on $10,000 cannot explain it. The same order holds over six months, one year, three years and five years.
Year to date starts at the Dec. 31, 2025 close. The three- and five-year figures are cumulative, not annual rates.
The past month was the exception: VGT fell 5.6% and QQQ fell 5.0%.
QQQ's year-to-date price return matches the Nasdaq-100, both 14.7%. Through Sept. 30, Vanguard reported VGT within a tenth of a percentage point of its index for the year to date.
Both funds yield 0.4%. The cash they pay does not close the price gap in the table.
The volume gap is for large trades
In the 20 trading days through Oct. 22, QQQ traded an average of $25.9 billion a day and VGT traded $574 million, about 45 times the dollar volume. That difference is for someone moving large sums. A few thousand dollars is small beside $574 million a day.
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