IVV vs VTI

IVVAiShares Core S&P 500 ETF

VTIAVanguard Morningstar Total Stock Market ETF

In short

IVV The 2000-vintage iShares take on the S&P 500, now a $100B-plus cornerstone holding: roughly 500 large US companies, 0.03% a year, and tracking that stays tight to the index.

VTI The whole US stock market in one ticker: roughly 3,600 names, from mega caps down to micro caps, for three basis points. Vanguard has run this portfolio in ETF form since 2001, and it's grown into one of the largest funds anywhere.

Stated mandate

IVV The fund seeks to track the investment results of an index made up of large-capitalization U.S. equities.

VTI The fund aims to replicate the performance of a benchmark index that covers the entire U.S. stock market.

Why people hold it

• IVV Costs 0.03% a year, a fraction of the typical fee among S&P 500 trackers, and undercuts the category's founding fund (SPY, 0.09%) on the same index.
• Tracking is the whole job, and it does it about as tightly as this peer group gets: roughly 500 large US companies, no manager discretion bolted on.
• A $100B-plus fund that trades heavily all session, which is what keeps bid-ask spreads thin for retail-sized orders and institutional blocks alike.
• Running since 2000 as a registered open-end fund, with quarterly distributions and one of the longest live records in the S&P 500 aisle.ishares.com

• VTI Costs 0.03% a year, half the 0.06% typical for its total-market peers.
• About 3,600 holdings, so the small and micro caps an S&P 500 fund leaves out are already in the mix.investor.vanguard.com
• Tracks its total-market benchmark very closely and trades heavily, and it sits among the strongest implementations in its peer group.
• The ETF is a share class of Vanguard's Total Stock Market Index Fund, sharing one portfolio with the mutual fund rather than running a separate copy.sec.gov

Worth knowing

• IVV Pure US large cap. No mid caps, no small caps, nothing overseas, so it works as one slab of a portfolio rather than the whole thing.
• It rides the index in both directions: when the S&P 500 has an ugly year, this has the same ugly year, minus the fee.
• A near-identical rival shaves a basis point (SPYM at 0.02%). On $10,000 that gap is about a dollar a year, so structure and trading habits matter more.

• VTI Market-cap weighted, so the biggest US companies drive the result and the thousands of small names at the bottom carry little weight.personal.vanguard.com
• All US, by design. Nothing outside the country comes with it.
• ITOT and SCHB match the 0.03% fee and BBUS runs 0.02%, so rivals deliver similar whole-market exposure for the same or less.

Full IVV profile⁠

Full VTI profile⁠