Interactive Brokers App
What to Expect — The Interactive Brokers app brings the full trading power of IBKR to your smartphone. Available on iOS and Android, the mobile application supports equity, option, futures, and forex trading with streaming real-time quotes, interactive charts, and complete order management. Biometric authentication provides rapid secure login while IBot, the AI-powered trading assistant, responds to voice and typed commands for market data and account queries. Push notifications keep you informed of fills, margin alerts, and account activity whether you are commuting, traveling, or stepping away from the desktop. This page details the feature set, platform-specific capabilities, and mobile trading tools that make the Interactive Brokers app a fully capable trading command center in your pocket.
Mobile Trading Features Across iOS and Android
The Interactive Brokers app delivers a consistent feature set on both major mobile platforms while leveraging each operating system's native capabilities for security and performance.
Order Management
Place market, limit, stop, stop-limit, trailing stop, and conditional orders directly from your phone. The order ticket adapts to each asset class, displaying relevant fields for stocks, options, futures, and forex. Multi-leg option strategies can be constructed through the strategy builder with visual confirmation of risk-reward profiles before submission. Interactive Brokers designed the mobile order flow to minimize taps — frequent traders can execute a stock order in three screen interactions from the watchlist. Order status, fills, and cancellations update in real time with audible and haptic feedback on supported devices.
Interactive Charts
Streaming charts with pinch-to-zoom and swipe gestures support candlestick, bar, line, and mountain chart types across multiple timeframes. Over 60 technical indicators are available including moving averages, Bollinger Bands, MACD, RSI, and Ichimoku clouds. Horizontal display mode on tablets and larger phones provides expanded chart real estate. The chart trader feature allows direct order placement from the chart with draggable stop and limit levels. Interactive Brokers optimizes chart rendering to maintain responsiveness during fast markets, with data compression that preserves visual accuracy while minimizing bandwidth.
Portfolio Dashboard
The home screen presents a consolidated view of portfolio value, daily P&L, buying power, and margin status. Drill down into position details with cost basis, unrealized gains, and allocation percentages by asset class or sector. The dashboard supports multi-account views for advisors and traders managing multiple sub-accounts. Portfolio risk analytics available on mobile include delta exposure, beta-weighted sector allocation, and currency exposure breakdowns across the 26 supported currencies in Interactive Brokers multi-currency accounts.
iOS vs Android Feature Comparison
The Interactive Brokers app maintains near-identical functionality across both mobile platforms. The table below highlights the feature availability and any platform-specific differences traders should know about.
| Feature | iOS | Android | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Biometric Login | ✓ Face ID / Touch ID | ✓ Fingerprint | Device-native secure enclave storage |
| IBot Voice Commands | ✓ | ✓ | Natural language processing for market data and account queries |
| Push Notifications | ✓ | ✓ | Configurable alerts for fills, margin, price triggers |
| Streaming Charts | ✓ 60+ indicators | ✓ 60+ indicators | Feature parity on both platforms |
| Options Trading | ✓ Multi-leg | ✓ Multi-leg | Strategy builder with P&L visualization |
| Futures Trading | ✓ | ✓ | Global futures exchanges supported |
| Forex Trading | ✓ 23 currency pairs | ✓ 23 currency pairs | Competitive spreads with IBKR pricing |
| Fund Transfers | ✓ | ✓ | ACH, wire, and internal transfers supported |
| Multi-Account View | ✓ | ✓ | Advisors and multi-account traders |
| Widget Support | ✓ Home Screen | ✓ Home Screen | Portfolio snapshot and watchlist widgets |
Mobile Trading at a Glance
IB Key Mobile Security
The Interactive Brokers app doubles as a security key through the IB Key system. Instead of relying on SMS-based two-factor authentication, which is vulnerable to SIM-swap attacks, IB Key generates cryptographically secure codes on your device. The system supports push notification-based approval for login attempts — when you sign in to TWS or Client Portal, a notification appears on your phone asking you to approve the login with a single tap. This creates a second factor that cannot be intercepted remotely.
For the highest security, the app supports hardware-backed key storage on both iOS Secure Enclave and Android Keystore. Biometric authentication gates access to the IB Key functionality, so even if someone gains physical access to your phone they cannot approve logins without your face or fingerprint. Interactive Brokers designed this security architecture to protect accounts from unauthorized access while maintaining the convenience mobile traders expect.
Paper Trading on Mobile
The paper trading environment is fully accessible through the Interactive Brokers app. Beginners can practice order entry, test strategies, and learn platform navigation without financial risk. The simulated environment mirrors live market conditions using delayed or real-time data depending on your market data subscriptions. Switching between paper and live trading requires only logging out and logging back in with the respective credentials.
Experienced traders use mobile paper trading to validate algorithmic triggers, test new order types in a consequence-free environment, and practice the mobile interface before executing time-sensitive trades on the go. The paper account includes simulated margin, commission calculation, and position tracking identical to the live environment. Interactive Brokers provides paper trading as a standard account feature with no additional fees, making it an ideal training ground for mobile trading proficiency.
“I manage my entire portfolio from the Interactive Brokers app while traveling between Santiago and New York. The charting is responsive, orders fill fast, and I can check my P&L in seconds. The biometric login means I never worry about typing passwords in public spaces.”
Frequently Asked Questions — Interactive Brokers App
Is the Interactive Brokers app free to download?
Yes, the Interactive Brokers app is free to download from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. There are no subscription fees or premium-tier charges to use the mobile application. Standard trading commissions and market data fees apply to trades executed through the app at the same rates as desktop platform trades. The app requires an active Interactive Brokers account to log in and trade. New users can initiate the account application process directly through the mobile application using the built-in onboarding flow. Existing IBKR clients simply download the app and log in with their established credentials — all watchlists, alerts, and account settings synchronize automatically from the cloud.
What features does the IBot assistant offer in the mobile app?
IBot in the Interactive Brokers mobile app provides the same natural language interface found in Trader Workstation, optimized for voice and typed input on mobile devices. You can ask for real-time quotes, account balances, buying power, and order status using plain English commands. IBot responds with formatted data cards, charts, and actionable links. Example commands include "What is my P&L today?", "Show me Tesla chart", "What are my open positions?", and "What is the price of gold futures?" The assistant supports voice dictation on both iOS and Android, making it possible to check positions or pull up market data hands-free while monitoring markets on the go. IBot also retrieves fundamental data, analyst ratings, and recent news headlines for requested symbols.
How does biometric login work on the Interactive Brokers app?
The Interactive Brokers app supports Face ID and Touch ID on iOS devices and fingerprint authentication on Android devices for fast, secure login. After initially logging in with your IBKR username and password, you can enable biometric authentication in the app settings. Subsequent logins require only a biometric scan, eliminating the need to type credentials each session. Biometric data is stored securely on-device using the operating system's native secure enclave — Interactive Brokers never receives or stores your fingerprint or facial recognition data. The app also supports IB Key two-factor authentication as an additional security layer for sensitive operations such as fund transfers, account setting changes, and adding new linked bank accounts.
Can I trade options on the Interactive Brokers mobile app?
Yes, the Interactive Brokers app provides full options trading capability including single-leg and multi-leg strategies. The option chain display is optimized for mobile screens with configurable columns for bid, ask, Greeks, implied volatility, and volume. You can construct spreads, straddles, butterflies, and custom combinations through the strategy builder interface. The app displays profit and loss diagrams for strategy positions, helping visual traders evaluate risk-reward profiles before placing orders. Options order types include market, limit, stop, and conditional orders. The mobile app also shows options analytics including delta, gamma, theta, and vega for individual contracts and aggregated position Greeks across your portfolio.
Does the Interactive Brokers app support push notifications for trading alerts?
The Interactive Brokers app delivers push notifications for filled orders, partially filled orders, margin calls, corporate action announcements, dividend payments, and price alerts configured in TWS or the mobile app. Notifications are granularly configurable — you can choose which alert types to receive and set quiet hours when notifications are suppressed during non-trading hours or overnight. Price alerts are synchronized across platforms so an alert created in Trader Workstation will trigger a push notification on your phone even if TWS is not running. The app also sends account activity notifications for deposits, withdrawals, and security-related events, keeping you informed of all account events without needing to log in and check manually throughout the trading day.