Pure Benchmarks · Portfolio Benchmark Report
Is Your Betterment Portfolio Underperforming?
Pure Benchmarks ranks real Betterment portfolios against thousands of other verified investor portfolios across nine standardized risk categories, from 100% equity to 90% fixed income. Every portfolio is recategorized daily from actual end-of-day holdings, and Community Nests shows exactly where your Betterment portfolio ranks against other real Betterment clients in the same risk category — built entirely from verified portfolio data, with no firm that manages money able to see any data point on the platform.
Why your Betterment portfolio can lag a pure index baseline
The stacked-fee wrapper. Automated allocation is convenient, but it adds an advisory wrap fee on top of the expense ratios of the underlying funds. Holding the index directly avoids the extra layer, so the wrapper creates a structural drag against the baseline.
Illustrative 10-year comparison — a standard managed portfolio versus a pure index baseline. Figures are illustrative only.
| Year | Standard managed portfolio | Pure index baseline | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Year 1 | $105,200 | $107,000 | -$1,800 |
| Year 3 | $116,400 | $122,500 | -$6,100 |
| Year 5 | $128,700 | $140,300 | -$11,600 |
| Year 7 | $142,300 | $160,600 | -$18,300 |
| Year 10 | $165,100 | $196,700 | -$31,600 |
See exactly where your Betterment portfolio stands.
One clean report against a pure index baseline. No email required.
See Your Free Benchmark ReportThis page is an information baseline for comparison only. It is not investment advice and not a recommendation to buy, sell, replace, or transfer any specific asset, account, or firm. Past performance does not guarantee future results. All figures shown are illustrative.