Zerodha Broking Ltd is an Indian

brokerage A broker is a person or entity that arranges transactions between a buyer and a seller. This may be done for a commission when the deal is executed. A broker who also acts as a seller or as a buyer becomes a principal party to the deal. Neith ...

and financial services company, based in

Bengaluru Bengaluru, also known as Bangalore (List of renamed places in India#Karnataka, its official name until 1 November 2014), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the southern States and union territories of India, Indian state of Kar ...

. It offers an

electronic trading platform In finance, an electronic trading platform, also known as an online trading platform, is a computer software program that can be used to place orders for financial products over a network with a financial intermediary. Various financial products ...

that facilitates institutional and retail trading of

stock Stocks (also capital stock, or sometimes interchangeably, shares) consist of all the Share (finance), shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided. A single share of the stock means fractional ownership of the corporatio ...

s, derivatives,

currencies A currency is a standardization of money in any form, in use or currency in circulation, circulation as a medium of exchange, for example banknotes and coins. A more general definition is that a currency is a ''system of money'' in common use wi ...

commodities In economics, a commodity is an economic good, usually a resource, that specifically has full or substantial fungibility: that is, the market treats instances of the good as equivalent or nearly so with no regard to who produced them. Th ...

mutual funds A mutual fund is an investment fund that pools money from many investors to purchase securities. The term is typically used in the United States, Canada, and India, while similar structures across the globe include the SICAV in Europe ('investmen ...

and bonds. It is a member of the

National Stock Exchange of India National Stock Exchange of India Limited, also known as the National Stock Exchange (NSE), is an Indian stock exchange based in Mumbai. It is the List of stock exchanges, 5th largest stock exchange in the world by total market capitalization, ...

(NSE),

Bombay Stock Exchange BSE Limited, also known as the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), is an Indian stock exchange based in Mumbai. It is the 6th largest stock exchange in the world by total market capitalization, exceeding $5 trillion in May 2024. Established with t ...

(BSE), and the

Multi Commodity Exchange Multi Commodity Exchange of India Limited, also known as the Multi Commodity Exchange of India (MCX), is an Indian commodity exchange. It was established in 2003 and is currently based in Mumbai. It is India's largest commodity derivatives ex ...

(MCX). Zerodha was founded and

bootstrapped In general, bootstrapping usually refers to a self-starting process that is supposed to continue or grow without external input. Many analytical techniques are often called bootstrap methods in reference to their self-starting or self-supporting ...

by brothers Nithin and

Nikhil Kamath Nikhil Kamath (born 5 September 1986) is an Indian entrepreneur and investor. He is the co-founder of Zerodha, a retail stockbroker, and True Beacon, an asset management company. As of March 2025, Kamath is worth $2.6 billion, according to Forb ...

. As of May 2024, it has 7.5 million active customers registered with the NSE, making it the second largest stockbroker in India.

History

Zerodha was founded in August 2010 by brothers Nithin and

. The name Zerodha, indicates a combination of words for the company's ideals: ''zero'' and , the

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

word for 'barrier'. In 2019, Zerodha became the largest retail stockbroker in India by active client base, overtaking ICICI Securities. It contributed up to 2% of daily retail volumes on Indian stock exchanges at the time. In June 2020, Zerodha became a "

unicorn The unicorn is a legendary creature that has been described since Classical antiquity, antiquity as a beast with a single large, pointed, spiraling horn (anatomy), horn projecting from its forehead. In European literature and art, the unico ...

" with a self-assigned valuation of around $1 billion based on an ESOP buyback. Zerodha had about 1.3 million customers in early 2020, which rose to nearly 10 million by the end of 2022. In 2020, Zerodha applied for a licence to set up an AMC mutual fund in India and launched its fund house in 2023.

Products and subsidiaries

A fixed commission of up to ₹20 is applied to all equity trading and derivative transactions, regardless of its size. Equity delivery is commission-free. The company also offers commodity trading through its wholly owned subsidiary, Zerodha Commodities Pvt. Ltd.

Rainmatter

In 2014, Rainmatter was founded as an early-stage fund focused on financing start-ups in new technology and new product development. Some notable investments by Rainmatter are in startups such as Cred, Finception, Smallcase, and Sensibull. The company has also backed GoldenPi and WintWealth, which are bond purchasing platforms.

True Beacon

In 2019, Zerodha started True Beacon, an

alternative investment fund An alternative investment, also known as an alternative asset or alternative investment fund (AIF), is an investment in any asset class excluding capital stocks, bonds, and cash. The term is a relatively loose one and includes tangible ass ...

(AIF) with a defensive investment strategy.

Zerodha Fund House

In October 2023, Zerodha launched Zerodha Fund House, an

asset management company An asset management company is an asset management / investment management company/firm that invests the pooled funds of retail investors in securities in line with the stated investment objectives. For a fee, the company/firm provides more dive ...

, in partnership with Smallcase. It focused on index funds and had only direct plans which paid no commissions to distributors. In March 2024, the fund house had an

AUM ''Om'' (or ''Aum''; ; , ISO 15919: ''Ōṁ'') is a polysemous symbol representing a sacred sound, seed syllable, mantra, and invocation in Hinduism. Its written form is the most important symbol in the Hindu religion. It is the ess ...

of .

FLOSS Fund

On 15 October 2024, Zerodha announced the launch of FLOSS Fund dedicated to Free/Libre and Open Source projects globally. Zerodha committed to giving up to $1 million per year to support developers and communities that create and maintain such projects.

Technical problems and interruptions

There have been multiple reports of technical issues including glitches, system outages and connectivity issues on Zerodha's Kite platform, especially on days with high market volatility and F&O expiry days. In November 2020, Livemint reported that some Zerodha traders complained of being unable to access its Kite platform due to a technical issue. Several users took to Twitter to report a login issue. Zerodha, in an official statement, acknowledged the problem.

References

{{FinTech in India Online brokerages Online financial services companies of India Companies based in Bengaluru Privately held companies of India Financial services companies established in 2010 Indian companies established in 2010 2010 establishments in Karnataka