$10,000 invested in VOO at launch in September 2010 is worth roughly $75,000 today. No options trades. No earnings calls at 4 a.m. No “conviction picks” that cratered 60%. Just one ticker, held for 15 years, compounding at about 14.5% annually with dividends reinvested.
VOO — the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF — is the most boring investment on the planet. It’s also one of the most effective. With nearly $870 billion in assets, it’s closing in on SPY to become the largest ETF ever created. Millions of 401(k)s, Roth IRAs, and brokerage accounts hold it as their single largest position.
But “buy VOO and chill” has become such a meme that people skip the homework. They don’t know what’s actually inside it, how concentrated it’s become, or what the real risks look like when the market drops 34% in five weeks (which it did, in 2020).
This is everything you need to know — the good, the ugly, and the math that matters. If you’re already holding VOO alongside other ETFs, you might find our VOO vs SPY fee comparison or VTI vs VOO deep dive useful alongside this VOO ETF review.
What Is VOO?
The S&P 500 in one fund — 500 of America’s largest companies for 0.03% per year.
~$870B AUM · 0.03% ER · 1.11% Yield · Quarterly
The $10K Test — What Actually Happened
| Time Horizon | $10K Became | CAGR |
|---|---|---|
| 5 Years (2021–2025) | ~$19,600 | ~14.4% |
| 10 Years (2016–2025) | ~$39,700 | ~14.8% |
| Since Inception (Sep 2010–2025) | ~$75,000 | ~14.5% |
$10,000 → 10 Years Later (2016–2025)
Gap: $1,819 · VOO’s large-cap focus added ~0.5% annually over total market
$10,000 growing to ~$39,700 in 10 years is a 3.97x return — compounding at 14.8% annually. But before you extrapolate that forward forever: the S&P 500’s long-term average (going back to 1926) is closer to 10% nominal. The last decade has been above-average, fueled by low interest rates, massive tech innovation, and unprecedented stimulus.
Could the next 10 years match it? Maybe. Could they deliver 7-8% instead? Absolutely. Past performance disclaimers exist for a reason.
For perspective on what $10K does in other popular ETFs, we’ve run the same test for QQQ vs VOO and SCHD vs VOO.
Risk Profile — What You’re Signing Up For
| Risk Metric | VOO |
|---|---|
| Max Drawdown | -34.0% |
| Sharpe Ratio | 0.78 |
| Annualized Volatility (Std Dev) | 17.3% |
| Beta | 0.98 |
| Portfolio Turnover | 2% |
Since inception (Sep 2010). Source: PortfoliosLab, MyPlanIQ
The max drawdown of -34% happened during the COVID crash in March 2020. Five weeks. A third of your money, gone — on paper. If you had $500,000 in VOO, you watched $170,000 disappear — down to $330,000 by late March. Six months later you were back to breakeven. But those six months felt like six years.
The Sharpe ratio of 0.78 is solid — you’re getting compensated reasonably well for the volatility you’re taking on. A Sharpe above 0.7 is generally considered good for an equity fund. For reference, SCHD’s Sharpe is about 0.70 over the same period, meaning VOO delivers slightly more return per unit of risk.
Beta at 0.98 just confirms what you’d expect: VOO is the market. It moves almost identically to the S&P 500 index itself, with the tiniest tracking difference from that 0.03% fee.
Year-by-Year Total Return — 11 Years of Data
| Year | Total Return | Note |
|---|---|---|
| 2015 | +1.31% | Flat year — China fears, rate hike |
| 2016 | +12.17% | Post-election rally |
| 2017 | +21.77% | 🔥 Tax reform optimism |
| 2018 | -4.50% | Rate hikes + trade war |
| 2019 | +31.35% | 🔥 Monster recovery year |
| 2020 | +18.29% | COVID crash → V-shaped recovery |
| 2021 | +28.78% | 🔥 Reopening + stimulus |
| 2022 | -18.19% | 🛡️ Inflation + rate shock |
| 2023 | +26.32% | 🔥 AI boom begins |
| 2024 | +24.98% | 🔥 Mag 7 continues |
| 2025 | +17.82% | Broadening rally |
Total returns include dividends reinvested. Source: Yahoo Finance
Nine out of eleven years are positive. Only 2018 and 2022 went red — and 2018 was a mild 4.5% dip. The 2022 drawdown was the real gut check: watching your portfolio lose nearly a fifth of its value over a calendar year.
But if you held through 2022, you got +26% the very next year. Then +25% after that. Then +18%. The people who sold in December 2022 missed one of the greatest two-year rallies in market history. That pattern — a painful drop followed by a sharp recovery — is exactly why VOO works as a long-term hold. You just have to actually hold.
Top 10 Holdings — Who’s Really Driving VOO
| Rank | Stock | Sector | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | NVIDIA (NVDA) | Technology | 7.74% |
| 2 | Apple (AAPL) | Technology | 6.86% |
| 3 | Microsoft (MSFT) | Technology | 6.14% |
| 4 | Amazon (AMZN) | Consumer Cyclical | 3.83% |
| 5 | Alphabet — Class A (GOOGL) | Communication | 3.11% |
| 6 | Broadcom (AVGO) | Technology | ~2.8% |
| 7 | Meta Platforms (META) | Communication | ~2.5% |
| 8 | Tesla (TSLA) | Consumer Cyclical | ~2.2% |
| 9 | Alphabet — Class C (GOOG) | Communication | ~2.6% |
| 10 | Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) | Financials | ~1.8% |
| Top 10 Total | ~39.5% | ||
Holdings and weights as of late January 2026. Source: Stock Analysis
Count the tech names. NVIDIA, Apple, Microsoft, Broadcom — four of the top six are pure tech. Add Amazon, Meta, and Alphabet (which are technically classified outside IT but run on technology), and you’ve got about 30% of the fund in seven companies. The “Magnificent Seven” effect in action.
Berkshire Hathaway at #10 is the lone non-tech name in the top tier. Warren Buffett’s conglomerate is a nice counterweight, but it’s a rounding error compared to NVIDIA’s nearly 8% weight.
Sector Breakdown — Where Your Money Actually Goes
| Sector | Weight | Visual |
|---|---|---|
| Technology | 35.14% | |
| Financial Services | 13.00% | |
| Communication Services | 10.91% | |
| Consumer Cyclical | 10.57% | |
| Healthcare | 9.61% | |
| Industrials | 7.50% | |
| Consumer Defensive | 4.72% | |
| Energy | 2.82% | |
| Utilities | 2.25% | |
| Real Estate | 1.83% | |
| Basic Materials | 1.65% |
Source: Yahoo Finance, as of February 2026
Over a third of VOO sits in technology. Add Communication Services (which houses Alphabet and Meta) and Consumer Cyclical (Amazon, Tesla), and you’re looking at roughly 57% in tech or tech-adjacent names. Keep that in mind when people say the S&P 500 is “diversified.”
It’s diversified across 507 stocks. It is not diversified across sectors the way it was 20 years ago. Healthcare, which used to rival tech, is now under 10%. Energy, once a titan, is barely 3%.
Dividend & Cost Analysis
Nobody buys VOO for the dividend. At 1.11%, it’s not going to replace your paycheck. But people underestimate how much those dividends matter when reinvested.
VOO pays quarterly — roughly $7.08 per share annually at current prices. On a $100,000 position, that’s about $1,110 per year flowing back in. Over 15 years of reinvestment, dividends have accounted for roughly 20–25% of VOO’s total return. Not the headline, but far from irrelevant.
The dividend has grown at about 7% per year over the last five years. Not SCHD territory (SCHD grows dividends at 11%+), but it steadily outpaces inflation. The companies in the S&P 500 collectively earn enough to bump their payouts by a mid-single-digit percentage each year, and that gets passed through to VOO holders.
For retirees living off dividends, VOO alone probably isn’t enough income. On a $500,000 portfolio, 1.11% gives you $5,550 a year — about $462 a month. If you need more cash flow, a JEPI/SCHD income strategy alongside VOO makes more sense.
The 0.03% Fee — What It Means in Real Dollars
VOO’s 0.03% expense ratio is so low it barely registers. On a $100,000 investment, you’re paying $30 a year. One dinner out.
But let’s be precise about what this saves you over time compared to a higher-fee fund:
| Portfolio Size | VOO (0.03%) | Typical Mutual Fund (0.50%) | You Save/Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| $50,000 | $15 | $250 | $235 |
| $200,000 | $60 | $1,000 | $940 |
| $500,000 | $150 | $2,500 | $2,350 |
| $1,000,000 | $300 | $5,000 | $4,700 |
Over 30 years of compounding, that 0.47% annual difference between VOO and a typical mutual fund adds up to tens of thousands of dollars. We did the exact math on fee drag in our VOO vs SPY comparison — even tiny fee differences compound into real money over decades.
What VOO Actually Is (and Isn’t)
VOO tracks the S&P 500 — an index of roughly 500 of the largest publicly traded companies in the United States. When you buy one share of VOO, you’re buying a tiny slice of Apple, NVIDIA, Microsoft, Amazon, JPMorgan, Johnson & Johnson, and about 500 other companies in one transaction.
So goes the pitch, anyway. The reality is more complicated than that.
The S&P 500 is market-cap weighted. The bigger a company gets, the larger its slice of the pie. Right now, the top 10 holdings make up about 39% of the entire fund. NVIDIA alone is almost 8%. That means your “diversified” index fund is really a concentrated bet on mega-cap tech that happens to have 497 other companies along for the ride.
Is that bad? Not necessarily. Those mega-caps have been the engine driving the market for years. But it’s worth knowing what you actually own when someone tells you to “just buy the index.” Any honest VOO ETF review has to flag this concentration risk.
A few things VOO is not:
It’s not the entire U.S. market. It misses mid-caps and small-caps entirely. If you want everything, that’s VTI — and we’ve compared the two here.
It’s not a dividend fund. The 1.11% yield is fine for reinvestment, but if you’re living off dividends, you’ll want SCHD or similar.
It’s not immune to crashes. VOO dropped 34% in five weeks during COVID (2020) and lost 18% over the full year in 2022. If you had $300K in VOO at the February 2020 peak, you were staring at $198K by late March. The recovery took about six months — but you had to hold through the pain to see it.
Verdict — Who Should (and Shouldn’t) Buy VOO
You want a single-fund core holding for a Roth IRA, 401(k), or taxable brokerage account. You have 10+ years before you need the money. You don’t want to spend any time managing your portfolio — buy once, set up automatic investments, and forget about it. You want the lowest fees possible with near-zero tracking error against the S&P 500.
You need current income (look at SCHD or JEPI). You want small-cap and mid-cap exposure too (look at VTI). You want more aggressive growth and can tolerate higher volatility (look at QQQ). You’re uncomfortable with 35%+ technology concentration.
VOO is more concentrated in mega-cap tech than at any point in its history. The top 10 holdings represent ~39% of the fund — that’s near record levels. If there’s a tech-specific correction (regulation, valuation compression, AI disappointment), VOO will feel it harder than a more diversified fund. This isn’t a reason to avoid it. It’s a reason to understand what you own.
VOO vs the Competition — Quick Guide
You don’t need to read all of these. Pick the comparison that matches your actual decision:
| Your Question | Comparison | Quick Take |
|---|---|---|
| “Should I get total market instead?” | VTI vs VOO | Nearly identical. VTI adds small/mid-caps. |
| “Is SPY basically the same thing?” | VOO vs SPY | Same index. VOO is cheaper to hold. |
| “Should I go heavier into tech?” | QQQ vs VOO | QQQ has crushed it — but with more pain. |
| “What about dividends instead?” | SCHD vs VOO | VOO wins total return. SCHD wins income. |
The VOO Verdict
If someone handed me $100,000 and said “pick one ETF for the next 20 years,” VOO would be on the shortlist. The S&P 500’s track record over any 20-year rolling period in history has been positive — though past patterns don’t guarantee future results.
But putting 100% of a portfolio in VOO alone may not be the right call for everyone. Some investors pair it with international exposure (VXUS) for geographic diversification. Others add a dividend tilt with SCHD to build an income floor. The “right” allocation depends entirely on when you need the money, your risk tolerance, and how well you sleep during -18% years.
The FIRE calculator we built can help you figure out what savings rate plus VOO’s historical returns means for your retirement timeline.
VOO isn’t exciting. It won’t make you rich overnight. But there’s a reason Warren Buffett told his wife to put 90% of her inheritance in an S&P 500 index fund. Over long enough timelines, boring wins. If you take one thing from this VOO ETF review, make it that.
Interactive VOO Growth Calculator
Plug in your own numbers and see what happens. Adjust the return rate to model optimistic (12%), baseline (10%), or conservative (7%) scenarios.
[qfl_calculator type=”voo-growth”]Fund Specs — Quick Reference
| Metric | VOO |
|---|---|
| Full Name | Vanguard S&P 500 ETF |
| Tracks | S&P 500 Index |
| Expense Ratio | 0.03% |
| AUM | ~$870 Billion |
| Holdings | ~507 stocks |
| Dividend Yield (TTM) | 1.11% |
| Dividend Frequency | Quarterly |
| 5-Year Dividend Growth | ~7%/yr |
| Inception Date | September 7, 2010 |
| Issuer | Vanguard |
| 10-Year CAGR (Total Return) | ~14.8% |
| Max Drawdown (Since Inception) | -34.0% |
Data as of early 2026. Sources: Vanguard, FinanceCharts, PortfoliosLab
Frequently Asked Questions
Is VOO a good investment for beginners?
It’s arguably the best first investment a beginner can make. One purchase gives you exposure to 500 of America’s largest companies at a cost of $30 per year per $100K invested. The main requirement is patience — you need to hold through the bad years to capture the good ones. If you can commit to 10+ years without touching it, VOO is hard to beat.
What’s the difference between VOO, SPY, and IVV?
All three track the exact same S&P 500 index. The difference is fees: VOO charges 0.03%, IVV charges 0.03%, and SPY charges 0.0945%. Over decades, those extra basis points in SPY add up. SPY has better options liquidity, which matters for active traders. For buy-and-hold investors, VOO and IVV are functionally identical. We break this down fully in our VOO vs SPY comparison.
Can I live off VOO dividends in retirement?
At a 1.11% yield, you’d need about $900,000 in VOO to generate $10,000 per year in dividends. Before taxes. Most retirees pair VOO with a higher-yield fund like SCHD (3.4% yield) or use a total return approach — selling shares as needed. VOO alone isn’t enough for most income strategies.
Is VOO too concentrated in tech?
Technology makes up about 35% of VOO, and the “Magnificent Seven” stocks account for roughly 30% of the fund — higher concentration than historical norms. Whether it’s “too much” depends on your view: if mega-cap tech continues to grow earnings, the weighting makes sense. If there’s a sector-specific downturn, VOO will feel it. You can dilute the tech concentration by pairing VOO with SCHD (value/dividend tilt) or an equal-weight S&P 500 fund like RSP.
Should I buy VOO or VTI?
Performance over the last 10 years is very close — VOO returned ~14.8% CAGR vs VTI’s ~14.3% over the same period. VTI adds about 3,500 mid-cap and small-cap stocks that VOO misses. If you want the broadest possible U.S. exposure, go VTI. If you only want blue chips, go VOO. Either way, you’re not making a bad choice. We covered this in detail in our VTI vs VOO comparison.
VOO Deep Dives & Comparisons
Now that you’ve finished this VOO ETF review, dig into the hands-on comparisons to see exactly how VOO stacks up against the ETFs you’re actually deciding between. Each guide includes side-by-side performance data, fee analysis, and a clear verdict.
Disclaimer: This article is for educational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. All data sourced from Vanguard, Yahoo Finance, FinanceCharts, Stock Analysis, and PortfoliosLab as of early 2026. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Consult a financial advisor before making investment decisions.