Is this live — are these today’s numbers?

No — every figure is hand-read from each fund’s own factsheet, not a live feed, and the “checked” date says when. Fees, fund sizes and returns move slowly, so once a year I re-read every factsheet and update it. If you’re about to buy, glance at the fund’s current KID too — mine is the shape, not the second-by-second price.

Is the fund with the lowest fee always the best one?

No — cheapest fee is step one, not the answer. An Irish-domiciled fund pays less US dividend tax inside the fund (15% instead of 30%), which can quietly outweigh a few hundredths of a percent of fee. Structure, domicile and size all matter alongside the number on the label. That’s why this tool describes the funds instead of crowning one.

Tracking difference or tracking error — what’s the difference?

Tracking difference is how far a fund’s return drifted from its index over a period — the gap itself. Tracking error is how bumpy that drift was — how steadily it hugged the index. I show tracking error where a provider publishes it; I don’t compute a tracking difference myself, because doing that properly needs the index’s licensed data, which isn’t mine to republish. The Fee Drag is the plain arithmetic behind why the gap exists at all.

Two funds track the same index — why don’t they return exactly the same?

Because tracking isn’t free. The fee comes off the top; the fund may hold a sample of the index rather than every share; it earns or loses a little lending its shares out; and its home country decides how much dividend tax it quietly pays. Add those up and two funds on one index drift apart — usually by a hair, occasionally by more. That drift, compounded over decades, is the whole point of this tool.

Ireland or Luxembourg — why does where the fund lives matter?

A fund holding US shares pays US tax on their dividends before you ever see them. An Ireland-domiciled fund pays 15% under the US–Ireland treaty; some others pay 30%. On a US-heavy index that gap can matter more than the fee. It’s also why a synthetic S&P 500 fund can quietly out-return its own index — a swap can sidestep that dividend tax altogether. Your own dividend tax is a separate question — that’s the Europe atlas.

Are you telling me which fund to buy?

No — and I never will. There are no affiliate links here and nothing for sale, so I’ve no reason to. I show you the funds’ own published facts, price the fee gap in your money and time, and explain what each thing means. Which one suits you depends on your broker, your account and your country’s tax. Not advice, and I’m not a licensed adviser.

All tools

The Tracking Gap

Same index, different fund.

Pick an index and the funds tracking it look interchangeable — same holdings, same benchmark. They aren’t. The headline fee hides a real, structural gap, and over decades it quietly costs you. Here are the funds side by side, why they differ, and what the gap is worth in your money and your time. I name real funds; I never tell you which to buy.

The shortlist that actually matters — the major funds Europeans really choose between, not all ~2,000 UCITS ETFs. For the full universe, tools like justETF list every fund; I’d rather show fewer and tell you why they differ.

Pick an index

The whole investable world in one line — developed and emerging markets, about 4,300 companies. The most popular single-fund choice for European investors, and the one I'd reach for first.

FTSE Russell · ~4,300 companies · developed + emerging

The gap, in your money and time

Your pot (€)

Over how many years?

yrs

€18,825

The priciest fund here (0.19%) versus the cheapest (0.07%) — that’s the gap on €100k over 30 years, on fee alone.

See it as months of your working life

The certain part of the gap: the fee (TER), compounded on your pot at a steady 6% real return over your horizon. I don’t project the funds’ past-return differences forward — same-index funds track almost identically, and past isn’t a promise. This prices what’s structural and persistent. Not advice.

See the gap

0.07% cheapestpriciest 0.19%

Every fund on this index, placed by its yearly fee. How tightly — or loosely — they cluster is the structural gap, at a glance. It’s the spread and why, never a ranking.

Sort by

Returns: total return, in EUR, to 30 June 2026 — from justETF, so every fund is to the same date. Tracking error is each provider’s own published 3-year figure, shown where they disclose it. You sort; there’s no crowned winner.

FTSE All-World funds compared. Sorted by Size.
Fund	Fee	Domicile	Structure	Size	1y · 3y · 5y	Tracking	Fee cost, 30y
Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS ETF (Acc)VWCE · Vanguard Largest here Lends securities The most popular All-World fund — optimised sampling, so it holds most of the index's ~4,300 names rather than every one.	0.19%	🇮🇪 Ireland	Physical (sampled) Accumulating	€45bn	26.2% · 65.6% · 73.1%	0.07%	€19k
Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS ETF (Dist)VWRL · Vanguard Pays income out Lends securities The original All-World, from 2012 — the same fund as VWCE, but it pays its dividends out each quarter.	0.19%	🇮🇪 Ireland	Physical (sampled) Distributing	€23bn	26.2% · 65.6% · 73.1%	0.07%	€19k
Invesco FTSE All-World UCITS ETF (Acc)FWRA · Invesco Lends securities A newer, cheaper challenger to the two Vanguards — launched in 2023, so it has no long track record yet.	0.15%	🇮🇪 Ireland	Physical (sampled) Accumulating	€3.6bn	26.3% · 66.2% · —	—	€13k
Xtrackers FTSE All-World UCITS ETF 1CALLW · Xtrackers (DWS) Lowest fee here New fund New — launched April 2026, and the cheapest All-World fee yet. Too young for a return history.	0.07%	🇮🇪 Ireland	Physical (sampled) Accumulating	€50m	— · — · —	—	cheapest

Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS ETF (Acc)VWCE · Vanguard

Largest here
Lends securities

Fee (TER): 0.19%
Domicile: 🇮🇪 Ireland
Structure: Physical (sampled), accumulating
Size: €45bn
Return 1y·3y·5y: 26.2% · 65.6% · 73.1%
Tracking error: 0.07%
Fee cost, 30y: €19k

The most popular All-World fund — optimised sampling, so it holds most of the index's ~4,300 names rather than every one.

Trades as VWCE (Xetra, EUR) · VWRA (LSE, USD) · VWCE (Borsa Italiana, EUR) · source

Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS ETF (Dist)VWRL · Vanguard

Pays income out
Lends securities

Fee (TER): 0.19%
Domicile: 🇮🇪 Ireland
Structure: Physical (sampled), distributing
Size: €23bn
Return 1y·3y·5y: 26.2% · 65.6% · 73.1%
Tracking error: 0.07%
Fee cost, 30y: €19k

The original All-World, from 2012 — the same fund as VWCE, but it pays its dividends out each quarter.

Trades as VGWL (Xetra, EUR) · VWRL (Amsterdam, EUR) · VWRD (LSE, USD) · source

Invesco FTSE All-World UCITS ETF (Acc)FWRA · Invesco

Lends securities

Fee (TER): 0.15%
Domicile: 🇮🇪 Ireland
Structure: Physical (sampled), accumulating
Size: €3.6bn
Return 1y·3y·5y: 26.3% · 66.2% · —
Tracking error: —
Fee cost, 30y: €13k

A newer, cheaper challenger to the two Vanguards — launched in 2023, so it has no long track record yet.

Trades as FWIA (Xetra, EUR) · FWRA (LSE, USD) · FWRA (Borsa Italiana, EUR) · source

Xtrackers FTSE All-World UCITS ETF 1CALLW · Xtrackers (DWS)

Lowest fee here
New fund

Fee (TER): 0.07%
Domicile: 🇮🇪 Ireland
Structure: Physical (sampled), accumulating
Size: €50m
Return 1y·3y·5y: — · — · —
Tracking error: —
Fee cost, 30y: cheapest here

New — launched April 2026, and the cheapest All-World fee yet. Too young for a return history.

Trades as ALLW (Xetra, EUR) · ALLW (LSE, USD) · XALL (SIX, CHF) · source

Checked July 2026. No affiliate links, nothing to sell. Structural facts from the funds’ own reports, returns via justETF — not a recommendation, and I’m not a licensed adviser. Past returns are not a guide to future ones. Which fund suits you depends on your broker, your account and your country’s tax. Not advice.

The link carries these exact numbers — nothing about you is stored.

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The returns are each fund’s total return in euros, all to the same date, from justETF — the one way to line them up fairly (a fund’s own factsheet uses its own date and currency, which is why I don’t build the column from those). Notice how close they are: funds on one index nearly match, so the small gaps are real — and the pricier funds visibly trail over five years. What separates them over thirty years isn’t last year’s return; it’s the fee and the structure, which is what the money-and-time figure above prices. Only a couple of brand-new funds are too young to show a full history.

The tracking column is each fund provider’s own published 3-year tracking error — how tightly it hugs its index. Providers disclose it inconsistently: SPDR, HSBC, Vanguard and Amundi print it on the factsheet, so it’s here. Others don’t publish that exact figure — iShares reports standard deviation and beta instead, Xtrackers only a forward-looking estimate, and some publish nothing — so rather than borrow an aggregator’s computed number, I leave those cells blank. Where it’s blank, the returns already tell the story: same index, same date, so how far a fund’s return sits from its peers is the real gap.

Why Ireland keeps showing up

Most of these funds are domiciled in Ireland, and it isn’t an accident. Ireland’s tax treaty with the US taxes US dividends inside the fund at 15% instead of 30% — so an Irish fund holding US shares quietly keeps more of them. On a US-heavy index that edge can outweigh a few hundredths of a percent of fee. A synthetic fund can go further still — a swap can sidestep that dividend tax altogether, which is why a synthetic S&P 500 fund has sometimes edged ahead of its own index.

Your own country’s dividend tax, in the atlas

Accumulating or distributing?

An accumulating fund reinvests dividends inside the fund, untouched. A distributing one pays them out as cash — which some countries tax the year you receive it, whether you needed it or not. Which suits you is a tax question, not a returns one, and it turns on where you live and the account you hold it in. That’s the atlas’s job, not mine to guess.

How to choose — not what to choose

1Pick the index first: how much of the world you want to own. That decision dwarfs the fund choice.
2Then weigh the things that persist — fee, domicile, physical vs synthetic, size and liquidity. Not last year’s return.
3Cheapest fee is step one, not the answer: a slightly pricier Irish fund can keep more after US dividend tax than a cheaper one that doesn’t.
4Check it lists in a currency and on an exchange your broker actually offers. The underlying return is the same whichever line you buy.

Which line do I actually buy?

The same fund lists on several exchanges in several currencies — the tickers here are one and the same share class. Buying the euro line or the dollar line changes nothing about what you earn; the holdings are identical. Pick whichever your broker offers cheapest.

Checked July 2026

The structural facts — fee, domicile, structure, size — are each fund’s own, from its factsheet or KID, checked and cited. The returns come from justETF, a reputable ETF data service, so every fund is measured to the same date on the same basis — the only honest way to compare them. Tracking error is each provider’s own published figure, where they publish it. I don’t compute a gap-versus-index myself, and there are still no affiliate links.

Nothing to sell

No affiliate links. No paywall. Nothing on this page is for sale, and no broker pays me to rank one fund above another. The neutrality is the whole point.

Not advice

Structural facts from the funds’ own reports, returns via justETF — not a recommendation, and I’m not a licensed adviser. Past returns are not a guide to future ones. Which fund suits you depends on your broker, your account and your country’s tax. Not advice.

Want the arithmetic behind the fee, with no fund names attached? The Fee Drag

Common questions

Is this live — are these today’s numbers?: No — every figure is hand-read from each fund’s own factsheet, not a live feed, and the “checked” date says when. Fees, fund sizes and returns move slowly, so once a year I re-read every factsheet and update it. If you’re about to buy, glance at the fund’s current KID too — mine is the shape, not the second-by-second price.
Is the fund with the lowest fee always the best one?: No — cheapest fee is step one, not the answer. An Irish-domiciled fund pays less US dividend tax inside the fund (15% instead of 30%), which can quietly outweigh a few hundredths of a percent of fee. Structure, domicile and size all matter alongside the number on the label. That’s why this tool describes the funds instead of crowning one.
Tracking difference or tracking error — what’s the difference?: Tracking difference is how far a fund’s return drifted from its index over a period — the gap itself. Tracking error is how bumpy that drift was — how steadily it hugged the index. I show tracking error where a provider publishes it; I don’t compute a tracking difference myself, because doing that properly needs the index’s licensed data, which isn’t mine to republish. The Fee Drag is the plain arithmetic behind why the gap exists at all.
Two funds track the same index — why don’t they return exactly the same?: Because tracking isn’t free. The fee comes off the top; the fund may hold a sample of the index rather than every share; it earns or loses a little lending its shares out; and its home country decides how much dividend tax it quietly pays. Add those up and two funds on one index drift apart — usually by a hair, occasionally by more. That drift, compounded over decades, is the whole point of this tool.
Ireland or Luxembourg — why does where the fund lives matter?: A fund holding US shares pays US tax on their dividends before you ever see them. An Ireland-domiciled fund pays 15% under the US–Ireland treaty; some others pay 30%. On a US-heavy index that gap can matter more than the fee. It’s also why a synthetic S&P 500 fund can quietly out-return its own index — a swap can sidestep that dividend tax altogether. Your own dividend tax is a separate question — that’s the Europe atlas.
Are you telling me which fund to buy?: No — and I never will. There are no affiliate links here and nothing for sale, so I’ve no reason to. I show you the funds’ own published facts, price the fee gap in your money and time, and explain what each thing means. Which one suits you depends on your broker, your account and your country’s tax. Not advice, and I’m not a licensed adviser.

Read the thinkingThe number Next toolThe First Bad Decade

Nothing here is financial or investment advice — it’s arithmetic and education. Every tool runs in your browser; nothing you type is sent anywhere or saved. Decisions about your money are yours, ideally with a licensed adviser. I’m happily not one.

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