Dow Jones Industrial Average
Thirty of the most established US companies, the oldest stock index still in use.
What it tracks
A committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices selects the 30 components. Unlike every other major , the Dow is price-weighted, a share trading at $500 counts five times more than one at $100, regardless of company size. This is an artifact of a pre-computer era: Charles Dow had to calculate the average by hand. The result is that the index's exposure has little relationship to economic importance. The committee looks for large, established US companies with sustained earnings, good reputations, and broad investor interest. When one component is removed, a replacement is found covering a similar sector.
Geographic exposure
Where in the world the index is invested, by domicile of listed company. For global indices this varies significantly between developed and emerging markets.
All 30 Dow components are US-listed. Like the S&P 500, their revenues are far from purely domestic, companies like Apple, McDonald's and Caterpillar earn a large share of revenues internationally. The true economic exposure is considerably more global than the domicile figure suggests.
Approximate end-2025 figures
Historical performance
Annual total returns from 2001 onward, including reinvested . Move the slider to see what a different starting amount would have become, and switch to the bar view to see how uneven the path actually was.
Total return, dividends reinvested, before fees and taxes. Past performance is not indicative of future results.
Returns by decade
Average annualised return for each full decade. This view makes it obvious that the path is anything but smooth, the 2000s were a lost decade for US equities, erasing all gains from the dot-com crash and the 2008 financial crisis.
* 2020s is partial (2020–2025). All figures are approximate total return .
Sector breakdown
How the index splits across the eleven standard GICS sectors. The bigger the bar, the larger the weight in the index.
Approximate end-2025 figures
Top 10 holdings
The largest names in the index by weight. Together they make up a meaningful share of the whole, pay attention to concentration.
| # | Company | Ticker | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | UnitedHealth Group | UNH | 9.1% |
| 2 | Goldman Sachs | GS | 7.4% |
| 3 | Microsoft | MSFT | 6.5% |
| 4 | Home Depot | HD | 5.9% |
| 5 | Caterpillar | CAT | 5.6% |
| 6 | Salesforce | CRM | 5.0% |
| 7 | Visa | V | 4.5% |
| 8 | Amgen | AMGN | 4.1% |
| 9 | McDonald's | MCD | 3.6% |
| 10 | Boeing | BA | 2.8% |
ETFs that track it
The funds most long-term investors use to own this index. Lower are almost always better. Domicile matters for , UCITS funds are domiciled in Ireland (IE) for European investors, US-domiciled (US) for American ones.
| Ticker | Fund name | Provider | Domicile | Type | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DIA | SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF Trust | State Street | US | Dist | 0.16% |
| CIND | iShares Dow Jones Industrial Average UCITS ETF | BlackRock | IE | Acc | 0.33% |
Accumulating, are automatically reinvested inside the fund. You don't receive cash but the share price grows. Simpler for long-term and more tax-efficient in many European countries.
Distributing, are paid out to you as cash. You decide what to do with them, but you're also responsible for declaring and paying on each distribution. Common preference for investors who want regular income.
A bit of history
Charles Dow created the index on May 26, 1896, as a simple average of 12 industrial companies. It was extended to 20 names in 1916 and to its current 30 in 1928. The index is maintained by S&P Dow Jones Indices, which can add or remove components at any time, the current list bears little resemblance to the original: no railroads, no steel mills. General Electric, the last surviving original member, was removed in 2018. The index survived the 1929 and the Great Depression, Black Monday (1987), the dot-com (2000–2002), the 2008 , and COVID-19. It crossed 1,000 for the first time in 1972, hit 10,000 in 1999, and topped 40,000 in 2024.
- + The world's most famous , quoted on every financial news channel since 1896.
- + 30 deeply liquid , each one a bellwether of its industry.
- + Lower than the Nasdaq-100; holds up better in tech-driven sell-offs.
- + Easier to follow: 30 names you can actually know, unlike 500 or 1,500.
- − Price-weighted, not weighted, a $400 stock has more index influence than a $50 one, regardless of company size.
- − Only 30 stocks. True requires far more breadth.
- − Misses Amazon, Alphabet, and many of today's tech leaders. Index composition reflects history more than the current economy.
- − Has lost more than 50% in at least two cycles since 1970.
- − Consistently underperformed the S&P 500 over 20-year periods.
All figures are approximate end-2025 values for educational illustration. Index composition, weights, holdings and returns change constantly. Nothing here is financial advice or a recommendation.