I started with 16, so I guess there's no "too early". I would strongly recommend in stock, especially as you're young. If you make losses for a year now, you have plenty of time to catch up. I guess I'll stop investing when I retire in a few decades. Except precious metal I never invested in a single value but always preferred equity funds - of course this lowers the profits a little, but also lowers the risk as the money is spread on many different companies. There are funds spread on many areas (like US only / Europe only, big companies only / small companies only, green energy only) and various levels of risk. Just be careful and mind the trap of getting greedy / risking too much money. I never needed to touch the money I invested, so it grew a lot over time and as situation allowed, I gradually invested more money and spread the risk further. Could I have made higher profits? Yes. Could I have made higher losses? Yes.