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It’s probably not even worth it now. You can get 4.7% guaranteed on a one-year treasury, with no three month penalty for early withdrawal. If you withdraw an I bond in 12 months, your effective rate will be 4.85% if the interest rate stays the same (and the government is doing everything it can to make that number go down in six months).

It's not the interest rate it used to be, but it is still a good option for many people

Why do you want/need i bonds? That’s the first question.

They serve a specific purpose.

Some ppl use it as a long term bond holding part of their overall asset allocation needs in their portfolio

Some people layer it in for their emergency fund bc the rate was higher than a HYSA

Some people use it for sinking funds that are 1-5 years out (you lose some interest in this case).

there’s not a blanket statement of “get bonds”

Ty, hopefully shouldn’t need to withdraw it early though, are there any other benefits?

Haven’t thought of a specific purpose, not using my emergency funds on it or anything just somewhat young and have money in the bank that’s not doing much of anything. Was wondering if I-bonds were a good option for putting that money to use seeing as I probably wouldn’t need to withdraw it early.

If the inflation rate gets worse, you can keep that money in there for years and benefit. More likely, it returns to a 2-4% rate for the medium term, trailing the interest rates of treasuries.

If you don’t need the money for 5 years you’re much better off investing in a broad market index fund like the vanguard total market index.

Go through the flow chart in the wiki, that will help you figure out what the money should be for

Depends what you want ibonds for.

Pretty young and have some money in the bank that’s just sitting there. It’s not enough to max out the ibond cap but still a decent amount that I feel should be in something earning me money.

but what is the money for? Are you planning on buying something with it on a year? Is this meant to be a longterm investment? Why ibonds?

I think long term investment would be my answer, don’t have any (at least any planned) big purchases in the near future

Oh okay. You dont really want to do ibonds for longterm investing they arent particularly good for it. They match inflation, they will never grow beyond inflation. They are designed to maintain value, not increase value. They are fir sabings for basically a purchase, not investment.

If you insist then to answer your question doesnt really matter because longterm what happens over 6 months is not particularly significant.

Okok, may be asking too much here but do you have any recommendations on what I should do with the money instead to help it grow long term?

Longterm investment? Stock market, broad based index funds covering multiple industries/sectors.

ibonds are for like if you want to buy a car in 2 years and you want your money to maintain its value with zero risk of loss. Hence the name..Savings bonds.

The return is designed to track inflation. It’s designed to maintain your purchasing power - not deliver real gains. Frankly they’re never worth it IMO.