Joel Greenblatt's Magic Formula ranks stocks on two factors, return on invested capital and earnings yield, then buys the top of the combined ranking. It is one of the few value strategies with a documented, mechanical process, which makes tooling straightforward in principle. In practice, tools differ on how they define the two factors and how wide a universe they rank. This post compares the 6 tools that run a Greenblatt-style screen in 2026.
Disclosure: invest-like.com scores stocks against Greenblatt among seven frameworks, so it is on this list and I built it.
The 6 tools
1. magicformulainvesting.com - Greenblatt's own screen
What it does: the official free screen from Greenblatt, returning a ranked list of Magic Formula stocks.
Price: free.
Best for: the canonical list, straight from the source.
Weakness: bare bones. It gives you names, not analysis, and the universe and exact method are fixed.
2. invest-like.com - Greenblatt as one of seven frameworks
What it does: scores every stock on a Greenblatt fit (ROIC plus earnings yield ranking) alongside six other frameworks, with reasoning, so you see whether a Magic Formula name also passes Buffett and Graham.
Price: free tier, Pro 15 EUR/month.
Best for: cross-checking a Magic Formula stock against other value lenses. Disclosure: I built it.
3. GuruFocus - Magic Formula screen + data
What it does: a Greenblatt-style screen plus the deep data to verify each name.
Price: roughly 50 to 500 USD/year.
Best for: running the screen and then digging into each result.
4. Finviz - build the two factors yourself
What it does: screen on ROIC and earnings yield proxies to approximate the ranking.
Price: free, Elite around 40 USD/month.
Best for: a quick DIY approximation of the formula.
Weakness: it is an approximation; Finviz does not rank on the exact combined score.
5. Old School Value - quantitative value screens
What it does: classical value screens including Greenblatt-style ranking, with a spreadsheet workflow.
Price: around 30 to 50 USD/month.
Best for: quantitative investors who want to tweak the formula.
6. Portfolio123 - backtest the formula
What it does: build and backtest a precise Magic Formula ranking system against history.
Price: paid tiers, from around 30 USD/month.
Best for: investors who want to test the formula's historical performance before trusting it.
What varies between tools
| Tool | Runs exact ranking | Shows analysis | Backtest |
|---|
| magicformulainvesting.com | Yes (fixed) | No | No |
| invest-like.com | Greenblatt fit + 6 more | Yes | Track record published |
| GuruFocus | Yes | Yes | Some |
| Finviz | Approximate | No | No |
| Old School Value | Configurable | Yes | Limited |
| Portfolio123 | Configurable | Yes | Yes |
Is the Magic Formula still working?
The formula's mechanical edge has narrowed as it became widely known, which is the fate of most published strategies. The durable lesson is the two factors themselves: high returns on capital bought at a reasonable earnings yield is a sound principle whether or not you follow the exact ranked list. That is why pairing the Greenblatt screen with a quality check (does the ROIC persist, is the earnings yield real and not a one-off) matters more than ever.
Common questions
What are the two Magic Formula factors? Return on invested capital (a quality signal) and earnings yield (a price signal). The formula ranks each factor, combines the ranks, and buys the top.
Is the Magic Formula free to run? Yes. Greenblatt's own site gives the ranked list for free, and invest-like.com's free tier shows the Greenblatt fit per stock.
Does the Magic Formula still beat the market? Its documented historical edge has compressed as the strategy became popular. The underlying principle (quality plus a fair price) remains sound; the exact mechanical returns are less reliable than in the original studies.
Should I follow the ranked list blindly? Greenblatt designed it to be followed mechanically to remove emotion, but a light quality overlay (avoiding names where the high ROIC or earnings yield is a distortion) reduces the trap rate.
Further reading
Educational only. Not investment advice.