Ranked by net assets, as of . Rebuilt every trading night.
The largest defense ETFs
Every fund here is sold on defense. What each one holds, and how much of it the S&P 500 already holds for you, is the column beside the size.
| # | Ticker | Fund | Net assets | Weight in S&P 500 companies | Total return, 1Y | Fee | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ITA | iShares U.S. Aerospace & Defense ETF | $14.4bn | 79.5% | +10.0% | 0.37% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 2 | PPA | Invesco Aerospace & Defense ETF | $8.0bn | 71.8% | +8.5% | 0.58% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 3 | SHLD | Global X Defense Tech ETF | $8.0bn | 40.5% | −4.8% | 0.50% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 4 | XAR | State Street(R) SPDR(R) S&P(R) Aerospace | $6.5bn | 35.0% | +11.8% | 0.35% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 5 | IDEF | iShares Defense Industrials Active ETF | $3.5bn | 36.1% | +4.9% | not filed | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 6 | EUAD | Select STOXX Europe Aerospace & Defense | $1.2bn | 0.0% | −3.6% | 0.50% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 7 | MISL | First Trust Indxx Aerospace & Defense ET | $802m | 62.6% | +8.6% | 0.60% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 8 | KDEF | PLUS Korea Defense Industry Index ETF | $157m | 0.0% | −6.6% | 0.65% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 9 | NATO | Themes Transatlantic Defense ETF | $101m | 58.4% | +3.0% | 0.35% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 10 | WDEF | WisdomTree Europe Defense Fund | $88m | 0.0% | −8.0% | 0.45% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 11 | GCAD | Gabelli Commercial Aerospace and Defense | $44m | 40.2% | +17.1% | 0.90% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 12 | WAR | U.S. Global Technology and Aerospace & D | $41m | 38.3% | too new | 0.60% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 13 | WDAF | WisdomTree Asia Defense Fund | $22m | 0.0% | too new | 0.45% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 14 | FOWF | Pacer Solactive Whitney Future of Warfar | $15m | 73.5% | +13.3% | 0.49% | SEC filing, whole fund |
| 15 | TSSD | Truth Social American Security & Defense | $7m | 71.5% | too new | 0.65% | SEC filing, whole fund |
Method
The 22 ETFs in the defense theme, of which 20 publish net assets, ranked on the most recent figure for each. Across the funds listed here the weight held in S&P 500 companies runs from 0.0% to 79.5%. Size is not a measure of anything a fund did. It is where the money is. The ranking is the published field sorted, nothing else: no scoring, no weighting and no view on any fund. Every fund ETFIQ covers in this category is eligible, including funds that have closed, because leaving them out would flatter the category.
Where to next
Where these figures came from
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A ranking is not a recommendation and no order on this site is an opinion. ETFIQ is an independent publisher, not an adviser. Standards and sources
Cite this page. ETFIQ, The largest defense ETFs, ranked by net assets, data as of Sep 11, 2026. https://etfiq.com/rankings/themes-largest-defense Free to use with attribution; the underlying files are at Open data.