OptionDash vs. Cheaper Covered Call Screeners: Which One Is Actually Worth It?

The Short Answer Before We Go Deeper

OptionDash is a paid covered call screener that costs roughly $25–$35 per month. It is worth paying for if you trade covered calls actively and want pre-filtered, ranked results fast. If you only sell calls on one or two positions a few times a year, a free tool — or even your broker's built-in screener — will likely do the job without the subscription fee.

That said, the real question is not which tool has the fanciest dashboard. It is whether the tool you pick helps you find better trades, faster, without making costly mistakes. This article walks through what each type of screener actually does, where the gaps are, and how to run a real trade example through both approaches.

What Does a Covered Call Screener Actually Do?

A covered call screener filters the options market down to a short list of contracts that meet your criteria. At minimum, a useful screener lets you filter by:

- Annualized return on the premium (often called "static return" or "if-called return") - Days to expiration (DTE) - Delta — a measure of how likely the call is to finish in the money - Bid-ask spread width (a proxy for liquidity) - Implied volatility (IV) relative to historical volatility

The Options Industry Council (OIC) defines covered calls as a strategy where you own 100 shares of stock and sell one call contract against them. The screener's job is to surface the contracts where the math looks most favorable for that setup.

Without a screener, you would have to open each ticker manually, scroll through the options chain, and do the annualized-return math yourself. On a liquid name like AAPL with dozens of expiration dates and 30+ strikes per date, that takes a long time.

What OptionDash Offers and What It Costs

OptionDash is purpose-built for covered call and cash-secured put traders. Its main features include a ranked screener that scores each opportunity by a composite metric, filters for moneyness (OTM, ATM, ITM), a "safety score" based on analyst ratings and fundamentals, and a portfolio tracker.

Pricing as of mid-2025 sits around $29/month for the standard plan, with an annual option that brings the effective monthly cost closer to $20. There is a limited free tier, but it caps the number of results you can see.

The honest upside: OptionDash saves time. If you manage a 10-stock covered call portfolio and want to roll positions every 30 days, having pre-ranked results with annualized return already calculated is genuinely useful. The honest downside: the "safety score" is a convenience feature, not a substitute for your own due diligence. A high safety score does not mean the stock cannot drop 20% after earnings. FINRA reminds retail investors that no screening tool removes the underlying risk of stock ownership.

The Real Risks You Need to Know Before Trusting Any Screener

Screeners rank opportunities by yield. High yield almost always means high implied volatility, and high implied volatility usually means the market expects something uncertain — an earnings report, a product launch, a macro event. A screener will happily surface a 4% monthly premium on a stock that drops 30% the next week. The premium does not protect you from that loss; it only offsets it slightly.

The SEC has published investor guidance noting that options strategies involve significant risk and are not appropriate for all investors. Covered calls cap your upside: if NVDA jumps $40 above your strike, you miss that gain entirely.

There is also a tax dimension. In the US, the IRS treats premiums from covered calls as short-term capital gains in most cases, and selling a call can affect the holding period of your underlying shares under the "qualified covered call" rules (IRS Publication 550). In Canada, the CRA has its own rules on whether options premiums are income or capital — worth checking with a tax professional if you are a Canadian trader.

Bottom line: use a screener to find candidates faster, not to skip risk analysis.

Free and Cheaper Alternatives Worth Knowing

Several tools compete with OptionDash at a lower price point or for free:

**Broker-native screeners (free):** TD Ameritrade/thinkorswim, Tastytrade, and Interactive Brokers all have options screeners built in. Thinkorswim's scan tool lets you filter by probability OTM, days to expiration, and bid-ask spread. It is not as turnkey as OptionDash, but it costs nothing if you already have an account.

**Barchart.com (free tier available):** Barchart offers a covered call screener under its options section. The free version limits daily lookups, but casual traders can usually work within that limit. It shows annualized return, IV rank, and open interest.

**PowerOptions (~$29–$49/month):** A longer-running screener that predates OptionDash. More data-dense interface, steeper learning curve, but preferred by some experienced traders for its depth of filtering.

**Cboe's tools (free):** The CBOE website offers educational tools and basic options data. Not a full screener, but useful for checking IV percentile on a specific ticker before you trade.

**Spreadsheet approach (free):** If you own 3–5 stocks and sell calls monthly, a simple Google Sheet pulling data from a free API (Yahoo Finance, for example) can replicate 80% of what a paid screener does. Time cost is higher; dollar cost is zero.

Worked Example: Screening for a Covered Call on AAPL

Let's say it is a Monday morning. AAPL is trading at $213.50. You own 100 shares and want to sell a 30-day call that is slightly out of the money, targeting a 1.5–2% static return for the month.

You open OptionDash (or Barchart's free screener) and filter for: - Underlying: AAPL - DTE: 25–35 days - Moneyness: OTM, 2–5% above current price - Minimum annualized return: 15%

The screener surfaces the $220 strike expiring in 32 days. The bid is $2.10, the ask is $2.15. You sell at the mid: $2.12 per share, or $212 for the contract.

Static return: $212 / $21,350 = 0.99% for 32 days, or roughly 11.3% annualized. If-called return (stock gets called away at $220): ($220 – $213.50 + $2.12) / $213.50 = 4.04% for 32 days, or about 46% annualized.

The delta on this strike is approximately 0.28, meaning the market prices in roughly a 28% chance the stock closes above $220 at expiration. You keep the full $212 premium if AAPL stays below $220. You give up any gain above $220 + $2.12 = $222.12.

A free screener like Barchart would show you this same trade in about two minutes. OptionDash would show it in under one minute with a composite score already attached. The trade math is identical either way — the difference is speed and convenience, not the numbers themselves.

So When Does Paying for OptionDash Make Sense?

Pay for OptionDash — or any premium screener — when the time you save is worth more than the subscription cost.

If you manage 8–15 covered call positions, roll them monthly, and want to scan the whole market for new candidates, $20–$29/month is a reasonable business expense. The screener pays for itself if it helps you find one better trade per month — say, a position that earns $40 more in premium than you would have found manually.

Stick with free tools if you hold 1–3 stocks, sell calls only a few times a year, or are still learning the mechanics. At that stage, the manual process of looking up strikes and doing the annualized-return math yourself is actually educational. You will understand the numbers better because you calculated them yourself.

One practical approach: use the free tier of OptionDash or Barchart for three months. Track whether the screener surfaces trades you would have missed. If yes, upgrade. If your broker's built-in tool is finding the same strikes, save the subscription fee.

Is OptionDash free to use?

OptionDash has a limited free tier that shows a small number of results per day. To access the full ranked screener and portfolio tracker, you need a paid plan, which runs roughly $20–$29 per month depending on whether you pay monthly or annually. Most serious covered call traders will hit the free tier's limits quickly.

What is the best free covered call screener for beginners?

Barchart.com's options screener is a strong free starting point — it shows annualized return, implied volatility rank, and open interest without requiring a paid account for basic use. If you already have a thinkorswim account through TD Ameritrade, its built-in scan tool is equally capable and costs nothing extra. Start with whichever platform you already trade on.

Can I use my broker's screener instead of paying for OptionDash?

Yes, for most retail covered call traders, a broker-native screener is sufficient. Thinkorswim, Tastytrade, and Interactive Brokers all let you filter options by delta, days to expiration, and return metrics. The main thing you give up compared to OptionDash is a pre-ranked composite score and a cleaner interface — not the underlying data.

Does selling covered calls affect my taxes?

In the US, premiums received from selling covered calls are generally treated as short-term capital gains, and the IRS has specific "qualified covered call" rules (covered in IRS Publication 550) that can affect the holding period of your underlying shares. Canadian traders should check CRA guidance, as premiums may be treated as income or capital depending on your trading frequency and intent. Consult a tax professional for your specific situation.

What delta should I target when selling covered calls?

Most covered call traders target a delta between 0.20 and 0.35 for out-of-the-money calls, which the market prices as roughly a 20–35% chance of the stock closing above the strike at expiration. Lower delta means less premium but more room for the stock to run; higher delta means more premium but a greater chance your shares get called away. The OIC recommends understanding delta before selecting a strike.

What is the biggest risk of using a covered call screener?

The biggest risk is treating a high-ranked result as a safe trade. Screeners rank by yield, and high yields almost always reflect high implied volatility — meaning the market expects uncertainty or risk in that stock. A screener cannot predict earnings surprises, sector selloffs, or company-specific bad news, all of which can cause the underlying stock to drop far more than the premium you collected. Always review the fundamentals and upcoming catalysts before entering any position.