Unlike mutual funds, ETFs are not managed by humans for the most part although there are some active ETFs in the market now. But, in general, they attempt to track indices such as the S&P 500 (SPY ETF) which tracks the largest 500 companies in the USA. Often the fees are much lower than mutual funds. Also, less than 20% of active fund managers ever beat the index meaning you have a very good chance of beating a human manager by holding a low cost ETF rather than having it actively managed.