is trading actually worth it for beginners right now?

Sup homie. Energy trader of over ten years here. I honestly don’t think trading is a good or reliable extra income stream for beginners. The learning curve is very steep, and if you’re trading in and out of positions, don’t forget about short-term capital gains tax, which applies to trades you hold for less than a year. That said, if you had to start in trading, I would not recommend crypto (easy to get your face ripped off) - I’ve built a trading bot for crypto that performs decently well, but it’s 100% a risk-first system. If you don’t understand risk, not a good place to begin. There is a reason why most day traders (and most traders across any product really) are not successful. It’s hyper competitive. Best bet if I had to isolate one, might be just to choose one index to trade (say S&P 500), only trade for 1-2 hours/day starting at opening bell. Try to get the trend directionally correct, but have strict stop loss exit points. Don’t try to trade all day, you’ll just get fatigued. Do a trade or a few, then get out within the first couple of hours. Start by paper trading to try and define a directional strategy. Then can ease into using actual $$. Hope that helps. 

Not to be discouraging but you will not be able to make consistent profits trading.

Trading (as a pose to longer term investing) aims to make money by either taking on certain niche risks that others aren’t willing to take or by “arbitraging” mispricings in markets.
If you try to make your money by taking on the risks, you will eventually blow up (due to your lack of knowledge and experience in risk management), and you will not be able to make your money arbitraging mispricings either, as any mispricing that you could indentify will already have been arbitraged away by financial institutions filled with PhDs and spending millions on tech and data that you will never be able to access.

Of course, there is some nuance to this. Some mispricings exist in markets too illiquid to be profitably exploited by larger financial institutions.
But these are unlikely to be arbitraged by someone like you, with no formal academic or professional background in finance and with two hours a day to spend looking at markets (no offence).

Any influencer or friend telling you that they are making millions off “trading” are either lying to you or taking on exorbitant risks that they will get punished for taking at some point in the future.

The truth is that trading holds many parallels with high-level sports, and so any actually good trader is likely to be identified and hired by a large hedge fund offering them very generous contracts (and are even more likely to not brag about it online).

This also means that the vast majority of profit-making opportunities are captured by a tiny proportion of top performers. Trading is not a skill like plumbing that you can learn and just start making money from, it is more similar to trying to join the NBA (not a “side hustle”).

This may sound cliché, but the best thing that you can do if you hope to make a passive income is to invest in a diversified portfolio and wait.

You’re actually in the same stage most beginners go through — and the confusion is completely normal because trading content online is often either oversimplified or overhyped.

To be honest, trading can be worth it, but not in the “quick extra income” way most videos make it sound. It’s more like a long-term skill that takes time, discipline, and a lot of practice before it becomes consistent.

Since you can already dedicate a couple of hours daily, that’s a good starting point — but the focus should be on learning first, earning later.

A realistic path for beginners usually looks like this:

 Start with one market only (stocks or forex — not everything at once)
 Spend time understanding basics: risk management, charts, and market behavior
 Use demo accounts for at least a few weeks/months before risking real money
 Focus more on protecting capital than making profits initially

One important mindset shift is this:
Trading is not a replacement for your regular income or salary in the beginning. It should be treated like skill-building, not income-building. Most beginners lose money because they try to “earn quickly” instead of learning properly.

Also, ignore anyone promising guaranteed profits — that’s usually where most people get trapped.

If your goal is extra income, think of trading like building a side skill that might eventually supplement your salary, not replace it immediately.

Take it slow, stay consistent, and focus on learning one thing at a time — that’s what actually separates long-term successful traders from beginners who quit early.