Ariel Investments is an investment company located in Chicago, Illinois. It specializes in small and mid-capitalized stocks based in the United States.

Ariel was founded as Ariel Capital Management in 1983 by John W. Rogers, Jr., who is chairman, co-CEO and chief investment officer of the company.

Rogers started the firm with a small-cap value mutual fund, called the Ariel Fund. Rogers remains the lead manager on the Ariel Fund. In 2002, Ariel started the mid-cap value-oriented Ariel Appreciation Fund mutual fund, which the firm's then-vice chairman, Eric McKissack, managed until McKissack's departure in 2002. From 2012 until 2025, Rogers was the lead manager on the Ariel Appreciation Fund. Rogers stepped down from the management of that fund as of February 1, 2025.

Longtime Chicago investment banker Charlie Bobrinskoy signed on as Ariel's vice chairman in 2004. Bobrinskoy began managing his own all-cap concentrated mutual fund, the Ariel Focus Fund, in 2005.

In May 2008, the firm rebranded and changed its name from Ariel Capital Management to Ariel Investments.

In August 2008, Ariel laid off 19 employees -- about 20 percent of its staff at the time -- amid what the firm's then-president called a "brutal bear market."

In 2011, Ariel built an all-cap global and international investment team, based in New York City.

In 2021, Ariel launched a private equity subsidiary, Ariel Alternatives, aimed at scaling middle-market, minority-owned businesses, under an initiative called Project Black.