I've been working for >1 year and have a student loan of 20,306.64 (down from 26k+) left to settle. My savings are 5.4k. Should I begin investing or finish clearing the loan first?

For myself, I paid off my student loan asap by wiping out my savings and started starting up again..

I had cleared my bank education loan of $30k one shot after graduation, before the interest rate kicks in, but achieveable mainly due to foresight that I'll need a bomb to cover that loan, and didn't get an ATM card in NS, plus selling weekends to do duties at $300 / Saturday and $150 / Sunday. Survived on <$400/year from angbaos for that 2 years.

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However, that had left me with less than $400 left in bank after I cleared the loan, so I borrowed $10k from sibling to act as my emergency funds, and paid him bank loan's interest rate. I cleared it off in 12 months with hardcore saving (cheap dates, i.e. parks, youtube, etc), before I start to look into investment.

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My logic was that, investment might bring me anywhere from -10% to +20% (very extreme, I know, but it is for example only), but paying off the debt (bank loan's interest to my sibling) is a secured 4.85% p.a. I always thought "one bird in the hand is always better than two or three birds in the bush". Guaranteed earnings / savings of ~4% is always significantly better than unguaranteed earnings, which might even cause loss.

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I understand that you might feel that there's a lot on your plate right now, but just toughen it out for real for a year, and you will be able to see significant drop in the loan balance. Keep unnecessary spendings to the minimum, prep your own meals for lunch at work, pick up side hustle like teaching tuition, etc. They will make a difference.

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Jiayou and free feel to ask any questions if you want.