Best 5 Bitcoin Exchanges with the lowest fees
When purchasing or trading bitcoin one of the main factors many users consider is the fee an exchange platform charges. There are a couple of fees you have to take into considerations when you are looking for a low fee exchange to buy bitcoin. The most common type of fees includes deposit and withdrawal fees, trading fees, trading spreads, and margin fees.
Overall cheapest bitcoin exchanges are those which do not have any deposit or withdrawal fee so you can send your bitcoins to and from the exchange without being charged. The no trading fee model can make the regular trading activity cheaper if the spread is tight enough for the bid and ask prices on bitcoin.
Although you might want to minimize all of these fees, the reality is that you need to consider your unique situation when buying or trading bitcoin as each of the exchange has its own benefits and drawbacks in terms of the fees.
Top Bitcoin exchanges with the lowest fees to buy and sell bitcoin
If you are looking for an exchange where you would like to buy or sell bitcoin at a low fee, your choice will depend on your preferred payment method. Nowadays when you buy bitcoin you have a myriad of payment methods you can choose from: you can pay with credit or debit card, with bank wire (both SEPA, SWIFT, or ACH) and even with some alternative payment provider like PayPal, Skrill or Netteller.
If you want to minimalize your costs, look for an exchange with the lowest deposit fees. Generally speaking buying bitcoin with bank wire transfer is usually considered the cheapest payment method. Next come those exchanges which offer alternative payment services and finally, the most expensive payment method is buying bitcoin with credit card and PayPal. The reason for this is that credit card companies and PayPal offer buyer protection in the form of chargebacks, while on the other side, bitcoin transactions are irreversible.
These exchanges are the best for only a handful of transactions. If you want to buy and sell bitcoin to profit from the changing price on a regular basis, head to the next section about trading with bitcoin at low fees.
Binance (best overall exchange) is “the amazon of crypto” and offers not only bitcoin, ethereum and hundreds of other cryptocurrencies to buy and sell with many fiat currencies with bank wire, credit card and many other options. Binance also offers staking of many coins ( earning interest on your crypto deposits) as well as margin trading. Binance is our recommendation for most users as they offer the best overall service and experience on the market today. The fees are probably the lowest you can get on the market with 0.1%. When you pay your trading fees with their own coin BNB, it gets even cheaper.
Cex.io ( good for newcomers ) – If you are new to bitcoin, probably Cex.io is the best place to start. They have a very intuitive user interface and they do not charge deposit or withdrawal fees. The exchange rate is fair compared to other platforms and you also have an instant buy option to purchase bitcoin with a credit card. Bear in mind that purchasing bitcoin with credit cards can cost you up to 7% in fees on Cex.io, but on the other hand, you will get your bitcoins instantly. In the case of bank wire transfers, there are no deposit fees, you have to wait until the deposit is going through the banking system, that can take 3-5 days in case of international transfers.
Kraken (good for bank wire) is one of the oldest cryptocurrency exchange, being on the market since 2011, their low fees and high liquidity is a great place for USD and EUR bitcoin markets. They also offer margin trading options for those who are looking for more than buying and holding bitcoins. Depositing with USD, CAD, and EUR SEPA is free of charge and only takes 1-2 days to be added to your account. The bitcoin price is one of the best on the market you can get. The only drawback of using Kraken that you cannot pay with credit or debit cards, only in Canada.
Paxful (best for cash) – If you want to buy bitcoin for cash, you can rely on other fellow bitcoiners on Paxful. On the peer-to-peer exchange, you can buy and sell bitcoin from other individuals with as low as 0% fees. Paxful charges 1% service fee but it is payable by the seller. Withdrawal fees are fixed at 0.0005 BTC covering the bitcoin network transaction fees. While Paxful overall is a safe place to buy bitcoin, the transaction can be as safe as the other counterparty you deal with. Make sure you do your own due diligence and find a reputable trader in your area to avoid scams and frauds.
Paybis (best for alternative payments) – Beyond credit cards, bank wire transfer, and cash you also have a lot of alternative payment providers you can turn to when purchasing bitcoin. Although buying bitcoin with PayPal is not advisable as it is against PayPal’s terms and conditions and your account can be locked, there are still a lot of other options you can use. Paybis offers buying bitcoin with Skrill, Neteller, and Payeer at very competitive fees. With the current promotion, your first transaction is fee of charge completely on Paybis.
Coinbase (best for credit card) is one of the biggest cryptocurrency exchanges where you can buy and sell bitcoin and other altcoins. There is very high liquidity on their platform and user can appreciate the smooth process of buying bitcoin and going through the verifications. Buying bitcoin with credit cards on Coinbase cost 3.99% transaction fee and a fixed cost of $0.99-$2.99 depending on the amount of bitcoin you buy. SEPA and ACH transfers are free of charge on Coinbase, but in this case, you need to wait for your deposit to be credited to your account.
Top Bitcoin exchanges with the lowest fees to trade bitcoin
Those who are looking for profiting the changing bitcoin price, exchanges might not be the best options due to the higher fees. Trading site are specially designed to offer low trading fees to attract frequent trading to their platforms. Lower fees however also come with a more complex trading platform and with different order types, so make sure you understand how the trading system works before engaging in a trade.
On a trading platform, the deposit and withdrawal fees are usually low and in many cases, it is restricted to crypto only. This means you can only deposit bitcoin to the platform and cannot pay with a credit card or bank wire transfer. Once you have money on your account, you can convert it to USD and other fiat currencies, but in the end, you need to convert is back to crypto if you want to withdraw from the platform.
When trading bitcoin you need to consider the following fees. The trading fees are usually expressed in a maker-taker fee model. This means that if you provide liquidity to the platform (you are a liquidity maker) you add orders to the order book in the form of limit orders, that stays on the order book until some other trader accepts your order on the other side (they are the liquidity takers) with a limit or market order. Makers’ fees are usually lower compared to taker fees and many trading platforms also use a volume leveled discount schedule which offers significant discounts to those traders who use a platform frequently with high volumes on a monthly basis. Beyond the trading fees, you have to consider the bid-ask spreads, which is the price the platform quotes for being on the buyer or on the seller side. The higher the bid-ask spread the more the exchange makes on a specific transaction even if the transaction fees are low and the market needs to move more in favor of your trading strategy to be able to close your trade in this case with profit. And finally, the last fee is the margin fee applicable you need to be aware if you are trading with leverage. Opening margin trades, holding them over a certain period and closing margin trades can all cost different fees depending on the platform you choose.
Binance (best overall exchange) also here, Binance is our recommedation. Be sure to buy some of their platform coin BNB – because when you pay your trading fees with BNB instead of Bitcoin, you get a generous discount on their fees. Apart from that, Binance has very low fees in general – and fantastic liquidity. No matter how big your position is – you can easily go in an out of large positions because Binance has one of the highes trading volumes in the crypto space. Additionally, Binance does offer Futures and Margin trading as well as coin staking and pretty much everything you want from a reliable Bitcoin exchange.
Bitfinex (best for advanced orders) is offering several advanced order options for trading both bitcoins and several other altcoins. The advanced order types can help you to tailor your trading strategy to take advantage of any market situations. The order execution cost 0-0.2% depending on monthly volumes and being on the taker or maker side of the deals. You can get up to 25% rebates on your trading fees if you use the platform’s own token, USDT LEO to pay the fees.
SimpleFX (best for bitcoin CFD trading) is a forex broker that has been offering bitcoin trading options for several years by now beside trading with fiat currencies and indices. Note, this is a CFD, a contract for difference platform, where the price of bitcoin is quoted by SimpleFX based on market indices, you are not trading directly with bitcoin. You can access with MetaTrader 4 and trade up to 500x leverage on certain currencies. SimpleFX is a completely commission-free trading platform meaning there are no trading fees, the platforms are profiting from the bid-ask spreads they offer.
BaseFEX (best for high bitcoin leverage) is a relatively new platform offering bitcoin futures and leveraged trading up to 100x margin. The trading fees are as low as 0.02-0.07% based on the maker-taker fee model and they only accept bitcoin deposits.
Deribit (best for bitcoin options) is a bitcoin derivative trading platform, the biggest on the market at the moment based on open interest and daily volume. Deribit offers physically-settled bitcoin and ethereum options and futures contracts with various settlement dates and high liquidity. The trading fees start at 0.5%.
Top Bitcoin exchanges with the lowest fees to trade altcoins
There are several exchanges now where you can buy, sell and trade altcoins beyond bitcoin. If you are looking for an exchange to trade altcoins with low fees, you need to consider those aspects discussed above on bitcoin exchanges. However, in the case of altcoin exchanges, the deposit and withdrawal fees can vary coin by coins depending on the miner fees of each blockchain. Make sure you check the fee schedule before depositing a certain coin to an exchange.
Additionally, in the case of altcoins with less liquid markets, some exchanges penalize small deposits with using higher fees for small amounts compared to lower fees for bigger deposits.
Binance (best for altcoins) is the no. 1 stop in altcoin trading. Their platform offers hundreds of different coins with no or very low deposit thresholds. The fees are probably the lowest you can get on the market with 0.1%. Just make sure you use the domain specific to your region as Binance uses different platforms for the US, Europe, and Asia depending on the local regulations.
Kucoin (best for trading altcoins) offers hundreds of altcoins to trade with competitive prices. Trading fees start at 0.1% and withdrawals are only charged at 0.0005 BTC. There is no KYC verification process on Kucoin as it is a crypto only trading platform.
BitMax (best for margin trading for lesser-known coins) – If you are looking for a platform where you can trade with margin on lesser-known coins, BitMax will be your place. Bitmax offers margin trading beyond bitcoin and ethereum and you can trade up to 3-5-10x margin with altcoins against USDT or bitcoin. The trading fees are super competitive, as they start at 0.04%, however, currently they do not accept users from the United States.
LocalCoinSwap (best for peer to peer option for trading altcoins) is a peer-to-peer market place similar to Paxful or Localbitcoins but they are specialized in trading altcoins. There are a lot of payment methods listed for each seller and the prices are fairly good if you manage to find a reputable trader. They charge 0.7-1% fee on altcoin transactions, however partially these fees are shared with the community.
Changelly (best for fast execution) – If you are in a hurry and need altcoin right now, Changelly will be your best help. There is no KYC for crypto to crypto conversions but you can also buy altcoins with credit cards at a reasonable price after verification. There are over 140 different cryptocurrencies you can purchase on Changelly with trading fees of 0.5%.
Coinbase is too expensive. To buy $100 of crypto using a credit or debit card (to have instant access) will cost you about $4.50 to deposit the funds and then another $5 in trading fees. So about $10 or 10%. If you use a bank account it is slight cheaper for the deposit fee, but then anything you buy is subject to a 5-7 day holding period. Not good if you want to buy crypto for an instant transaction.
Wirex wanted to charge me 27.22 GBP to send 180 GBP from my Wirex wallet to my Binance wallet.