What does your order actually cost in fees?

It shows what a spot order costs in fees on each exchange we review, for an order size you choose. Pick maker, taker or instant buy and the table re-ranks from cheapest to dearest, with the region each rate belongs to next to it.

Every rate is the entry tier published on the exchange's own fee page, checked on 17 October 2026. We do not use review sites. Some exchanges publish different schedules per region, so each row names the one we used.

A maker order adds liquidity: you post a limit order and wait for someone to trade against it. A taker order removes liquidity by trading against orders already on the book, so it is usually the more expensive side. Instant buy is the exchange's in-app purchase button, which hides the cost in a fee, a spread, or both.

The calculator ranks instant buy only where an exchange publishes a fixed percentage. Coinbase does not: its fee depends on payment method, order size, market conditions, location and asset, and a spread is built into the quote. Both show on the order preview before you confirm, so the calculator marks Coinbase as having no fixed rate rather than inventing one.

On a $1,000 taker order the entry-tier gap between the cheapest and the dearest exchange in the calculator is $7.50. The table is our own arithmetic on the published rates: order size multiplied by the taker rate.

Maker orders are cheaper almost everywhere. MEXC charges 0% maker, Kraken's entry tier is 0.40% maker against 0.80% taker, and Coinbase's public entry tier is 0.40% against 0.60%. Posting a limit order instead of crossing the book is the simplest saving a beginner can make.

Several exchanges run a separate entity or schedule for European users, and the entry rate can be very different. These are the cases the calculator labels:

• Bybit. bybit.com charges 0.10% maker and taker. Bybit EU, the platform for EEA residents, charges 0.25% at the entry tier. Since a 29 June 2026 notice, Bybit says access to certain Bybit Global services for EEA residents will be progressively limited.
• OKX. OKX Europe has two spot schedules. A spot-only account pays 0.10% maker and 0.20% taker since 25 September 2026; opening an X-Perps derivatives account lowers that to 0.08% and 0.10%. OKX's US schedule starts at 0.20% maker and 0.35% taker.
• KuCoin. The global table is 0.1% for both sides, but KuCoin EU suspended trading and deposits on 4 February 2026 and still showed that banner on 17 October 2026.
• Binance. The 0.10% rate is for Binance.com, which is not open to US residents. On 24 June 2026 Binance said it had withdrawn its MiCA application in Greece and would seek authorisation in another EU member state, and that some users may be affected.
• MEXC. On 29 September 2026 MEXC announced it will wind down services for users in the Netherlands, with positions processed from 24 October 2026.

Check that an exchange serves your country, and which entity you would be contracting with, before you compare its fees.

• Spreads. Spot order books have no spread added. Instant-buy screens do: OKX publishes a maximum built-in spread of 1.00% on Buy, Sell and Convert in Europe, and Coinbase builds one into the quote without publishing a figure. We never add a spread the exchange does not publish.
• Volume tiers. Every exchange cuts fees as 30-day volume grows. Kraken's lowest tier, 0.40% maker and 0.80% taker since 9 July 2026, falls to 0% maker and 0.10% taker at Tier 12. The VIP note on each row shows the top published tier.
• Native-token discounts. Binance (BNB, 25% off), Bybit (MNT, 25%), MEXC (MX, 20%), KuCoin (KCS, 20%), Bitget (BGB, 20%) and Gate (GT, 10%) cut spot fees if you pay in their token. They need a token balance, so they are listed, not applied. Crypto.com's discount depends on a CRO balance of 50,000 or more on the Exchange.
• Subscriptions. Coinbase One removes the Coinbase fee on simple trades up to a monthly limit, but the spread still applies and Advanced trades are excluded. US plans run from $4.99 a month; the Italian page lists Basic at 4.99 EUR, Preferred at 19.99 EUR and Premium at 199.99 EUR a month.
• Deposits and withdrawals. Coinbase US wires cost $10 in and $25 out, while euro SEPA transfers on Coinbase carry no fee. Binance charges 1 EUR on SEPA buys.

Young Platform and Conio sell crypto to you directly rather than running an order book, so maker and taker fees do not exist. Young Platform charges 1.89% on euro orders above 100 EUR plus a published spread of 0.40% to 0.80% on large coins. Conio charges 0.99% with a minimum of 30 EUR plus a spread of up to 4%. Bitpanda charges 0.99% on Bitcoin and 1.49% on most other coins in its app, and a single 0.25% rate at Fusion Level 1.

An app that charges 1% with no spread can still cost more than an exchange at 0.80% taker with a tight book. Compare the all-in price on the order preview, not only the headline percentage.