What are the best crypto trading platforms? When you plunge into crypto trading, you have numerous options on which platform to trade. There are two general categories for platforms: paid and unpaid. You may want to use a “Free” platform if starting with a small amount of investment capital.
Do you require more service? Then, you’ll likely be willing to spend some of that hard-earned capital on a paid service. The “Free” is in quotes because, as we all know, nothing’s free.
Every service wants to make money. And they will either sell you something, charge you something, use your trades, or sell your information.
ShapeShift and Robinhood are the only US-based large trade “Commission-free” crypto exchanges on our list. What is best for the individual trader depends on their volume and type of trading, experience level, and security concerns.
Table of Contents
Best Crypto Trading Platforms Introduction
- Security (safe?)
- User-friendliness
- Insurance
Because most crypto trading is in the first Bitcoin(~78%) and the second Ethereum(~15%), we reviewed platforms where both of these currencies, at a minimum, are available. These best crypto exchanges must have two additional benefits.
Security includes two-factor authentication, an integrated safe wallet, and cold storage.
User-Friendly- platform (both mobile and desktop preferred.
For the minimum security of our readers, we chose to only deal with both online and traditional exchanges based in and thus regulated in the US.
Some Euro and select Asian-based companies and exchanges are great, but others have histories of impropriety with their client’s funds and trading.
Many platforms offer “Free” or low-cost non-crypto trading in stocks, bonds, ETFs, and other investments.
1. Coinbase
Coinbase is the largest exchange, with over 20 million users, founded in 2012. It has high liquidity for most cryptocurrencies (it supports 14 of them).
The website and its Coinbase Pro Trading platform are easy to use for all levels of investors, and the app is also quite good.
For trading cryptos, the commission is ~1.49% (this is on the high end). If using an already Coinbase wallet-held cryptocurrency to buy another, you’d average pay a ~0.50% commission. The company was planning a Coinbase IPO later in 2021.
2. Trade Station
Trade Station is an excellent all-around choice for intermediate to advanced traders. The only reason for not being great for beginners is that it requires a $2000 minimum deposit.
The robust web-based platform provides compound interest on “eligible” crypto holdings. Trading in Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, and XRP is available.
For account balances below $100,000, there is a 0.50% maker or taker fee. For stocks, options, and ETFs, there is $0 commission trading. Check out our Trade Station broker review.
3. Etoro
Etoro is most famous for being the pioneer of Social Copy Trading. Social trading lets users share information with other community members in real-time.
Copy trading is the stringent form of social trading, which binds a Copy (your) account with another trader’s account following their trades.
There are good for some beginners to see how successful traders are trading. Currently, Etoro has 9 million users. Etoro has quite low costs for most activities, charging no fee for sending or receiving transactions.
However, Blockchain sending and receiving fees are applicable. There’s a 0.1% conversion fee and a minimum withdrawal of $30; Etoro USA LLC does not charge a withdrawal fee.
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| DESCRIPTION | Trading companies list that includes free trading brokers, day trading brokers, futures trading, and investing brokers | Trading tools list that includes stock scanners, charting software, journaling, apps, and simulators | Stock market books list that includes the most popular day trading, swing trading, and options trading books |
| BREAKDOWN | Broker name • Review • Pros & Cons • Most popular brokers • FAQs Brokers > | Company name • Review • Pros & Cons • Most popular tools • FAQs Tools > | Name of the Book • Author • Trading topic • Overview • FAQs Books > |
Best Crypto Trading Platform List
Trading cryptocurrencies is a lot like the Wild West. There’s no regulation to it. As a result, some brokers have folded. And with it has gone some money. The best crypto trading platform will trade option-based credit spreads, other options strategies, and stocks. When they’ve been around awhile and offer other forms of trading, you know they won’t disappear one night.
1. ShapeShift
ShapeShift was founded in 2013, now with US operations, as a conduit to buy and trade cryptos easily. Many hard crypto wallets, including Ledger and Jaxx, make converting their coins to the ShapeShift exchange easy.
This makes buy/sell transactions cheap and exchanges of many cryptos (45) instant. There is a “free” conversion of Bitcoin to Altcoin, altcoin to Altcoin, or Altcoin to Bitcoin.
Shapeshift’s instant rates include the small “miner fee” charge levied from users for using their conversion services in the range of 0.5% (50 basis points).
2. Kracken
Kraken was founded in 2011. They’ve been trading in 18 different cryptos. And though they don’t have an app for the US, only a few EU countries have a quality web platform.
Kracken makes money with a maker/taker fee schedule that looks at the previous 30 days of volume. Each $1000 in volume under $50K pays $2.60 in fees.
Maker fees are from 0 to 0.16%, and taker fees are from 0.10 to 0.26%, cheaper than Coinbase and Gemini.
3. Bittrex
Bittrex is excellent for offering the largest selection of coin trading pairs (over 100 coins). They now offer a quick mobile app known for speed and stability and have a perfect record of not being hacked.
However, there is talk about suspended user accounts and limited customer support options. So, not everything is perfect.
Bittrex’s pricing model is simple. There’s a flat fee of 0.25% on all trades. This is a great choice if you’re trading under $25,000 per month. Those over this amount should be better served(price-wise) with Kraken.
4. Gemini
Gemini is five years old and may be most famous for its owners, the “Winklevoss twins,” who sued Mark Zuckerberg over the creation of Facebook. Did you know they currently hold 1% of ALL the Bitcoins?
Gemini is a fully SEC-compliant custodian and digital asset exchange for several top cryptos and its own Gemini dollar (GUSD). If you’re concerned about a safe place to trade, this is the best choice.
However, it has very high fees; otherwise, unless you are a Gemini dollar holder, it is probably worth a pass. Fees range from $0.99-2.99 for under $200 transactions and 1.49% for over $200.
This is approximately five times what you can find from other exchanges for being SEC-compliant.
5. Robinhood
Robinhood is probably the most famous of the “free” trading platforms. However, Robinhood has had some crashing issues. But it allows trading of Bitcoin, Ethereum, and five other coins.
Ten additional crypto coins can be watch listed. If you wish to trade different assets with cryptos, this platform is for you. They have commission-free crypto trades.
However, Robinhood’s fee for trading is semi-hidden as payment for the order flow (PFOF) routing fee, which is also charged on any stock trades.
They also admit that it may obtain undisclosed revenue(nearly half) from activity-based rebates from crypto exchanges, market-makers, and brokers, among other crypto intermediaries.
Since Robinhood’s pricing structure is not transparent, the all-in costs are potentially higher than those of some other platforms. There’s no way to know.
Final Thoughts: Best Crypto Trading Platforms
Security is the absolute best and main feature of a Crypto trading platform. It’s your money. As a result, you don’t want someone to be able to hack in and take it. Just think how that feels. And with no real recourse for recovering it. I don’t know about you, but I never want to find out how that feels whether I’m day trading cryptocurrency or mining it.
Should you buy cryptocurrency? You don’t have to shy away from the best cryptocurrency trading platform as long as you have the best cryptocurrency trading platform. It’s a hot-button topic and one that’s widely debated. But if you have strong risk management, you can trade anything.
