Fees

The most popular fee schedule used by cryptocurrency exchanges uses a tiered "maker" and "taker" scheme. It uses the trading volume to create tiers and charge maker and taker fees based on your trading volume.

A maker is a party that creates a market on the exchange by selling cryptocurrency, and the taker is the party that takes it off the market by purchasing it. Each party pays fees for the transaction, but makers generally pay less.

Fee schedules at cryptocurrency exchanges are designed to encourage frequent trading in large transaction amounts worth thousands of dollars. For example, trading at Coinbase with a trading volume of less than $10,000 incurs maker and taker fees of 0.50%, while trade volumes of more than $10,000 decrease in tiers based on your trade volume.

Other factors to consider when determining fees are traders’ location and coin’s availability (to be exchanged on the crypto exchange).

Fees can either be displayed as a mean or total: both highlighting the cost to transact during an interval. Remember: fees do not include new issuance. High fees per transaction can both gauge larger transactions and/or higher transaction costs, while low total fees can be both a healthy sign of market participation, as well as a harbinger of reduced activity.