This review will help you identify which is the best crypto exchange for day trading.
Day trading is preferred by those who want to take advantage of the spread markup on various financial products.
When it comes to crypto day trading, different platforms provide different crypto offerings, features, tools, and customer support. Choosing one crypto platform over another can be a daunting task.
In this guide, I have made your work simpler. I have listed the best crypto exchange platforms for you to choose from. Further, I have advised you on the important factors to consider in choosing your best exchange platform for crypto day trading.
This article is part of my series on the best Canadian crypto exchange.
The top 10 crypto exchanges for day trading
Based on our ranking criteria and several factors outlined later on in this guide, the following are the top 10 best crypto exchange platforms for day trading:
1. Binance
Taking the top position of the best crypto exchange platforms for day trading is Binance. This is expected since Binance is the world’s largest crypto platform and leads in various trade metrics.
Trade metrics
The following trade metrics reinforce Binance’s top position:
- Tradable crypto assets: 414
- 24-hour trading volume: $20,405,338,808.72
- Total assets: $10,635,757,957.52
- Markets: 1626
- Liquidity index: 866
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
Binance has the following trading fee structure:
- Trading fee: 0.1%
- Maker fee: 0.1%
- Taker fee: 0.1%
Pros
- A wide variety of crypto trades including spot trading, margin trading, crypto futures, etc.
- Wide range of digital currencies
- Higher trading volumes compared to other cryptocurrency trading platforms
- Many Order types that make the platform ideal for advanced traders
- Plenty of tools and features that promote advanced trading
- High liquidity
- Up to 25% discount when paying using BNB, a native cryptocurrency
- Low trading fees – just 0.1% flat exchange commission
- Overall low fees
Cons
- Complicated user interface that makes it confusing to new users
- No direct fiat to crypto transactions. One has to use BNB, Binance’s native token, as a crypto-fiat intermediary.
2. Coinbase
The best choice for financial institutions and other institutional investors is Coinbase. This crypto platform has collaborated with banks and other financial institutions to advance crypto financial products to its users and bank account holders.
Trade metrics
Coinbase crypto exchange boasts the following key trade metrics:
- Tradable crypto assets: 249
- 24-hour trading volume: $2,553,832,489.35
- Total assets: N/A
- Markets: 402
- Liquidity index: 761
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
Crypto traders on the Coinbase platform are charged the following fees:
- Trading fee: 0.5%
- Maker fee: 0.05%
- Taker fee: 0.04%
Pros
- Coinbase advanced – ideal for high-frequency trading, provides low fees to high-volume traders
- Coinbase pro – ideal for those crypto day traders who want professional tools and services.
- A wide variety of crypto trades including spot trading, margin trading, crypto futures, etc.
- Supports common fiat payment methods including debit card payment, credit card payment, ACH bank transfers, etc.
- Cold storage facility
Cons
- Comparatively high exchange commission
- Higher fees on card payments
3. ByBit
Standing out as the best crypto exchange platform for day trading crypto derivatives, ByBit is a fast-rising star in the crypto industry.
Trade metrics
The following trading metrics describe the ByBit cryptocurrency trading platform:
- Tradable crypto assets: 633
- 24-hour trading volume: $4,680,179,647.18
- Total assets: $10,635,757,957.52
- Markets: 900
- Liquidity index: 615
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
To trade on the ByBit cryptocurrency trading platform, you will need to factor the following fees:
- Trading fee: 0.1%
- Maker fee: 0.01%
- Taker fee: 0.06%
Pros
- Best for crypto derivatives
- Top-notch customer support thus leading to a great user experience
Cons
Not available to the residents of the United States
4. OKX
Advanced charting tools plus competitive fees make OKX one of the best cryptocurrency exchanges for crypto day traders.
Trade metrics
- Tradable crypto assets: 329
- 24-hour trading volume: $3,011,548,534.39
- Total assets: $18,766,120,661.15
- Markets: 736
- Liquidity index: 609
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
The OKX has a tiered fee structure.
- Trading fee: 0%
- Maker fee: 0.08%
- Taker fee: 0.1%
Pros
- Fiat currency support
- High liquidity
- Copy trading
- Supports margin accounts, futures contracts, spot trading, and trade options
- Charges some of the lowest commissions in the crypto market
Cons
- The user interface is not beginner-friendly
- Card fees baked into the exchange rate
5. Kraken
Advanced security measures accompanied by 1:1 asset cover make Kraken the most secure crypto asset trading platform for cryptocurrency traders.
Trade metrics
- Tradable crypto assets: 265
- 24-hour trading volume: $785,661,256.86
- Total assets: N/A
- Markets: 806
- Liquidity index: 729
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 5X
Trading fee structure
- Trading fee: 1.5%
- Maker fee: 0.16% (reducible, subject to 30-day trade volume)
- Taker fee: 0.26% (reducible, subject to 30-day trade volume)
Pros
- Provides advanced trading features – including stop-loss orders and futures trading
- Strong security measures which make it safer than other crypto platforms
- Sophisticated feature-rich mobile app – the Kraken Pro, which is ideal for high-frequency trading, provides low fees for high-volume traders
- Has the benefits of a centralized exchange, including robust security measures such as KYC, AML, and Two-Factor authentication security requirements that protect platform users
- The most secure cryptocurrency trading platform in the crypto world
- Ease of use – a beginner-friendly user interface that makes it easy for new investors to get started quickly
- In-depth data analytics tools that make it easy for advanced platform users to make informed crypto trading strategies
- A high number of active crypto traders that boosts the platform’s liquidity
Cons
- Very high exchange commission of up to 0.26%
- Very high withdrawal fees of up to $35
- Lacks the benefits of a decentralized exchange such as No-KYC requirements and anonymous trading
- A complex fee structure that can be confusing to new investors
- Focused only on crypto trades
- Users’ assets are not covered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)
- Many customers complain about the lack of satisfactory customer support
6. Kucoin
Boasting advanced charting tools and competitive fees, Kucoin is a great option for crypto day traders.
Trade metrics
- Tradable crypto assets: 818
- 24-hour trading volume: $756,531,902.40
- Total assets: $4,665,503,032.44
- Markets: 1352
- Liquidity index: 549
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
- Trading fee: 0.1%
- Maker fee: 0.1%
- Taker fee: 0.1%
Pros
- Supports Trailing Stop Orders
- Kucoin provides trading signals to its users
- Copy Trading mechanism that allows new investors to copy the trading strategies of advanced traders.
- Free trading bot.
- Supports fiat money withdrawal to your bank account.
- Advanced charting tools that provide an in-depth visual presentation on a trading screen about the performance of different categories of crypto assets on the exchange market.
- Cold storage facility
Cons
- Not available in the United States
- Mandatory and stringent KYC requirements
- Complex user interface
7. Gate.io
Boasting advanced trading bots, Gate.io is ideal for advanced traders.
Trade metrics
- Tradable crypto assets: 512
- 24-hour trading volume: $3,150,322,139.86
- Total Assets: $4,938,787,306.51
- Markets: 3617
- Liquidity index: 505
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
- Trading fee: 0.2%
- Maker fee: 0.2%
- Taker fee: 0.2%
Pros
- Advanced trading bots
- Wide array of crypto assets to trade in
- Copy trading
Cons
- The user interface is not beginner-friendly
- Limited support for fiat withdrawals
- Higher fees compared to similar platforms
8. MEXC
Positioning itself as a low transaction fee cryptocurrency trading platform, MEXC is a great option to many crypto day traders due to its low fees on crypto trades.
Trade metrics
- Tradable crypto assets: 2242
- 24-hour trading volume: $1,621,627,016.61
- Total Assets: $3,988,340,380.38
- Markets: 2721
- Liquidity index: 627
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
- Trading fee: 0%
- Maker fee: 0%
- Taker fee: 0.1%
Pros
- Best platform for low transaction fee
- Plenty of crypto assets to trade in
- Modern user interface with a focus on ease of use
- Copy trading
Cons
- Limited support for fiat withdrawal methods
- Unregistered securities exchange
- Poor customer support
9. Bitget
Billing itself as one of the leading platforms for crypto derivatives, Bitget is a great option for those crypto traders who deal in day trade crypto derivatives.
Trade metrics
- Tradable crypto assets: 283
- 24-hour trading volume: $1,524,985,648.17
- Total assets: $3,012,456,745.82
- Markets: 822
- Liquidity index: 593
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 10X
Trading fee structure
- Trading fee: 0.1%
- Maker fee: 0.1%
- Taker fee: 0.1%
Pros
- Plenty of day trade crypto derivatives
- Copy trading
- Wide selection of crypto assets to trade in
Cons
- High transaction fee on card purchases
- Frequent freezing of user accounts
10. Crypto.com
Mobile crypto day traders will find Crypto.com their best platform. Crypto.com is a mobile-first cryptocurrency exchange platform.
Trade metrics
- Tradable crypto assets: 349
- 24-hour trading volume: $852,560,831.84
- Total assets: $3,786,475,146.51
- Markets: 703
- Liquidity index: 625
- Maximum spot leverage factor: 5X
Trading fee structure
- Trading fee:
- Maker fee: 0.07%
- Taker fee: 0.75%
Pros
- A wide array of crypto assets to trade in
- Best for mobile platform usage
- Transparent fee structure
Cons
- Higher fees for those not holding CRO token
- Not great for those not using mobile phones
- Poor customer support service
The next best crypto exchanges
If none of the top picks for day trading meets your requirements, you still have the following to choose from:
- Bitfinex
- Bitstamp
- CEX.IO
- PrimeXBT
- BitMex
- Phemex
- Pionex
- Mergex
- Bitsgap
- WhiteBIT
However, you need carry out extensive research before deciding on one of them.
Factors to consider in choosing your best crypto exchange for day trading
Yes, the crypto market is highly dynamic. The top players of yesterday are not the top players of today. And today’s top players may not be tomorrow’s top players. Thus, knowing how to choose the best crypto exchange for day trading is the hallmark of successful day traders.
The following are the key factors that informed our ranking criteria and which you need to consider in choosing your best crypto exchange for day trading:
1. Availability and accessibility
However great the crypto platform is, if it isn’t available within your jurisdiction, it has no trade utility. For example, among the top 10, Binance (global), Kucoin, and others are not available in the United States
2. Reputation
Crypto assets are highly vulnerable. Thus, reputation is an important consideration.
The following are indicators of reputation:
(a) Security measures
Several security measures are designed to ensure your digital assets are not compromised. These measures include:
- Two-factor authentication – this is now a basic standard for security measures. It helps to protect your crypto assets from unauthorized intrusion.
- KYC and AML requirements – these measures require disclosure of personal information. Though unpleasant to users, they help to weed out bad actors from the crypto exchanges thus improving your chances of dealing with good actors.
- Regulatory compliance – This is another unpleasant thing to crypto exchanges. However, compliance with regulatory bodies isn’t a bad thing. This protects all players in the crypto market, including crypto traders, crypto investors, and crypto exchanges. If fraudulent crypto exchanges dominate the cryptocurrency market, investor confidence will decline and the market will collapse thus hurting all other crypto exchanges.
(b) Brand leadership
Brand leadership refers to the ability of a brand to exert influence across the industry and the market. This means that the industry and the market look up to it to provide leadership in product features and enhancements, breaking technologies, and pricing policy, among others. Players in the market use the brand leader as a benchmark. This leadership is gained through brand recognition and brand loyalty.
In the case of the crypto industry and the cryptocurrency market, the two prominent brand leaders are Binance and Coinbase.
(c) Asset base
The asset base is an important reputation factor. Investor confidence is advanced when investors know the asset base covers their investment portfolio. This is extremely important in the cryptocurrency market since crypto assets are virtual assets with no intrinsic value.
Thus, in the eyes of an investor, a crypto exchange with a strong asset base is more reputable than the one with a weak asset base. An asset base can be gauged by:
- Total assets – refers to the total value of assets traded on a crypto exchange.
- Total reserves – refers to the total value of reserves allocated to back up volatile assets.
(d) Trust score
Crypto industry players such as CoinMarketCap and CoinRanking have come up with a Trust Score. This score indicates the trustworthiness of data and information provided by a given cryptocurrency exchange.
3. Liquidity
In money markets, especially the cryptocurrency markets, liquidity is an important factor. To crypto traders, liquidity means the ease with which the assets available on the market to meet transactional needs.
Liquidity determines whether you will be able to buy or sell a given crypto asset at the time you want to. High liquidity enables you to easily and quickly find the buyer or seller of your asset. For day traders, high liquidity is a must.
The following were considered as indicators of liquidity:
- Trade volume
- Liquidity index
- Number of markets
CoinMarketCap has a liquidity index with a range from 1 to 1000. The closer a crypto exchange’s liquidity index is to 1000 the more liquid its market is. We’ve used this as part of our ranking criteria.
4. Trading tools and features
Often, trading tools are part of the advanced features of a crypto platform. Trading tools enhance the speed, efficiency, accuracy, and convenience of executing transactions on a crypto platform. The resultant effect is boosted user experience.
The following are some of the major trading tools and features:
(a) Risk management tools
Engaging in crypto day trading is riskier than many other forms of trading. This is because margins are relatively thin and can be easily erased within moments.
Risk management tools can help you cover your crypto day trading from unwarranted losses. Yet, in terms of risk management tools, not all platforms are the same. This is one of the key areas that can enable you to choose one platform over another. Nonetheless, your skill and knowledge level will determine whether a risk management tool will serve you well or not. Advanced traders can easily take advantage of sophisticated risk management tools.
(b) Analysis tools
To enable you to make informed investment decisions, the best crypto exchange platform should have technical analysis tools that incorporate a variety of technical indicators to bring up a more accurate and reliable analysis.
(c) Charting tools
To facilitate quick decision-making, charting tools make it easy to process different types of charts to suit different user needs. Charting tools are essential to crypto day trading since they enable crypto traders to make quick and timely investment decisions.
(d) Apps
A mobile app is almost a must-have feature of a crypto trading platform. This is because most users access trading platforms via mobile phones. Furthermore, due to the urgent nature of crypto day trading, accessing, utilizing, and monitoring your trades while on the go is necessary.
(e) Trading bots
Trading bots automate trading strategies. What they require are sets of instructions to execute. These instructions are executed when the set instructions match the prevailing market conditions.
Advanced trading bots can automatically execute various Order types based on limit orders set in a given trading strategy.
Trading bots saves time and effort. Furthermore, automated trading bots do not require a crypto trader to be present during the execution of crypto trades. Thus, you can trade while asleep, doing other work, or even traveling.
(f) Learning tools and resources
The best crypto exchange platform is the one that has learning tools and resources that enable crypto traders to reap maximum benefits from using it. These are very helpful to new investors who need to learn about the various opportunities presented by the crypto trading platform.
Some of the learning resources and tools include:
- FAQs – a knowledgebase of frequently asked questions saves support effort, and users’ time. This enhances user experience.
- Learning materials – includes articles, eBooks, videos, webinars, etc.
- Demo trading accounts – refers to trading accounts similar to actual trading accounts but are used for educational purposes.
5. Trading fee structure
No matter how reputable, accessible, feature-rich, and liquid a trading platform is, you can’t use it if its fee structure isn’t within your means.
Thus, a good fee structure should be:
- Affordable – affordability is not about being cheap but being worth of the value being delivered.
- Competitive – being competitive means being within the market range.
- Incentivizing – it should provide avenues that encourage rather than discourage usage. Incentivization could be in the form of discounts, rebates, offers, gifts, prizes, etc.
- Easy to master – flat fee is easy to grasp. Nonetheless, a simple variable fee can be easy to master.
Ideally, a crypto trading platform with low fees should be considered. However, ensure that being charged the lowest fees is not bait to trap you into a risky investment. Thus, the cheapest is not necessarily the best. Consider the hidden costs.
6. Fiat currency support
No doubt that fiat money still dominates our day-to-day transactions. Thus, you still need fiat money to buy crypto assets, at least at first instance. You may also need to convert your crypto earnings to fiat money to meet your other needs. This is why fiat currency support is an important consideration. Choose a crypto platform that supports your fiat currency.
In addition, choose a cryptocurrency trading platform that supports common fiat payment methods including debit card payment, credit card payment, ACH bank transfers, etc.
7. Customer support
Ultimately, great user experience is the crown jewel awarded to the best crypto exchange platform. Without inspiring customer support, the user experience will suck. Bad user experience destroys reputation, repels users, dries liquidity, and eventually kills the platform.