How trading fees work on Kraken

Fee schedule volume-based discounts are based on crypto trading volume only. Making purchases using the Buy Crypto widget, Kraken app as well as trading stablecoin and FX pairs on our order books does not contribute to the fee schedule 30-day volume.

Our Kraken.com platform matches orders from clients who want to buy cryptocurrencies with orders from clients who want to sell cryptocurrencies (or vice versa).

We charge a fee when your order is executed (matched with another client's order). The fee ranges from 0% to 0.40% of the total cost (value) of your order and depends on the following:

Your 30-day trading volume (in USD).
The currency pair that is being traded.
Whether your order is maker or taker.

Orders that are cancelled before being executed (also known as "untouched" orders) do not incur any fees.

Minimum trade fee

There is a minimum trade fee entered as the minimum amount as per precision on that pair being traded. This impacts trades of small value that may not have the decimal precision needed to create a ledger entry.

Margin fees

If you are trading using leverage (an optional, advanced feature),

the following additional fees will be applied:

Note that the availability of margin trading services is subject to certain limitations and eligibility criteria.

Fee currency selection

The trade order form lets you set your preference for the currency in which your trading fees are determined if the order is filled. But it won't necessarily give you your choice (for example, if you set it to a currency in which you have zero balance). Also, fee currency selection does not apply to opening and rollover fees.

Example: Spot trading

Let’s assume the following:

You want to purchase 2 Bitcoin (BTC) at a price of $5,000
Your 30-day trading volume is currently at $125,000
Your order is executed with taker fees

In this example, the total costs of your order equals 2 * $5,000 = $10,000. According to the fee schedule for the BTC/USD market, at this volume you will either be charged the maker fee of 0.12% or the taker fee of 0.22%. Because your order is executed with taker fees, the total fee can be calculated as follows:

$10,000 * (0.22 / 100) = $22

Now, let’s assume that your 30-day trading volume was already at $1,000,000 and the above order gets executed with maker fees. According to the fee schedule for the BTC/USD market, at this volume you will either be charged the maker fee of 0.06% or the taker fee of 0.16%. Because your order is executed with maker fees, the total fee can now be calculated as follows:

$10,000 * (0.06 / 100) = $6

Example: Spot trading with margin

Let’s assume the following:

You want to short sell 50 Ethereum (ETH) at a price of $400
Your 30-day trading volume is currently at $0.00
Your order is executed with taker fees

In this example, the total costs of your order equals 50 * $400 = $20,000. According to the fee schedule for the ETH/USD market, at this volume you will either incur the maker fee of 0.25% or the taker fee of 0.40%. Because your order is executed with taker fees, the initial trade fee can be calculated as follows:

$20,000 * (0.40 / 100) = $80

As you are opening a position with this order, you are also incurring the opening fee. According to the margin fees as listed for the ETH/USD market, this fee is set at 0.02% and can be calculated for this order as follows:

$20,000 * (0.02 / 100) = $4

If you add the initial trade costs and the costs for opening the position, the total fees for this order up until now can be calculated as: ($80 + $4) = $84

Additionally, while this position remains open, a rollover fee of 0.02% is charged every four hours. This means that if you leave the position open for 24 hours, the rollover fee will be charged (24 / 4) = 6 times and can be calculated as:

$20,000 * (0.02 / 100) * 6 = $24

Finally, if you close this position after 24 hours at a price of $200, the total costs of your closing order equals 50 * $200 = $10,000. The trade fees for the closing order can be calculated as:

$10,000 * (0.40 / 100) = $40

This means that the total fee amount for opening the position, maintaining the position for 24 hours and subsequently closing the position equal to ($80 + $4 + $24 + $40) = $148.

The decimal and thousands separators shown in this article may differ from the formats displayed on our trading platforms. Review our article on how we use points and commas for more information.