What Bitcoin exchange fees really cost a DCA plan
A single 1% fee is easy to ignore. Paid 261 times it is not. The table below runs one schedule at six fee levels: $50 a week since Oct 13, 2021, $13,050 put in, priced on Coinbase's daily closing prices. At 1% you end up 304,332 sats short of the zero-fee version, worth $255.26 at a bitcoin price of $83,874. A sat is one hundred-millionth of a bitcoin.
The schedule runs through Oct 13, 2026 (UTC). Bitcoin is valued at $83,874, the Coinbase price on Oct 13, 2026 at 07:52 UTC. This page is rebuilt about once a day, so that price can be a day or more old. The calculator on the home page pulls a fresh price.
The same schedule at six fee levels
| Fee per buy | Fees paid | Sats given up | BTC ended with | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0% | $0.00 | — | 0.30433209 BTC | $25,526 |
| 0.22% | $28.71 | 66,953 ($56.16) | 0.30366255 BTC | $25,469 |
| 0.25% | $32.63 | 76,083 ($63.81) | 0.30357125 BTC | $25,462 |
| 0.5% | $65.25 | 152,166 ($127.63) | 0.30281042 BTC | $25,398 |
| 1% | $130.50 | 304,332 ($255.26) | 0.30128876 BTC | $25,270 |
| $1 flat (example)2% of each buy | $261.00 | 608,664 ($510.51) | 0.29824544 BTC | $25,015 |
$50 bought every week from Oct 13, 2021 to Oct 13, 2026 (UTC), priced on Coinbase's daily closing prices (methodology), and valued at $83,874, the Coinbase price on Oct 13, 2026 at 07:52 UTC. The fee is taken off each purchase before conversion, which is how exchanges charge it. Every row puts in the identical $13,050. Only the bitcoin that reaches your account differs. A rate here is whatever each buy loses, whether a platform calls it a fee or builds it into the price as a spread.
Read the sats column as the real price of the fee. Paying 1% on every buy instead of 0.25% across this window cost $191.44 of bitcoin at that price. The rate is the only difference between those two rows.
The last row is an example, not any platform's price. A fixed $1 per order is 2% of a $50 buy, and the same $1 would be 0.5% of a $200 one, so a flat charge falls hardest on small, frequent buys. Over this schedule it took $261.00 and left 608,664 sats fewer than paying nothing. None of the figures in the platform list below includes a flat per-order charge.
A fee and a spread are not the same thing
An explicit fee is a line item. You send $50, the platform takes 1%, and $49.50 buys bitcoin at the market price. It shows up on your receipt and in your tax records.
A spread is the difference between the price the platform quotes you and the price the market is actually trading at. If the mid price is $100,000 and the app offers to sell you bitcoin at $100,900, you paid 0.9%. It is not listed as a fee. Your receipt can say $50 in, $50 of bitcoin out, zero fees, and be technically accurate.
This is why “0% fees” is the start of a question, not the answer to one. A platform that quotes you a price and takes the other side of your trade needs revenue, and it is often in the spread instead of the fee. Some platforms in the list below charge no fee on recurring buys and state a spread instead. A platform can also state that one kind of order carries neither a fee nor a spread while it charges both on others. The fee number alone cannot tell you which situation you are in.
How to measure it yourself: at the moment you buy, note the price you were quoted, then check the BTC/USD price on a large spot exchange. The percentage gap is your spread. Do it two or three times, at different times of day. That gives you a better estimate of your true all-in cost than any comparison table can, including this one.
Why a small percentage matters across hundreds of buys
Be precise about the mechanism, because the loose version of this claim is wrong. A percentage fee does not compound against itself. Paying 1% on 261 separate purchases leaves you with about 1% less bitcoin, not 1% compounded 261 times. A percentage fee cannot take a third of your stack unless the percentage itself is a third. A flat fee per order is different: on a small enough buy it can.
What compounds is the value of the bitcoin you never received. That missing slice tracks the same price as everything else you own. If your stack goes up tenfold, so does the shortfall. Do not think of a fee as a one-time cost you absorb and move past. It permanently reduces the fraction of the supply you hold, and the market prices that reduction forever after.
There is a second, blunter way to frame it. A 1% fee takes $1.00 of every $100 you put in. Over ten years of buying, that adds up to about 1.2 months' worth of contributions that bought no bitcoin.
Fees are one of the very few inputs to a DCA plan that the buyer sets. The price, the falls along the way and the timing are not yours to choose. The rate you pay to convert is, and finding it out costs an afternoon of reading fee schedules.
What each platform charges on a recurring buy
Applied to the same $13,050 across 261 purchases. This is a list of what each platform itself states for a recurring buy, not a ranking or a recommendation. The rows are not like-for-like: some figures are a fee and some are a spread, and the line under each name says which. Coinbase publishes no fixed figure, so no total is shown there. Where a platform takes a spread but does not publish a number for it, the spread is left out and that row understates the cost.
Exchange Fee Comparison
What $13,050 over 261 recurring purchases costs at each platform's own published rate, last checked Oct 12, 2026
| Platform | Pricing | Total Cost | Net Invested | Per Purchase |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cash Appautomatic buys: no fee and no spread | 0% | $0.00$0.00 a buy | $13,050 | $0.00 |
| Strikespread only; no fee after the first week | ~0.22% | $28.71$0.11 a buy | $13,021 | $0.11 |
| Riverspread only; no fee after the first 7 days | ~0.25% | $32.63$0.13 a buy | $13,017 | $0.13 |
| Swanfee only; Swan says that is all it charges on a buy | 1% | $130.50$0.50 a buy | $12,920 | $0.50 |
| Krakenfee only; its spread is extra and not published | 1% + spread | $130.50$0.50 a buy | $12,920 | $0.50 |
| Coinbaseno fixed rate published; shown in the order preview | Set per order | not published | not published | not published |
These are not one comparable fee. Each platform prices differently, so the line under each name says whether its figure is a fee, a spread or both, and what it leaves out. A platform that publishes no figure gets no total. Every figure was read from the platform's own pricing page, last checked Oct 12, 2026; your own cost moves with order size and payment method. Not every platform is offered in every country, and fees can differ by region.
What each figure counts, and its source
Cash App. Cash App's fee page lists zero fees and zero spread on automatic buys (Auto Invest, Round Ups and paycheck deposits). A manual buy under $2,000 is priced differently: 0.9% to 2% depending on its size, plus a spread of up to 0.75%.
Cash App: bitcoin feesChecked Oct 12, 2026
Strike. Strike charges no fee on recurring buys after the first week and says it targets an all-in spread of 0.22%; the spread on any one buy can be higher or lower. Recurring buys in the first week also pay Strike's tiered fee, 0.89% at the lowest volume tier, which is not counted here.
Strike: What are the trading fees?Checked Oct 12, 2026
River. River charges no fee on a recurring buy from seven days after it is set up and says its buy spread typically falls around 0.25%, varying with market conditions. The first order (the first seven days of a daily plan) also pays River's standard 1% fee, which is not counted here.
River: What are River's fees?River: Does River charge a spread?Checked Oct 12, 2026
Swan. Swan's fee page lists a 1% fee on buys and says that is all it charges on a buy. Two things are not counted here: a new client pays no fee on their first $250, and bitcoin left in Swan's own storage (Swan Safe) costs 0.03% of the balance a month unless auto-withdrawals are switched on.
Swan: feesChecked Oct 12, 2026
Kraken. Kraken's fee schedule lists a 1% trading fee on instant and recurring buys. The price it quotes also includes a spread, which Kraken says varies with volatility, order size and account activity and does not publish as a number, so it is not counted here. Payment-method fees, such as card fees, are extra as well. Kraken+ waives this fee on up to $10,000 of trades a month. It costs $4.99 a month or $49.99 a year. At 1%, $4.99 is the fee on $499 of buys in a month, and the yearly price works out to the fee on about $417 a month. Monthly billing is offered through the mobile app only and the website sells the yearly plan. Spread and payment fees still apply, and benefits vary by region.
Kraken: fee scheduleKraken: Kraken+Checked Oct 12, 2026
Coinbase. Coinbase's fee page gives no fixed fee or spread figure for an ordinary buy, so no total is shown here. It says the fee is worked out when you place the order and depends on payment method, order size and market conditions, that the quoted price includes a spread, and that both appear in the order preview before you confirm. It also says it tests fee changes across regions and order sizes. The only trading-fee figures on that page are for limit orders: a 1% execution fee, and a 1.875% Coinbase fee that it says varies by payment method. Its Coinbase One subscription removes trading fees with certain limitations, though a spread may still be included.
Coinbase: pricing and fees disclosuresChecked Oct 12, 2026
What to check on any exchange
The headline trading fee is often the smallest of the numbers below. All six are part of what a buy costs.
1.Trading fee vs. instant-buy fee
Many exchanges run two products on one platform. One is a spot order book, where you trade against other users. It charges a maker fee if your order sits on the book and a taker fee if it fills straight away, both quoted in basis points. A basis point is one hundredth of a percent. The other product is a one-click "buy" or "convert" button that usually charges more. The low number on a fee page is usually the order book, and it applies only to orders placed there.
2.The spread on the quoted price
Compare the price you are quoted against the mid price on a large spot market at the same moment. The gap is a cost whether or not anyone calls it a fee. A platform that charges no fee on an order usually earns on the spread instead, and some show that spread only in the order preview.
3.Deposit and funding costs
Bank transfers (ACH, SEPA, Faster Payments) are commonly free or close to it. Debit and credit card funding usually costs more, and that charge comes on top of the trading fee. If the way you move money in costs more than the trade itself, the trading fee is the smaller of the two numbers.
4.Withdrawal fee for moving to self-custody
Where an on-chain withdrawal is charged, it is normally a flat amount in bitcoin rather than a percentage. That weighs on small frequent withdrawals and hardly matters on large ones. Some platforms charge nothing, some pass the network fee through at cost, and others charge a fixed amount above it. Check whether the platform lets you withdraw to your own address at all.
5.Recurring-buy terms specifically
Recurring buys sometimes get a different fee schedule than manual ones, in either direction. With DCA the recurring buy is the only order you ever place. So that is the number that matters to you.
6.Currency conversion
If you fund in one currency and the pair is quoted in another, there is an FX conversion in the middle with its own margin. Buying a BTC pair quoted in your own currency avoids paying two spreads.
This site takes no position on which exchange you should use and earns nothing from any of them. Exchange names appear here only because their own pricing pages are where the calculator's fee presets are read from.
Frequently asked questions
How much do Bitcoin exchange fees actually cost over a DCA plan?
Take a schedule of $50 a week for 5 years, run on historical prices: 261 purchases and $13,050 put in. A 1% fee takes $130.50 out in fees and leaves you 304,332 sats short of the same schedule with no fee. A sat is one hundred-millionth of a bitcoin, and that shortfall was worth $255.26 at a bitcoin price of $83,874, the Coinbase price on Oct 13, 2026 at 07:52 UTC. A 0.25% fee takes $32.63.
What is the difference between a fee and a spread?
A fee is an explicit charge that appears on your receipt: 1% of the order, itemized. A spread is the gap between the price the platform quotes you and the mid-market price at that moment. It is built into the price instead of being listed as a fee. Some platforms show it in the order preview and some do not publish it at all, and it can exceed the fee it replaces. "Zero fee" often means the cost has moved into the spread, though not always: a platform can state that one kind of order carries neither. The way to measure a spread is to compare the quote you were given against a large spot market at the same moment.
Does a percentage fee compound?
Not against itself. The fee is a percentage of each buy, so after 261 buys at 1% you hold about 1% less bitcoin. It is not 1% compounded 261 times. What compounds is the value of the bitcoin you did not get. That missing bitcoin rides the same price as the rest of your stack, so the shortfall grows in fiat terms exactly as fast as your portfolio does. A fee is best understood as permanently owning a slightly smaller slice, not as a one-off cost.
Is the cheapest exchange always the right choice?
No, and this page does not recommend one. Fees are one input among several. Can you withdraw to your own wallet? How is the platform regulated in your jurisdiction? What is its custody and security record, and does it publish reserve attestations? How often did it go down during volatile periods, and does it support your bank? A platform with a lower fee that will not let you withdraw to your own wallet is not the same product as one with a higher fee that will.
Does buying less often save on fees?
Not with a percentage fee, which costs the same in total however the money is split: twelve monthly buys of $200 and fifty-two weekly buys of about $46 both put in $2,400 and pay the same share of it. A flat fee per order is different because it is charged once per buy. At a flat $1, fifty-two weekly buys pay $52 a year and twelve monthly buys pay $12. The $1 is an example, not any platform's price.
Are the rates on this page current?
Each figure in the platform list was read from that platform's own pricing page and last checked on Oct 12, 2026. Platforms reprice without much notice, and Coinbase publishes no fixed rate at all, so the list shows no total there. The figures are a starting point and the platform's own page is the authority. Some fees also depend on how much you trade in a month or on how you pay, so a headline rate may not be the one you pay.
Run your own numbers
Put your own amount, cadence, dates and fee into the calculator. It runs the whole schedule on historical prices and itemizes what the fee cost.
Open the calculatorRelated
Not financial advice, and not a recommendation of any exchange. Fee rates change, so verify them on the provider's own fee page before you act. The figures above are a historical simulation for education. Past performance does not guarantee future results, bitcoin is volatile, and you can lose money.