Introduction: Crypto investors have a tough decision to make when it comes to choosing between two of the most popular exchanges, Bybit and Kraken. Both exchanges boast a variety of features and services, but which one is the right choice for your trading needs? To help you decide, we have compared these two platforms across a range of metrics to find out which exchange comes out on top.
Bybit and Kraken are two well-known cryptocurrency exchanges with unique strenghts. Bybit was founded in 2018 in Singapore and has 1000 employees that supports traders across 180 countries. With 10 million users and 5 million app downloads, Bybit has become increasingly popular among traders.
Kraken, on the other hand was founded in 2011 in San Francisco and has over 2000 employees. It is available in 190 countries and has over 9 million users and 1 million app downloads. While Bybit is more known for being a trading haven, Kraken is well known for being one of the most secure and well regulated exchange on the market.
Signing up for Bybit is easy and straightforward and the KYC verification (for those that want to) process can take as little as 10 minutes to complete. On the other hand, signing up for Kraken takes less than a minute and basic verification can be achieved in less than 2 minutes.
The full Kraken KYC process can take up to 5 days if all the required documents have been received. Note that one big difference between the exchanges is that Kraken requires all it's customers to KYC while Bybit does not have such a requirement.
Bybit offers a wider range of services than Kraken which includes basic trading services such as spot, margin, futures and perpetual contracts, making it a popular choice for advanced traders. Bybit also offers more features, such as copy trading, trading bots, lending and borrowing and a Web 3 wallet which is not available on Kraken. Additionally, Bybit offers higher leverage with up to 125x compared to Kraken's 50x, giving traders more flexibility and higher risk.
In contrast, Kraken has a more limited product offering with spot trading, futures, perps and margin trading, making it ideal for beginner and intermediate traders. Kraken also offers staking for international users (no longer available in the US) and NFTs through its marketplace.
Bybit provides a Maker fee of 0.10% and a Taker fee of 0.10% for spot trading, while Kraken charges a higher Maker fee of 0.16% and a Taker fee of 0.26%. For futures trading, Bybit has a lower Maker fee of 0.01% and a Taker fee of 0.06%, while Kraken's Maker fee is 0.02% and Taker fee is 0.05%.
Bybit's fees are the lowest for both spot and futures trading, making it a great option for traders looking to minimize their trading costs.
Bybit and Kraken both offer a variety of deposit methods for their users. Bybit provides support for five fiat currencies including USD, RUB, MXN, BRL, ARS and TRY, with a range of deposit options such as bank transfer, SEPA, FPS, QiWI, Advcash, PIX, and a deposit fee of $8 via Wire Transfer.
On the other hand, Kraken offers a wider range of fiat currencies, supporting USD, EUR, CAD, AUD, GBP, CHF, and JPY, and accepts deposit methods such as Fedwire, SWIFT, ACH, SEPA, and FPS. It's worth noting that ACH deposits are free for USD, EUR, and CAD. With a broader range of deposit options and more fiat currencies supported, Kraken is the better choice for users looking for a wide range of options.
If you want to withdraw fiat currencies, Kraken is the better choice as it supports 7 different currencies (ACH, SEPA, SWIFT, FPS, etc.) with fees ranging from free to $4. Bybit, on the other hand, only supports fiat withdrawals for USD, BRL and TRY, with zero fee bank withdrawals for TRY and BRL and a high USD Wire transfer fee of $25.
