Bitget vs KuCoin
A no-nonsense side-by-side of Bitget and KuCoin for crypto futures — leverage, fees, maintenance margin and what each is actually good at. Whichever you pick, plan the trade first with our free calculators.
Pick Bitget if you want copy trading and one of the largest futures order books. Pick KuCoin if a huge altcoin futures selection matters more. Base taker fees are identical; Bitget has the higher leverage cap. Not sure yet? Practice the strategy free before funding either.
| Bitget | KuCoin | |
|---|---|---|
| Max leverage | 125× | 100× |
| Maker fee (base) | 0.02% | 0.02% |
| Taker fee (base) | 0.06% | 0.06% |
| Maintenance margin | ~0.5% | ~0.5% |
| Known for | copy trading and one of the largest futures order books | a huge altcoin futures selection |
What a round trip actually costs on each — enter your position size and how often you trade.
Taker fees, charged on the full position both sides. Maker (limit) orders cost less; VIP tiers cut both.
Which should you pick?
If you want copy trading and one of the largest futures order books, go with Bitget. If a huge altcoin futures selection matters more, KuCoin fits better. Many traders keep accounts on both and route each trade to wherever the liquidity and funding are best on the day. There is no wrong answer — there is only an unplanned trade.
What the fees actually cost you
These two price the taker side within a rounding error of each other, so fees are the wrong axis to pick between them — the decision lives in leverage, listings and who will let you open an account. The arithmetic is still worth seeing, because it is paid on notional (the full leveraged size, not your margin) and charged twice per round trip:
| Bitget | KuCoin | |
|---|---|---|
| Taker per side | 0.06% | 0.06% |
| Round-trip cost | $12.00 | $12.00 |
| Over 100 trades | $1,200.00 | $1,200.00 |
Level on fees, then. What moves the needle instead is order type: resting maker limits cost less than taking the book on both venues, and both step rates down as 30-day volume grows. A trader who works limit orders pays less on the "expensive" venue than an impatient one pays on the "cheap" one. Model it against your own size with the funding-fee calculator and the PnL calculator.
Leverage: what the caps really mean here
Bitget advertises 125x against KuCoin's 100x. Read that as a ceiling, not a recommendation: at 125x a move of about 0.80% against the position is enough to end it, against 1.00% at the lower cap. Traders who survive rarely trade anywhere near either number, so a higher cap is only an advantage if you already know why you need it.
Safety, regulation & track record
Both opened within 1 year of each other (Bitget 2018, KuCoin 2017), so neither wins on track record alone.
Bitget publishes a protection fund, ranks top-five by futures volume, and centres its product on copy trading; not available to US residents. KuCoin settled US regulatory action and wound down US access; carries one of the largest altcoin listing bases in the industry.
Neither is available to US residents — a US-regulated venue such as Kraken fits that case better. Whichever you choose, never keep more on any exchange than you are actively trading, enable withdrawal whitelists and two-factor authentication, and confirm current fees, leverage caps and regional availability on the exchange itself before funding.
Fees and limits are approximate base-tier figures and change by tier, region and over time — confirm on each exchange. Exchange links are referral links; we may earn a commission at no cost to you. Educational, not financial advice.