Bybit vs Kraken
A no-nonsense side-by-side of Bybit and Kraken 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 Bybit if you want a fast matching engine and deep USDT-perpetual liquidity. Pick Kraken if security and long-standing trust matters more. Kraken is cheaper on base taker fees; Bybit has the higher leverage cap. Not sure yet? Practice the strategy free before funding either.
| Bybit | Kraken | |
|---|---|---|
| Max leverage | 100× | 50× |
| Maker fee (base) | 0.02% | 0.02% |
| Taker fee (base) | 0.055% | 0.05% |
| Maintenance margin | ~0.5% | ~0.5% |
| Known for | a fast matching engine and deep USDT-perpetual liquidity | security and long-standing trust |
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 a fast matching engine and deep USDT-perpetual liquidity, go with Bybit. If security and long-standing trust matters more, Kraken 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
This is the one pairing on this site where the fee gap is large enough to decide the question on its own. Kraken charges 0.05% against Bybit's 0.055%, and because the fee lands on notional - the whole leveraged position, not the margin behind it - and is paid entering and exiting, the difference compounds fast:
| Bybit | Kraken | |
|---|---|---|
| Taker per side | 0.055% | 0.05% |
| Round-trip cost | $11.00 | $10.00 |
| Over 100 trades | $1,100.00 | $1,000.00 |
Over a hundred round trips that is $100.00 in Kraken's favour - enough to notice on a small account. Keep it in proportion though: one liquidation you could have avoided costs more than a year of the difference. Both venues price maker orders below taker and cut rates as 30-day volume grows. Model it against your own size with the funding-fee calculator and the PnL calculator.
Leverage: what the caps really mean here
Bybit advertises 100x against Kraken's 50x. Read that as a ceiling, not a recommendation: at 100x a move of about 1.00% against the position is enough to end it, against 2.00% 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.
Which venue is actually blowing traders up right now
Fee schedules are published by the exchanges; forced-close flow is not. We run our own collector on the public liquidation websockets of nine venues, so the block below is a measurement of what Bybit liquidated in the last 24 hours, not an estimate or a vendor figure. Kraken does not publish a public liquidation websocket, so there is nothing to measure on that side and we show nothing rather than guess.
Measured by the MarginPad collector across nine exchange websockets · 24h window · 2026-09-21 17:11 UTC
A venue carrying a bigger share of the day's liquidations is not automatically the riskier place to trade - it usually means more leveraged size is open there. What the long/short split tells you is which way the crowd was leaning when it got taken out. The full nine-venue breakdown, updated continuously, sits on the liquidation feed, and the same numbers are free as JSON at /api/v1/venues.
Safety, regulation & track record
Kraken has been running since 2011, 7 years longer than Bybit (2018) - a real difference when the question is who has already survived a full cycle and a bad week.
Bybit publishes proof-of-reserves and has no major custodial hack on record; restricted in several regulated markets and not open to US residents. Kraken one of the oldest exchanges still running, US-regulated with a strong security record, favouring conservative leverage over headline numbers.
On US access: Kraken is the US-friendly option here, while Bybit does not serve US residents. 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.