Why Are Coinbase Fees So High? (Answer to The Question) -

Coinbase, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges on the planet, has nearly 90 million users for a reason. Safe, secure, lightning fast, and with maybe the post advanced (and attractive) mobile app in the game, it’s not hard to see why so many flock to Coinbase every day.

At the same time, Coinbase fees can be quite a bit higher than what you are going to find elsewhere. On top of that, Coinbase has a whole host of different fees that your crypto transactions may get hit with compared to other platforms that limit the amount of fees they’ll assess on trades.

To get a better feel for all the different fees that Coinbase can charge (as well as some tips and tricks to avoid many of these fees, or to minimize them as much as possible) let’s dig a little deeper.

Coinbase 101

Part cryptocurrency exchange, part cryptocurrency wallet – and even a platform that allows members to stake many of their cryptocurrencies, too – the multifaceted nature of Coinbase is a big part of its popularity.

Of course, the support that Coinbase has for more than 100+ cryptocurrency options is nothing to sneeze at either.

Combine all of that with one of the most polished apps in the industry, a reputation for taking security threats very seriously, and insurance backed crypto accounts and opening an account here becomes a bit of a no-brainer.

All that said, it’s not unreasonable for Coinbase to ask for a premium fee structure when they are bringing this much more to the table.

Add in the fact that there’s no real uniform fee structure for the bitcoin world – or crypto in general, for that matter – and Coinbase’s higher fees become a little bit easier to understand.

Breaking Down Coinbase Fee Structure

While Coinbase certainly has higher fees than a lot of their competitors, they also have a lot more transparency about their fee structure than most competitors, too.

For example, standard fees from Coinbase are disclosed up front with no hiding whatsoever.

You know that if you trade $10 or less there’s going to be a $0.99 fee assessed. Trades between $10 and $25 are hit with a $1.49 fee, trades between $25 and $50 are going to cost $1.99, with trades between $50 and $200 hit with a $2.99 fee.

Once you got beyond $200, though, you end up looking at percentage-based fees rather than flat fees – again disclosed up front before you make your trade or transaction.

Other Fees

Other fees that Coinbase assesses can include payment method fees (ranging from free with ACH transfers to $10 incoming/$25 outgoing with wire transfers, and 1.49% charges on bank account transfers).

There are ways to manage and mitigate the kinds of fees you’ll be expected to pay when using Coinbase, though. But that’s something that we dig a little bit deeper into in just a moment.

Are the Higher Coinbase Fees Worth Paying?

Only you are going to be able to figure out whether or not the higher Coinbase fees assessed by this platform are worth paying.

A lot of people (to the tune of almost 90 million users) have decided that yes, while Coinbase charges higher fees than a lot of the other platforms in the crypto world these fees are well worth it for everything that the platform offers.

Some folks, though, have decided to check out other crypto exchanges and crypto wallets.

It’s not at all unusual for those people experimenting with other exchanges to find themselves back at Coinbase sooner rather than later, though.

There’s just something about the security, simplicity, and are almost unlimited crypto options available from Coinbase that make it such a popular option.

Most decide that the higher fees are okay for all the premium features and services they get to take advantage of.

How to Minimize the Fees You Pay to Coinbase

You can manage, minimize, and mitigate many of the fees assessed by Coinbase in a couple of different ways, but none of them is as effective as opening up a Coinbase Pro account.

Coinbase Pro is the “preferred” trading platform available from Coinbase and as a premium service it almost completely eliminates a lot of the standard fees you would have had to pay with traditional Coinbase completely.

On top of that, you’re going to be able to enjoy significantly lowered transaction and trade fees than you would have seen on the traditional Coinbase market, too.

For example, trading anything less than $10,000 on Coinbase Pro will have you assessed with a 0.50% fee. That’s a whole lot less than the kinds of fees you would have seen with standard Coinbase – and the fees get reduced even more when you trade higher amounts of crypto on the platform.

Trade $100,000-$1 million worth of crypto, for example, and your transaction fees will set at 0.20%.

Trade $500 million or more and you’ll see your fees drop down to 0.04%.

Not bad, right?

Join Coinbase Pro

Joining Coinbase Pro is a really simple and straightforward process.

In fact, you’ll be able to do so through the Coinbase app or the Coinbase website – moving your standard account over into the Pro version without any headache and without any hassle.

Obviously, it’s important to make sure that the subscription fees you’ll pay for Coinbase Pro cancel out the kinds of fees that you would have been paying with the standard Coinbase set up.

It doesn’t make sense, after all, to pay a premium subscription price tag for Coinbase Pro unless it’s going to help you save a considerable amount of money – at the very least the amount of the subscription – over time.

Closing Thoughts

There are a couple of different reasons that Coinbase has higher fees than most of the other platforms in the crypto world right now, but at the end of the day it really boils down to:

Coinbase being the dominant crypto exchange in the world right now
Offers a better, safer, and more experience than most other exchanges
Coinbase not having to worry about “industry-standard” fees, rules, regulations regarding crypto fees

… And all the premium features that Coinbase has tucked “under the hood” of their application!

Why Are Coinbase Fees So High? (Answer to The Question)