#1 Best Exchange for Traders in 2021: CEX.io
Overall Rating: 71.0 / 100
Trust: 8.5/10
Trading: 9.75/10
Derivatives: 0/10
# of Coins: 6.5/10
Fees: 8.5/10
Customer Service: 10/10
Funding Options: 10/10
Recurring Buys: 0/10
CEX.io Review:
- CEX.io is a London-based crypto exchange founded in January 2013 by Oleksandr Lutskevych (who still serves as CEO).
- CEX.io began as the first cloud mining operation, but abandoned it due to increased mining difficulty and low Bitcoin price and chose to focus 100% on their exchange operations in 2015.
- CEX.io prides themselves on being easy to onboard new users and offer industry-leading trading options.
- CEX.io shines brightest when looking at it's trading features and security - as evidenced by offering the ability to trade with industry leading leverage while on margin
CEX.io CEO:
Oleksandr Lutskevych (since 2013)
CEX.io Strengths:
- CEX.io has been around since 2013 (as an exchange since 2015) so they are well known in the crypto industry. They are also well versed and connected in Bitcoin mining and the network.
- We gave them a 8.5/10 Trust Score and love that they institute Proof of Funds.
- Traders will love them for many reasons - excellent API coverage, margin trading, and 100x leverage trading (YES YOU READ THAT RIGHT). This might be the best exchange for traders - depending on what views and features you prioritize.
- Lots of cool features coming: Savings Account, custody, and (rumored) automatic recurring buys.
- On-site staking capability for certain coins.
CEX.io Weaknesses:
- No automatic recurring buy option.
- Liquidity isn’t great as their Bid/Ask Spread = 2.554%.
- While we love that they practice Proof of Funds, we wish CEX.io would consider implementing more cybersecurity protocols, namely: Penetration Tests and Bug Bounty.
- Fees are average.
- Weak education section especially for beginners.
# of Coins:
55
Current Promotions:
No notable promotions to report.
CEX.io Fees:
- Average fees across the board with news that they might improve.
- Maker: 0.0% - 0.16% Taker: 0.10% - 0.25%
CEX.io Withdrawal Fees:
| Payment method | Deposit | Withdrawal |
| VISA | 2.99% | Service charge: up to 3% + $ 1.20 Commission: |
| MasterCard | 2.99% | Service charge: up to 1.8% + $ 1.20 Commission: |
| skrill | 3.99% | 1% |
| Bank transfer | $0 | 0.3% + $ 25.00 |
| ACH | $0 | $0 |
Trading Fee Schedule:
| Trade Volume 30d, BTC | Taker | Maker |
| ≤ 5 | 0.25% | 0.16% |
| ≤ 30 | 0.23% | 0.15% |
| ≤ 50 | 0.21% | 0.13% |
| ≤ 100 | 0.20% | 0.12% |
| ≤ 200 | 0.18% | 0.10% |
| ≤ 1000 | 0.15% | 0.08% |
| ≤ 3000 | 0.13% | 0.04% |
| ≤ 6000 | 0.11% | 0.00% |
| > 6000 | 0.10% | 0.00% |
CEX.io Trading Features:
- Trading is where CEX.io absolutely shines. They offer world class API coverage, margin trading, and up to 100x leverage (we absolutely discourage this option for new traders).
- 151 tradable pairs is impressive and likely more than you’ll ever need.
- Depending on what you find to be most valuable, this might be the best exchange for traders.
- To see CEX.io's full tradable pair list scroll to the bottom of this review.
CEX.io HODLing Features:
CEX.io does not offer automatic recurring buys - which is our favorite feature for HODLers. If you want to set automatic, recurring buys you should consider Binance.US.
Security - CEX.io has one of our lower Trust and Cybersecurity scores. They are rolling out a custody option soon. They do provide Proof of Funds which is very important. They’ve also never been hacked or had information stolen in their 7 years of operation. We only list exchanges that we trust and are very safe. If you plan on holding crypto for a long time you need to be sure the exchange you trust with your holdings is incredibly secure.
We are big fans of auto/recurring buys (Dollar Cost Averaging) and encourage you to utilize this strategy if you don’t want to make a large, one-time purchase, and then move your crypto into a hardware wallet. Check out Binance.US if you want to set up automatic recurring purchases.
DCA:
Analysis and Educational Tools:
If you are looking for your primary exchange site to also be your primary education destination we would encourage you to look further (possibly Binance.US). There are Blog and Press sections, but these are primarily focused on how to use site features, trading, or account setup/settings.
CEX.io does a lot of things well (mostly trading), but this is not one of them. We would recommend you use our site’s education section instead.
Mobile App
The CEX.io mobile app is very clean and easy to use.
Some of the more advanced trading features are either not available on the app, or are more difficult to navigate than the desktop version.
Tradable Pairs
| # | Coin | Pair |
| 1 | XRP | XRP/USD |
| 2 | Bitcoin | BTC/USD |
| 3 | XRP | XRP/EUR |
| 4 | Bitcoin | BTC/EUR |
| 5 | Ethereum | ETH/USD |
| 6 | XRP | XRP/USDT |
| 7 | XRP | XRP/GBP |
| 8 | Stellar | XLM/USD |
| 9 | Bitcoin | BTC/GBP |
| 10 | Ethereum | ETH/EUR |
| 11 | Tether | USDT/USD |
| 12 | XRP | XRP/BTC |
| 13 | Bitcoin Cash | BCH/USD |
| 14 | Cardano | ADA/USD |
| 15 | Bitcoin | BTC/USDT |
| 16 | Litecoin | LTC/USD |
| 17 | Stellar | XLM/USDT |
| 18 | Chainlink | LINK/USD |
| 19 | Ethereum | ETH/USDT |
| 20 | Ethereum | ETH/BTC |
| 21 | TRON | TRX/USD |
| 22 | NEO | NEO/USD |
| 23 | Stellar | XLM/BTC |
| 24 | Bitcoin | BTC/RUB |
| 25 | Stellar | XLM/EUR |
| 26 | Cardano | ADA/EUR |
| 27 | Dash | DASH/USD |
| 28 | Tezos | XTZ/USD |
| 29 | Cardano | ADA/GBP |
| 30 | Bitcoin Cash | BCH/EUR |
| 31 | Uniswap | UNI/USD |
| 32 | Tether | USDT/EUR |
| 33 | Bitcoin Cash | BCH/USDT |
| 34 | Litecoin | LTC/EUR |
| 35 | Cardano | ADA/USDT |
| 36 | Ethereum | ETH/GBP |
| 37 | NEO | NEO/USDT |
| 38 | Litecoin | LTC/USDT |
| 39 | Zilliqa | ZIL/USD |
| 40 | TRON | TRX/USDT |
| 41 | NEO | NEO/EUR |
| 42 | Tezos | XTZ/USDT |
| 43 | Matic Network | MATIC/USD |
| 44 | Polkadot | DOT/USD |
| 45 | Cosmos | ATOM/USD |
| 46 | Tether | USDT/RUB |
| 47 | Litecoin | LTC/GBP |
| 48 | OMG Network | OMG/USD |
| 49 | Basic Attention Token | BAT/USD |
| 50 | Chainlink | LINK/EUR |
| 51 | #MetaHash | MHC/USD |
| 52 | TRON | TRX/BTC |
| 53 | Litecoin | LTC/BTC |
| 54 | Tether | USDT/GBP |
| 55 | TRON | TRX/EUR |
| 56 | Bitcoin Cash | BCH/BTC |
| 57 | Dash | DASH/EUR |
| 58 | Gas | GAS/USD |
| 59 | Dash | DASH/USDT |
| 60 | Ontology | ONT/USD |
| 61 | Holo | HOT/USD |
| 62 | Bitcoin Cash | BCH/GBP |
| 63 | BitTorrent | BTT/USD |
| 64 | Dash | DASH/BTC |
| 65 | Ontology | ONT/USDT |
| 66 | Bitcoin | BTC/USDC |
| 67 | Compound | COMP/USD |
| 68 | Basic Attention Token | BAT/USDT |
| 69 | Zilliqa | ZIL/USDT |
| 70 | Basic Attention Token | BAT/EUR |
| 71 | Matic Network | MATIC/EUR |
| 72 | Chainlink | LINK/USDT |
| 73 | OMG Network | OMG/USDT |
| 74 | Ontology Gas | ONG/USD |
| 75 | Matic Network | MATIC/USDT |
| 76 | NEO | NEO/GBP |
| 77 | 0x | ZRX/USD |
| 78 | OMG Network | OMG/BTC |
| 79 | Cosmos | ATOM/EUR |
| 80 | Wabi | WABI/USD |
| 81 | Lambda | LAMB/USD |
| 82 | OMG Network | OMG/EUR |
| 83 | Tezos | XTZ/EUR |
| 84 | #MetaHash | MHC/BTC |
| 85 | Holo | HOT/USDT |
| 86 | Polkadot | DOT/USDT |
| 87 | Chainlink | LINK/GBP |
| 88 | Golem | GNT/USD |
| 89 | Cosmos | ATOM/USDT |
| 90 | Compound | COMP/USDT |
| 91 | Matic Network | MATIC/GBP |
| 92 | Ontology Gas | ONG/USDT |
| 93 | Gas | GAS/USDT |
| 94 | Gas | GAS/EUR |
| 95 | USD Coin | USDC/USD |
| 96 | #MetaHash | MHC/ETH |
| 97 | Ontology Gas | ONG/EUR |
| 98 | Gas | GAS/GBP |
| 99 | BitTorrent | BTT/EUR |
| 100 | #MetaHash | MHC/EUR |
| 101 | Wabi | WABI/EUR |
| 102 | Ontology Gas | ONG/BTC |
| 103 | Uniswap | UNI/USDT |
| 104 | 0x | ZRX/USDT |
| 105 | Golem | GNT/USDT |
| 106 | Curve DAO Token | CRV/USDT |
| 107 | Tezos | XTZ/GBP |
| 108 | Binance USD | BUSD/ETH |
| 109 | Basic Attention Token | BAT/GBP |
| 110 | Ontology | ONT/BTC |
| 111 | Ontology | ONT/EUR |
| 112 | DFI.money | YFII/USDT |
| 113 | Cosmos | ATOM/GBP |
| 114 | Binance USD | BUSD/USDT |
| 115 | USD Coin | USDC/USDT |
| 116 | Wabi | WABI/USDT |
| 117 | REN | REN/ETH |
| 118 | Meta | MTA/USDT |
| 119 | Gemini Dollar | GUSD/USD |
| 120 | Gemini Dollar | GUSD/USDT |
| 121 | TrueUSD | TUSD/ETH |
| 122 | BitTorrent | BTT/BTC |
| 123 | Curve DAO Token | CRV/ETH |
| 124 | Uniswap | UNI/ETH |
| 125 | yearn.finance | YFI/ETH |
| 126 | yearn.finance | YFI/USDT |
| 127 | Sushi | SUSHI/ETH |
| 128 | DFI.money | YFII/ETH |
| 129 | Gemini Dollar | GUSD/EUR |
| 130 | Sushi | SUSHI/USDT |
| 131 | #MetaHash | MHC/GBP |
| 132 | Wabi | WABI/GBP |
| 133 | Dai | DAI/ETH |
| 134 | Wrapped Bitcoin | WBTC/USDT |
| 135 | Dai | DAI/USDT |
| 136 | REN | REN/USDT |
| 137 | Band Protocol | BAND/USDT |
| 138 | TrueUSD | TUSD/USDT |
| 139 | Cream | CREAM/USDT |
| 140 | Balancer | BAL/USDT |
| 141 | Lambda | LAMB/USDT |