Bybit scores 22 points above Kraken, led by withdrawal track record. Kraken ranks #11 and Bybit #1 of 17 published exchanges. Every term of the gap is on the ledger below; the inputs are on the audit receipt.
Kraken59
vs
Bybit81
Scores are out of 100; published scores fall within 41–99 · ranks #11 and #1 of 17
Criteria roundingThe criteria block is rounded to whole points before it is spread+0.1
Reproduced gap+21.8
Published gapAfter score rounding and bounds — see the note below8159+22.0
Weight is in points of the 86-point weighted total. Points are score points of the gap between the two.
BybitScore 81Derivatives-heavy global exchange that survived the February 2025 theft of over 400,000 ETH and stETH (worth more than $1.4 billion, in its own announcement) with same-day self-disclosure, open withdrawals and monthly Hacken proof-of-reserves — now two-entity: MiCA-licensed Bybit EU GmbH for the EEA, and for everyone else an offshore entity, Bybit Technology Limited, whose Platform Terms (effective 2 September 2026) hold assets in an omnibus account and say nothing about insolvency.Strength: Withdrawal incident record — 9/10Watch-out: The protections are entity-split and the good half is the small half: an EEA buyer gets Bybit EU GmbH with MiCA segregation and an explicit 'will not use Custody Assets' clause, but every other buyer contracts with Bybit Technology Limited, whose Platform Terms (effective 2 September 2026, read on 2026-09-29) hold your coins in an 'omnibus user account', say nothing about segregation or what happens to them in an insolvency, let the company freeze the account 'at any time and at our sole discretion', and allow larger withdrawals to take up to thirty days.KrakenScore 592011-founded exchange with cross-metric fee tiers (volume OR holdings), a MiCA CASP custody policy and a self-disclosed 2024 exploit record — but its proof of reserves names no attestor and no cadence beyond 'a regular cadence', and its terms admit 'a court may disagree with our treatment of your Digital Assets'.Strength: Withdrawal incident record — 8/10Watch-out: The default Instant Buy surface charges 1% PLUS a spread Kraken discloses to exist but never numerically bounds — a recurring buyer who never finds Kraken Pro pays an unprintable premium on every order; and the support page warns withdrawal fees 'may differ from those displayed here'.
Quick facts
At a glance
1 of 3 rows read the same for both.
FactKrakenBybit
Pro taker feeSnapshotKraken fee schedule, read 29 September 2026 at https://www.kraken.com/features/fee-schedule (English; a fetch without a language header is served the same numbers in German). Kraken Pro spot tiers, columns "Spot 30-Day Vol (USD) OR", "Futures 30-Day Vol (USD) OR", "AoP (USD)", "Spot Maker (%)", "Spot Taker (%)": "Tier 1 $0+ < $5M N/A 0.40 % 0.80 %"; "Tier 2 $2.5K+ ≥ $5M N/A 0.30 % 0.60 %"; "Tier 3 $10K+ ≥ $10M 20k 0.22 % 0.38 %"; "Tier 12 $10M+ ≥ $300M 10m 0.0 % 0.10 %"; "Pro 5 $500M+ >5B 100m 0.0 % 0.05 %" (17 tiers in all). Tier rule: "Your tier is based on the best of :" spot volume, futures volume or assets on platform. Instant buy/sell, the default app surface: "Kraken charges a 1% trading fee on instant and recurring trades and a 1.5% fee on custom orders, which are waived for Kraken+ members on trading volume up to $10,000 per month (details below)." plus a spread the page discloses without a number: "the price you see includes a spread, the difference between the market rate and the rate you receive." and "Note: While trading fees are waived, spreads and card processing fees still apply." Small-balance conversion: "a fixed 3% fee applies to amounts below the minimum order size." Crypto withdrawals: a per-asset article exists (https://support.kraken.com/articles/360000767986, "Last updated: December 31, 2025") with the caveat "Withdrawal fees are subject to change and may differ from those displayed here; the final fees will be accurately shown at the time of confirmation."An EEA reader contracts with Bybit EU GmbH, whose fee page (https://www.bybit.eu/en-EU/fee/spot, re-read 3 November 2026) charges a "Regular User" on "Fiat Pairs" (a EUR purchase) "0.15%" / "0.2%" (maker / taker) under "<100,000" USD of 30-day volume, and "0.1%" / "0.1%" on "Crypto Pairs"; the 28 October 2026 read printed "0.25%" / "0.25%". Everyone else: Bybit Trading Fee Structure, re-read 28 October 2026 and read 29 September 2026 at https://www.bybit.com/en/help-center/article/Trading-Fee-Structure ("Last updated on 2026-09-02 01:17:46"). Spot (crypto-crypto) taker / maker: "VIP 0" "0.1000%" / "0.1000%"; "VIP 1" "0.0800%" / "0.0675%"; "Supreme VIP" "0.0450%" / "0.0300%". Perpetual & futures: "VIP 0" "0.0550%" / "0.0200%", down to "Supreme VIP" "0.0300%" / "0.0000%". Tier rule: "The VIP level is determined based on either your asset balance or your trading volume over the past 30 days, whichever qualifies you for the higher tier."; VIP 1 needs an asset balance of "≥ 100K" or 30-day spot volume of "≥ 1M". Fiat-crypto spot pairs cost more: "VIP 0" "<100,000" "0.2000%" / "0.1500%". Page caveat: "the actual fee rates may vary depending on your region." Retail One-Click Buy by card (https://www.bybit.com/en/help-center/article/FAQ-Bank-Card-Payments): EU Visa/Mastercard "1.1%"; non-EU Visa "3.05%"; non-EU Mastercard "2.7%"; Apple Pay "1.8% + 0.24 EUR fixed cost". Fiat exit, Sell Crypto (https://www.bybit.com/en/help-center/article/FAQ-One-Click-Buy, "Last updated on 2026-09-28 02:47:20"): EUR "2.1% + 5 EUR fixed cost"; USD "2.2% + 10 USD fixed cost".
Asset coverageEditorial——
Region fitSnapshotus, europe, caeurope, asia, latam
From the published criteria
Which should you pick?
Kraken
59#11 of 17
Pick it when
Pick Kraken if licence coverage matters most — it scores 8/10 to Bybit's 6/10 there (weight 24).
Strength
Withdrawal incident record — 8/10
Tradeoff
The default Instant Buy surface charges 1% PLUS a spread Kraken discloses to exist but never numerically bounds — a recurring buyer who never finds Kraken Pro pays an unprintable premium on every order; and the support page warns withdrawal fees 'may differ from those displayed here'.
Bybit
81#1 of 17
Leads
Pick it when
Pick Bybit if withdrawal track record matters most — it scores 9/10 to Kraken's 8/10 there (weight 28).
Strength
Withdrawal incident record — 9/10
Tradeoff
The protections are entity-split and the good half is the small half: an EEA buyer gets Bybit EU GmbH with MiCA segregation and an explicit 'will not use Custody Assets' clause, but every other buyer contracts with Bybit Technology Limited, whose Platform Terms (effective 2 September 2026, read on 2026-09-29) hold your coins in an 'omnibus user account', say nothing about segregation or what happens to them in an insolvency, let the company freeze the account 'at any time and at our sole discretion', and allow larger withdrawals to take up to thirty days.
Self-identify in 10 seconds
Which one is actually for you?
Kraken
Choose Kraken if licence coverage matters most
Licence coverage: 8/10 against 6/10 for Bybit (weight 24)
Asset protection: 7/10 against 5/10 for Bybit (weight 18)
KrakenScore 592011-founded exchange with cross-metric fee tiers (volume OR holdings), a MiCA CASP custody policy and a self-disclosed 2024 exploit record — but its proof of reserves names no attestor and no cadence beyond 'a regular cadence', and its terms admit 'a court may disagree with our treatment of your Digital Assets'.Strength: Withdrawal incident record — 8/10Watch-out: The default Instant Buy surface charges 1% PLUS a spread Kraken discloses to exist but never numerically bounds — a recurring buyer who never finds Kraken Pro pays an unprintable premium on every order; and the support page warns withdrawal fees 'may differ from those displayed here'.
BybitLeads
Choose Bybit if withdrawal track record matters most
Withdrawal track record: 9/10 against 8/10 for Kraken (weight 28)
BybitScore 81Derivatives-heavy global exchange that survived the February 2025 theft of over 400,000 ETH and stETH (worth more than $1.4 billion, in its own announcement) with same-day self-disclosure, open withdrawals and monthly Hacken proof-of-reserves — now two-entity: MiCA-licensed Bybit EU GmbH for the EEA, and for everyone else an offshore entity, Bybit Technology Limited, whose Platform Terms (effective 2 September 2026) hold assets in an omnibus account and say nothing about insolvency.Strength: Withdrawal incident record — 9/10Watch-out: The protections are entity-split and the good half is the small half: an EEA buyer gets Bybit EU GmbH with MiCA segregation and an explicit 'will not use Custody Assets' clause, but every other buyer contracts with Bybit Technology Limited, whose Platform Terms (effective 2 September 2026, read on 2026-09-29) hold your coins in an 'omnibus user account', say nothing about segregation or what happens to them in an insolvency, let the company freeze the account 'at any time and at our sole discretion', and allow larger withdrawals to take up to thirty days.
Criterion by criterion
Scorecard
Published criteria · weight in points of 868 of 8 cells scored. Strength is read from the evidence file; the weight is the published one. Methodology
Trading cost
weight 7.2 of 86Tie
Kraken7/10 out of 10
Bybit7/10 out of 10
Withdrawal track record
by 1 of 10weight 6.7 of 86Bybit leads
Kraken8/10 out of 10
Bybit9/10 out of 10
Licence coverage
by 2 of 10weight 5.8 of 86Kraken leads
Kraken8/10 out of 10
Bybit6/10 out of 10
Asset protection
by 2 of 10weight 4.3 of 86Kraken leads
Kraken7/10 out of 10
Bybit5/10 out of 10
Score dimensions
weights sum to 86
The published score is five dimensions, each weighted for the category. "Published criteria" is the criteria block above; the other four are the engine's own terms — availability, friction, trust record, measured data. Each bar is one side's points out of that dimension's maximum; the weight beside the name is its points of the 86-point weighted total. The published criteria above can fill 24 of the block’s 30. A weight marked “constant here” belongs to a dimension every ranked product in the category holds at the same value: it still counts in the total, and it orders nothing here.
Availabilityweight 20 of 86
Kraken12/20Bybit12/20
Tie
Published criteriaweight 30 of 86
Kraken18/30Bybit16.7/30
Kraken leads
Frictionweight 10 of 86 · constant here
Kraken2.7/10Bybit2.7/10
Tie
Trust recordweight 8 of 86 · constant here
Kraken3.2/8Bybit3.2/8
Tie
Measured dataweight 18 of 86
Kraken3.5/18Bybit13.2/18
Bybit leads
Decision rulePublished order
Choose Bybit unless the term Kraken leads on is the one you are buying.
Pick Kraken if licence coverage matters most — it scores 8/10 to Bybit's 6/10 there (weight 24).
The published order weighs every criterion the same way for everyone. To weigh them your way, run .
From the published order
Next best action
If this isn't your case
Other matchups worth comparing
How you can lose money here, and what the ranking scores
Custody failure: whoever holds the assets loses or withholds them.
Scored by When this venue broke, did people get their money out — and how would I know? · 28% (Kraken 8/10, Bybit 9/10)
Insolvency failure: the firm or issuer that owes you cannot pay.
Scored by If this exchange fails — or freezes me — are the coins legally mine, and on whose terms? · 18% (Kraken 7/10, Bybit 5/10)
Regulatory failure: no licence where you are, or a forced market exit.
Scored by Whose licence actually covers me in my country — and can I find it on the register? · 24% (Kraken 8/10, Bybit 6/10)
Not assessed by this ranking: Control failure, Liveness failure, Execution failure, Exit failure. A high place says nothing about these; the Methodology tab says what each means.
Also scored, as cost, quality or a summary of several families: What will I actually pay here at my volume — including the spread they don't print? (30%).
Questions
Frequently asked questions
Bybit scores 22 points above Kraken, led by withdrawal track record. Published scores, out of 100: Kraken 59 (rank 11 of 17 exchanges), Bybit 81 (rank 1 of 17).
ReviewedRe-read in progressOverdue; re-read by 10 November 2026.Methodology v2026.10.18
How this page is reviewed
Reviewed means both products compared here was read against its sources on or after that date; every ranked category is re-read at least every 45 days. Models research, extract and parse. A deterministic engine ranks. Every quote passes an adversarial refute pass.
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