Relay vs Arbitrum Bridge Relay leads by 31 points.
Relay scores 31 points above Arbitrum Bridge, led by route coverage and transfer speed. Relay ranks #1 and Arbitrum Bridge #8 of 18 published bridges. Every term of the gap is on the ledger below; the inputs are on the audit receipt.
Relay86
vs
ARArbitrum Bridge55
Scores are out of 100; published scores fall within 41–99 · ranks #1 and #8 of 18
Relay scores 31 points above Arbitrum Bridge, led by route coverage and transfer speed.
Relay #1 of 1886
ARArbitrum Bridge #8 of 1855
Scores are out of 100; published scores fall within 41–99; a bar is empty at 41 and full at 99.
Why, term by termRelay leads on 2 of 4 published criteria; Arbitrum Bridge on 2. The terms sum to the gap.
TermRelayArbitrum BridgeWeightPoints
Route coverage8/102/106.7+10.5for Relay+5.4 of 32
Trust5/1010/106.2−8.1for Arbitrum Bridge−4.2 of 32
Route clarity7/109/105.8−3.0for Arbitrum Bridge−1.5 of 32
Transfer speed9/102/105.3+9.6for Relay+4.9 of 32
AvailabilityScore dimension201420+15.6for Relay
Trust recordScore dimension5.63.28+6.2for Relay
Net of the terms+30.8
Criteria roundingThe criteria block is rounded to whole points before it is spread+0.1
Reproduced gap+30.9
Published gapAfter score rounding and bounds — see the note below8655+31.0
Weight is in points of the 86-point weighted total. Points are score points of the gap between the two.
RelayScore 86Cleaner bridge path for users who want low-friction multichain movementStrength: Speed — 9/10Watch-out: Relay's chain list on 2026-09-30 had no Sui, Stellar or Cosmos chains; Squid's chain data covers all threeArbitrum BridgeScore 55Native canonical bridge for Ethereum ↔ Arbitrum movementStrength: Trust — 10/10Watch-out: 7-day challenge delay on direct withdrawals (use third-party bridges for fast exits)
Quick facts
At a glance
FactRelayArbitrum Bridge
Bridge feeSnapshotRelay docs, "Cost & Fee Structure" (docs.relay.link/references/api/api_core_concepts/fees, fetched 30 September 2026): four components - Execution Cost ("$0.02 flat fee - always included" plus a destination fill-gas estimate), Swap Cost (payments to liquidity providers, DEX fees and solver rebalancing; no rate published), Platform Fees, and integrator App Fees. The Platform Fee table reads "Token Bridge & Same-Chain Wrap/Unwrap Stablecoin Swap Major Swap Minor Swap Platform Fees charged to end users 0.00% 0.01% 0.06% 0.15%", so a same-token bridge carries a 0.00% platform fee. "For regular (non-gasless) transactions, the user pays origin gas directly from their own wallet to the network".Arbitrum docs, "Quickstart: Arbitrum bridge" (docs.arbitrum.io/arbitrum-bridge/quickstart.md, fetched 30 September 2026): no bridge fee is stated on that page; the user pays gas - "You’ll need the native currency of the parent chain to bridge your assets to the destination chain." A withdrawal needs a second, parent-chain transaction after the challenge period: "Upon confirmation (about one week later), you can execute them" (docs.arbitrum.io cross-chain messaging page). No dollar cost is published on either page, so the deposit and withdrawal dollar ranges the previous note carried are not repeated.
Asset coverageEditorialLower-friction cross-chain token movement across supported routesETH and any ERC-20 with a registered token bridge contract
Region fitSnapshotus, europe, globalglobal
From the published criteria
Which should you pick?
Relay
86#1 of 18
Leads
Pick it when
Pick Relay if route coverage matters most — it scores 8/10 to Arbitrum Bridge's 2/10 there (weight 28).
Strength
Speed — 9/10
Tradeoff
Relay's chain list on 2026-09-30 had no Sui, Stellar or Cosmos chains; Squid's chain data covers all three
AR
Arbitrum Bridge
55#8 of 18
Pick it when
Pick Arbitrum Bridge if trust matters most — it scores 10/10 to Relay's 5/10 there (weight 26).
Strength
Trust — 10/10
Tradeoff
7-day challenge delay on direct withdrawals (use third-party bridges for fast exits)
Self-identify in 10 seconds
Which one is actually for you?
RelayLeads
Choose Relay if route coverage matters most
Route coverage: 8/10 against 2/10 for Arbitrum Bridge (weight 28)
Transfer speed: 9/10 against 2/10 for Arbitrum Bridge (weight 22)
RelayScore 86Cleaner bridge path for users who want low-friction multichain movementStrength: Speed — 9/10Watch-out: Relay's chain list on 2026-09-30 had no Sui, Stellar or Cosmos chains; Squid's chain data covers all three
ARArbitrum Bridge
Choose Arbitrum Bridge if trust matters most
Trust: 10/10 against 5/10 for Relay (weight 26)
Route clarity: 9/10 against 7/10 for Relay (weight 24)
Arbitrum BridgeScore 55Native canonical bridge for Ethereum ↔ Arbitrum movementStrength: Trust — 10/10Watch-out: 7-day challenge delay on direct withdrawals (use third-party bridges for fast exits)
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
Route coverage
by 6 of 10weight 6.7 of 86Relay leads
Relay8/10 out of 10
Arbitrum Bridge2/10 out of 10
Route clarity
by 2 of 10weight 5.8 of 86Arbitrum Bridge leads
Relay7/10 out of 10
Arbitrum Bridge9/10 out of 10
Transfer speed
by 7 of 10weight 5.3 of 86Relay leads
Relay9/10 out of 10
Arbitrum Bridge2/10 out of 10
Trust
by 5 of 10weight 6.2 of 86Arbitrum Bridge leads
Relay5/10 out of 10
Arbitrum Bridge10/10 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
Relay20/20Arbitrum Bridge14/20
Relay leads
Published criteriaweight 30 of 86
Relay17.3/30Arbitrum Bridge13.8/30
Relay leads
Frictionweight 10 of 86 · constant here
Relay2.7/10Arbitrum Bridge2.7/10
Tie
Trust recordweight 8 of 86
Relay5.6/8Arbitrum Bridge3.2/8
Relay leads
Measured dataweight 18 of 86
Relay12.5/18Arbitrum Bridge12.5/18
Tie
Decision rulePublished order
Choose Relay unless the term Arbitrum Bridge leads on is the one you are buying.
Pick Arbitrum Bridge if trust matters most — it scores 10/10 to Relay's 5/10 there (weight 26).
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
Verification failure: an invalid state or transfer is accepted.
Not assessed by this ranking: Contract failure, Control failure, Liveness failure, Custody failure, Regulatory 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: Route coverage (28%), Route clarity (24%), Execution speed (22%).
Questions
Frequently asked questions
Relay scores 31 points above Arbitrum Bridge, led by route coverage and transfer speed. Published scores, out of 100: Relay 86 (rank 1 of 18 bridges), Arbitrum Bridge 55 (rank 8 of 18).
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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