The cryptocurrency market offers more than 13,000 digital currencies across more than 400 crypto exchange platforms according to Coinmarketcap. This is a huge number and for beginner crypto traders, it can be a bit hard to decide which exchange platforms are trustworthy and suitable for their needs.
For example, if you’re only looking to trade with a few of the most popular crypto-assets like Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH), you’ll find these coins on literally every exchange. However, if you’re looking to trade some assets that have a lower market cap, but which attract a lot of attention with their features, you might need to look for those coins at various exchanges.
In these situations, you’ll likely need to have multiple exchange platform accounts, utilizing the advantages of several platforms. You might want to open an account on one of the most popular exchanges such as Coinbase.com, Kraken, or Bitstamp to use it for your initial investments and later try to buy some less-known coins that aren’t listed on the platform. That’s when you’ll probably open another exchange platform account on an exchange that has lower trading traffic but offers far more coins, such as Bittrex.com.
In this guide, we’ll take a look at both Coinbase and Bittrex, explore what are the main characteristics of each platform, and discuss how long it takes to transfer funds from Coinbase to Bittrex.
Coinbase
Coinbase is one of the most popular exchanges on the crypto market. The platform was launched back in 2012, which makes it one of the oldest exchanges on the market. It’s fully regulated too, which means that it’s subject to tax regulations and financial laws in the regions where it operates. The platform is known for providing some of the most reliable trading services among crypto platforms, for its great security, strong selection of cryptocurrencies, wide range of trading features, and very user-friendly interface.
The platform is perfect for crypto beginners and a popular first choice for people who are new to crypto because it’s really easy to use and offers direct crypto purchases with fiat money as well as all of the necessary trading tools.
According to the company, Coinbase has a quarterly trading volume of 462 billion USD, operates in more than 100 countries, and has more than 68 million verified users. All of this wouldn’t be possible without the highly reliable services provided by the platform. When you use Coinbase, you know that you’ll get the cryptos you purchase and there’s no way you’ll become a victim of any sort of scam. This reliability and high speed come at a price, and this is why Coinbase fees are somewhat higher compared to other exchanges, but it’s definitely worth the convenience because you’ll always get your crypto trading done safely and quickly.
Trading Features
In terms of trading features, the Coinbase platform offers users a simple and straightforward trading experience. If you’re new to cryptocurrency exchanges, trading on Coinbase is a great choice to start your crypto journey, because it’s just so simple. You get a simple overview of your asset portfolio and a market interface where you can choose trading pairs, place buy or sell orders, look at the market charts in order to analyze price fluctuations, and send or receive funds to your Coinbase wallet.
For more experienced traders that wish to have access to advanced trading tools, Coinbase has its own Coinbase Pro platform which was formerly known as GDAX. The Coinbase Pro platform is far more complex and offers traders a very detailed trading interface, with price charts that are more interactive and enable brokers to implement advanced trading tactics thanks to detailed market analysis. Pro traders also have a range of advanced trading orders at their disposal such as margin trading and the fees are lower compared to the basic platform.
Cryptocurrency Selection
Coinbase has a great selection of cryptocurrencies and you can find most of the top trending coins and tokens on the platform. In total, more than 50 of the most popular digital currencies are available for trading on Coinbase, including BTC, ETH, Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Cardano (ADA), Dogecoin (DOGE), Dash (DASH), Litecoin (LTC), Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), Ripple (XRP), Chainlink (LINK), Eos (EOS), and other cryptos.
Keep in mind that Coinbase is a fiat-friendly exchange platform, which means you can deposit fiat currency and cash out altcoins through the platform.
Fees
Coinbase fees are higher compared to most of the other popular exchange platforms because the convenience of having a wide range of highly reliable and fast crypto services comes with a cost.
If you’re buying cryptos with a bank card such as a credit card or debit card you’ll be charged a 3.99% card fee. Crypto purchases with a wire transfer incur a 10 USD standard fee, while ACH transactions are free of charge. In case you want to buy coins with a bank account transfer, you’ll incur a standard 1.49% fee. On top of these fees, Coinbase also charges a spread fee, which can vary from 0.50% for purchases worth up to 10,000 US dollars, down to 0.05% for market takers and 0.00% for market makers with 30-day trading volumes of 500 million USD or more.
Security
Coinbase takes platform security very seriously and this is why 98% of all funds traded on the platform are kept safely offline in the company’s cold storage. The 2% that’s kept online is used for platform liquidity and in case those funds get compromised by a cyberattack, users are insured up to the amount of 250,000 USD.
Coinbase portfolio
The platform also uses a KYC (know your customer) protocol to prevent any scams and money laundering. This means you’ll have to provide all of your personal information such as full name, address, email, phone number, and a photo of a government-issued identification document such as your ID card, passport, or driver’s license. All of this information is confidential and safely stored on Coinbase servers.
You can also set up 2FA (two-factor authentication) when logging in just to make sure no one can log into your account instead of you.
Mobile App
Coinbase also has a great mobile app that brings all of the platform’s features to your mobile device. It’s compatible with both Android and iOS devices and it also comes with a very user-friendly interface suitable for crypto beginners. All the necessary trading options are just a few clicks away to give you the convenience of crypto trading on the go.
Bittrex
The Bittrex platform offers users many of the same features Coinbase does, but it has a couple of key differences such as lower fees and the broader selection of cryptocurrencies. Bittrex is also a veteran crypto exchange that was launched two years after Coinbase, in 2014.
A key aspect of Bittrex which you should consider is that, unlike Coinbase, this exchange isn’t legally regulated in the US or Europe. Bittrex is actually registered in Bermuda and it has the Bermuda Digital Asset Business Act license, which might motivate some users to search for an alternative exchange that is regulated in the region they live. The thing is users don’t really know what kind of protection they have as Bittrex clients, because the Bermuda financial authorities can’t provide as much legal protection as US or EU financial regulatory bodies. In terms of legal protection, Coinbase is much safer because it’s fully regulated under US laws.
Trading Features
Bittrex is definitely a crypto exchange platform that is more suitable for experienced traders than beginners, but if you’re just looking for a marketplace to buy some less popular coins or tokens, then your experience level isn’t an issue. You can buy or exchange cryptos really easily.
On the other hand, if you’re looking to implement some more complex trading strategies and want to have in-depth market analytics and price charts at your disposal, then Bittrex is a great choice.
When using Bittrex for crypto trading, check in advance if depositing fiat money to your Bittrex account is available in your region. US customers, for instance, can’t buy cryptos with fiat money on Bittrex if they want to use a VISA or MasterCard bank card. They need to buy cryptos with another digital currency such as Bitcoin. This is a popular reason why users often need to send intermediary crypto like BTC or ETH from their crypto wallet or another exchange platform account to their Bittrex account before they can buy the coin they desire.
Cryptocurrency Selection
The huge selection of cryptocurrencies is the key reason why people use Bittrex because most of the top exchange platforms don’t offer as many cryptos. Not that Coinbase doesn’t have a good crypto selection, because all of the most popular coins are there, it’s just that Coinbase doesn’t offer some less popular coins that might offer more trading opportunities to users because of their high volatility.
Bittrex exchange features
Bittrex enables users to trade more than 1000 crypto coins and tokens, which makes Bittrex one of the top exchanges on the market in terms of supported cryptos. You can find all of the top trading cryptos along with hundreds of low-cap crypto projects which might prove to be profitable investments in the future.
You can buy, sell, or exchange the likes of DigiByte (DGB), OMG Network (OMG), Vera (VRA), Jasmy (JASMY), Xels (XELS), Decentraland (MANA), Terra Luna (LUNA), and hundreds of other altcoins.
Fees
Bittrex fees are lower than those on Coinbase. If you want to purchase cryptos with a payment card, the fee is 3%. You won’t incur any fees for depositing money into your platform wallet through a bank transfer or if you’re depositing other cryptos.
The trading fees on Bittrex also function on a market maker and taker model. You’ll incur a 0.75% trading fee unless you have a 30-day trading volume of at least 5000 USD – then your fee drops to 0.50%. The lowest fee you can incur on Bittrex as a market taker is 0.05% if you have a 30-day trading volume of at least 100 million USD.
In terms of percentage, these fees aren’t lower than those on Coinbase but the fee thresholds are considerably lower. For example, on Coinbase, you can get the market maker fee down to 0.05% only if you have a monthly trading volume of at least 500 million USD which is five times more than the threshold on Bittrex for the same fee.
Security
In terms of security, Bittrex offers solid services. On between 80 and 90% of all platforms, funds are always stored offline in cold crypto storage. These funds are out of the reach of any cyber attacker at all times.
The platform uses a standard KYC protocol against scams and money laundering, so you’ll be required to provide detailed personal information as well as a photo of your government-issued identification documents.
Bittrex exchange security
Two-factor authentication is also an integral part of Bittrex policy and you’ll always be required to authenticate your withdrawal requests either through an SMS or email code.
Mobile App
Similar to Coinbase, Bittrex also has its own mobile app, which is compatible with Android and iOS devices. All of the features of the browser version of the platform are also available through the mobile app. You can buy, sell, and exchange your cryptos with the app and you can also manage your whole portfolio within the Bittrex account.
Transfering Bitcoin From Coinbase to Bittrex
If you can’t fund your Bittrex account with a bank card payment or wire transfer from your region, and you happen to have a Coinbase account, then the simplest thing to do in order to buy some less popular coins or tokens on Bittrex is to just send Bitcoin from your Coinbase account to Bittrex.
The process is pretty simple:
- Log into Bittrex and navigate to the Wallets section.
- Select the Account Balances field and find Bitcoin.
- Click the blue plus sign and you’ll see the Bitcoin address of your Bittrex account.
- Select the BTC address and copy it.
- Log into your Coinbase account through another browser tab.
- Select the Accounts tab, find your Bitcoin wallet (make sure you have an adequate Bitcoin deposit in your account), and click the Send option.
- Paste your Bittrex wallet address into the recipient field and select the amount of Bitcoin you wish to send.
- Once you have filled in the necessary fields click Continue and this will initiate the Bitcoin transaction.
- The transaction time can be up to 4 or 5 hours when transferring from Coinbase to Bittrex.
A Few Final Words…
When trading cryptos, you’ll probably have a lot more than one crypto exchange account, because not all of the coins you’ll want to trade will be available on a single exchange or maybe you’ll find an exchange that offers lower transaction fees and faster services. In any case, it’s perfectly normal to have accounts on multiple exchanges, but you should be careful when choosing a platform.
The combination of Coinbase and Bittrex works really smoothly because you’ll surely find all of those lower cap cryptos with high market volatility on Bittrex and in case you can’t buy them directly with fiat currency, you can use your Coinbase account to send some BTC and buy those coins.