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KuCoin vs. Gate.io: Which Is Better To Trade Altcoins?
Hedge With Crypto aims to publish information that is factual and accurate as of the date of publication. For specific information about a cryptocurrency exchange or trading platform please visit that provider’s website. This information is general in nature and is for education purposes only. Hedge With Crypto does not provide financial advice nor does it take into account your personal financial situation. We encourage you to seek financial advice from an independent financial advisor where appropriate and make your own enquiries.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Quick Verdict
Gate.io is ideal for derivatives traders who want access to futures and options trading, as well as users who value the Copy Trading feature and trading bots. The ability to automate trading is attractive, as well as the plethora of coin options available on both the spot and derivatives platforms. On the other hand, KuCoin is another great palace for trading altcoins and offers better liquidity overall, as well as a better-designed mobile trading experience. KuCoin also has more interest-earning products, so users looking for passive income would prefer KuCoin over Gate.io.
A summary of their main features is compared in the table below.
| KuCoin | Gate.io | |
|---|---|---|
| Website |
https://www.hedgewithcrypto.com/go/kucoin |
https://www.hedgewithcrypto.com/go/gateio |
| Promotion | Up to 500 USDT in bonuses | None available at this time |
| Fiat Currency | USD, GBP, EUR, CNY & 46 others | USD, EUR, GBP, AUD, CAD, +80 Others |
| Supported Cryptocurrency | 806 | 1,752 |
| Max. Trading Fee | 0.1% | 0.2% |
| Overall Rating | HedgewithCrypto Score 4.6 / 5 We provide an overall weighted average rating out of 5 stars. Our ratings are based on objective criteria like the ease of use, fees, deposit methods, customer support and availability. Our reviews are not influenced by 3rd parties. Click here for further information about our rating methodology and a full list of categories we review against.   Visit KuCoin |
HedgewithCrypto Score 4.1 / 5 We provide an overall weighted average rating out of 5 stars. Our ratings are based on objective criteria like the ease of use, fees, deposit methods, customer support and availability. Our reviews are not influenced by 3rd parties. Click here for further information about our rating methodology and a full list of categories we review against.  Visit Gate.io |
| Review | Read our full KuCoin Review | Read our full Gate.io Review |
In-Depth Comparison: KuCoin vs. Gate.io
Gate Technology Incorporated, otherwise known as Gate.io is a large global cryptocurrency exchange with more than 1,752 crypto assets and over 2,902 trading pairs. As one of the best exchanges we have reviewed, Gate.io offers deep liquidity on popular trading pairs, and access to coins that most other exchanges don’t carry. Gate.io offers spot, margin, futures, and options markets, as well as a copy trading feature to copy the trades of popular traders on the platform.
Gate.io hosts over 10 million users around the globe, with a daily trading volume of over $2 billion on its derivatives platform alone. In addition to trading, Gate.io offers interest-bearing accounts and an NFT platform.
Gate.io Pros
- Offers more coins than most exchanges (1,752)
- Spot and derivatives trading with up to 100x leverage
- NFT marketplace to buy, sell, and mint NFTs
- Low trading fees for spot and derivatives trading
Gate.io Cons
- Not available to U.S. users
- Fiat support is lacking (third-party only)
- Mobile app poorly rated on iOS and Android
KuCoin is a popular cryptocurrency exchange for altcoin traders, offering 700+ coins across thousands of trading pairs. Established in late 2017, KuCoin has become one of the best exchanges for altcoin trading in the world, with over 20 million users around the globe. The exchange has tons of features, including spot and futures trading, margin trading, leveraged tokens, interest-bearing accounts, and more. The KuCoin mobile app is highly-rated and offers access to most every feature that the web app offers.
KuCoin Pros:
- Deep liquidity on most trading pairs
- Over 700 cryptocurrencies to choose from
- Beginner-friendly crypto trading, and advanced platforms are available
- Well-designed mobile app
- Some of the lowest trading fees around
KuCoin Cons:
- Fiat support is limited (third-party only)
- Not available for traders in the United States
Comparison of Features, Products & Services
KuCoin and Gate.io offer thousands of crypto trading pairs and access to the most altcoin gems in the market. Here is a comparison and overview of some of the common and unique features of both KuCoin and Gate.io.
Supported Countries
KuCoin and Gate.io are available worldwide, supporting customers in over 200 countries around the globe. Due to both of their derivatives trading platforms and strict regulations, they are not available in the United States. Both also have a huge customer base, with KuCoin supporting over 20 million customers, and Gate.io servicing over 10 million customers.
Winner. KuCoin.
While both exchanges support almost every country in the world, both are not available in the U.S. However, KuCoin has double the number of customers as Gate.io and allows non-KYC users from any location.
Supported Fiat & Deposit Methods
KuCoin supports 50+ fiat currencies through third-party integrations, but deposits are charged fees, and fiat can only be used to purchase 10 – 15 different coins. Gate.io supports 20+ fiat currencies, but only through third-party integrations, and also carries high fees. Both KuCoin and Gate.io support credit/debit card purchases as well, again, with higher fees than normal trading.
Each platform is not designed to deposit fiat currency, but rather to use a third-party gateway for the transaction. Another method of trading includes using fiat currency to execute a Peer-to-Peer (P2P) trade.
Winner: KuCoin.
KuCoin supports more fiat currencies, though both platforms rely on third-party integrations to onboard fiat users. The fees are zero on both platforms to deposit crypto assets as both are designed for crypto-to-crypto trading.
Available Markets & Supported Currencies
Both KuCoin and Gate.io offer massive crypto selections, with KuCoin offering 700+ cryptocurrencies across thousands of trading pairs, and Gate.io offering over 1,752 crypto assets. Gate.io offers one of (if not THE) largest crypto selections of any centralized exchange.
Both platforms offer access to several different markets, including spot, futures, and margin trading. KuCoin and Gate.io are two of the best crypto margin trading platforms, with hundreds of derivatives markets supported, and multiple ways to use leverage. For Kucoin, the available markets are:
- Spot. Trading with up to 10x leverage on hundreds of trading pairs.
- Futures contracts. Over 100 trading pairs on both standard and perpetual futures contracts with up to 100x leverage available.
- Leveraged tokens. Both LONG and SHORT positions on 100+ tokens with 3x leverage.
Gate.io offers access to spot margin trading and futures contracts as well, and also supports options trading. Here are all of the markets supported by Gate.io:
- Spot. Margin with up to 10x leverage on certain trading pairs.
- Futures contracts. Standard futures contracts with up to 20x leverage, and perpetual futures contracts with up to 100x leverage available. Standard contracts are settled on a weekly or quarterly basis. Over 400 trading pairs are available.
- Options contracts. USDT-settled options contracts are available on an intraday (1 / 4 / 24 hours), weekly, and quarterly basis.
- Leveraged tokens. Both LONG and SHORT positions on hundreds of tokens with up to 5x leverage.
- Inverse contracts. Perpetual and futures contracts using the coin itself as collateral.
Both Gate.io and KuCoin offer some of the best derivatives trading choices in the market, with a huge selection of coins available.
Winner: Gate.io.
While KuCoin offers a ton of choices, Gate.io simply offers more ways to buy altcoins. With 400+ trading pairs available for leveraged trading, access to options contracts and inverse contracts, and margin and leveraged tokens, Gate.io has it all. Both platforms offer up to 100x leverage, but Gate.io offers up to 5x on leveraged tokens (vs. 3x for KuCoin), and more choices for derivatives trading overall.
Trading Volume & Liquidity
Both KuCoin and Gate.io handle a lot of trading volume and offer deep liquidity on popular coins and small-cap altcoins. Both process about $1 billion in daily spot volume. As popular derivatives trading platforms, both KuCoin and Gate.io process billions in volume per day, with KuCoin handling over $3.5 billion in daily volume, and Gate.io processing about $2 billion every day.
At the time of writing, Gate.io offers average liquidity on most large-cap coins, with a liquidity score of 568 (out of 1,000). KuCoin has an average liquidity score of 598, which is slightly better than Gate.io, but not as high as larger exchanges like Coinbase or Binance. The liquidity on large-cap trading pairs is great on both cryptocurrency exchanges (around 700), but with so many altcoins, some trading pairs are much lower in the liquidity ratings. Liquidity ratings help determine whether users can place large orders and avoid excess slippage.
Winner: KuCoin.
While both platforms are almost identical in spot trading volume, KuCoin hosts more derivatives trading and has a better overall liquidity score. The deep liquidity also makes KuCoin the better platform for day trading crypto.
Earning Interest on Crypto
KuCoin and Gate.io both offer multiple ways for users to earn interest on crypto. There are varying risks and returns for each type of interest product, with crypto staking and liquidity mining offering lower rates with lower risk, and crypto lending offering higher rates with higher risk. Here are the interest-earning products for each platform, and how they work:
KuCoin Interest Products
- Crypto lending. Earn interest for lending out crypto on short-term loans (up to 28 days max).
- KCS Bonus. KCS holders share in the trading fees on the platform by earning a KCS bonus.
- Staking. Users can earn stable rewards on both fixed and flexible term crypto staking the most popular staking coins.
- Liquidity pool mining. Join liquidity pools to earn yield by collecting transaction fees from DeFi exchanges.
- KuCoin lottery. KuCoin offers a lottery game called Lucky Raffling that draws winners of a large jackpot.
- Cloud Mining. Cloud mining service that allows users to mine for tokens, paying KuCoin a fee for managing the hardware and utility costs.
Gate.io Interest Products
- Liquidity mining. Deposit funds into liquidity pools to earn yield by collecting transaction fees from DeFi exchanges. Hundreds of crypto pairs to choose from.
- Cloud Mining. Cloud mining service offers the ability to lease hash power and utilities in return for mining crypto. Not too many choices, though, as most mining pools are closed to new users.
- Lending Pools. Lend out crypto to margin borrowers to earn interest. Short-term loans (typically 7 days).
- Slot Auctions. Lock up Polkadot (DOT) or Kusama (KSM) and earn new tokens in an auction. User funds are returned no rewards are won.
Winner: KuCoin.
While Gate.io offers several ways to earn interest and access to hundreds of crypto pairs for liquidity mining, KuCoin simply offers more choices across its suite of earn products.
Buying & Selling NFTs
While both KuCoin and Gate.io offer a basic NFT marketplace, the KuCoin offering is lacking. KuCoin has an NFT launchpad that allows users to buy, invest in, and manage in-game NFTs, but there is no marketplace to sell or mint NFTs. In contrast, Gate.io offers a fully-functioning NFT marketplace with a decent selection, allowing users to buy, sell, and minting NFTs from multiple blockchains.
Winner: Gate.io.
Gate.io is one of the better NFT marketplaces offered by a crypto exchange, though there are certainly better places to trade NFTs. KuCoin doesn’t offer much, and sends users to a third-party site for the ability to sell and mint NFTs.
KuCoin vs. Gate.io: Ease of Use
KuCoin and Gate.io both cater to experienced traders, with advanced spot and derivatives trading platforms. Both have well-designed layouts to view charts, order books, and detailed order forms on one screen.
Gate.io doesn’t have an “easy mode” for beginners and is designed for advanced traders that understand the complexities of crypto trading and different order form selections. Both the mobile app and web app show detailed charting for a similar trading experience online and through a mobile device. Gate.io offers a custom charting feature to view up to 4 charts side-by-side, allowing for more advanced pwallanning and trade setups. Users can quickly navigate between spot, derivatives, options and grid bots built into the order form that automates trading strategies. There is even a social trading and copy-trading platform to trade with the best investors.
KuCoin is also aimed at experienced traders but includes a “Buy Crypto” option for beginners to simply make a purchase. The advanced trading platform offers TradingView charting, quick access to margin, and well-designed derivatives trading. Both leveraged tokens and trading bots are quickly accessible, with bots being built directly into the order forms. The mobile app is highly rated and offers most every feature of the web platform, allowing advanced trading and more on the go.
Winner: KuCoin.
Gate.io is great for advanced traders, but beginners may quickly feel overwhelmed and get lost. KuCoin offers most of the same advanced trading features, but with a quick “Buy Now” option for beginners and a more user-friendly mobile app. KuCoin's social trading platform is also more user-friendly on its mobile app.
KuCoin vs. Gate.io: Trading Experience
Both KuCoin and Gate.io offer a comprehensive trading experience, designed for advanced traders. KuCoin offers a modern design with TradingView charts on its platform, giving users access to hundreds of indicators and drawing tools, and the ability to save layouts. When trading, users can access live order books, depth charting, isolated and cross margin selections, and direct access to the KuCoin futures markets. Users can also save crypto to a list for fast access to their favorite trading pairs.
KuCoin also allows users to set up a grid trading bot directly within the order form. The derivatives platform offers similar charting and access to standard and perpetual futures trading with up to 100x leverage.
Gate.io offers a comprehensive platform with both a Simple and Professional charting view, as well as the ability to side-by-side 4 charts at once. Gate.io also features live order books and trade history, depth charting, and full-featured order forms with market, limit, stop-loss, and conditional order types, as well as a favorites menu to quickly access saved cryptocurrencies.
Gate.io also offers multiple crypto trading bots, both simple grid bots and advanced trading bots, that users can customize to automate their trading. And Gate.io offers Copy Trading, meaning users can subscribe to a popular trader and automatically copy each of their trades. For derivatives, Gate.io offers standard and perpetual futures with detailed charting and intuitive order forms, as well as options trading with an options simulator to learn and practice.
Winner: Draw.
Both platforms are very well designed, including access to advanced crypto charting and features, as well as comprehensive derivatives trading choices. Both trading platforms are ideal for advanced and professional-level traders.
KuCoin vs. Gate.io: Trading Fees
KuCoin also offers very low trading fees with the most popular coins starting at 0.1% per trade, and small caps coins trading at 0.3% per trade. Discounts are available for high-volume traders, and KuCoin offers rebates for the highest level traders and those that hold a significant amount of the native KuCoin token (KCS). Gate.io also offers very low fees for traders, starting at 0.2% per trade, with discounts available to high-volume traders and users that hold a large amount of Gate.io tokens (GT). Fees go as low as 0.00% for the high-volume traders, and there are rebates available for market makers with the highest trading volume.
| KuCoin Fees | Gate.io Fees | |
|---|---|---|
| Spot (fiat-to-crypto) | Large caps: From 0.1% (maker) / 0.1% (taker), Small caps: From 0.3% (maker) / 0.3% (taker) | From 0.2% (maker) / 0.2% (taker) |
| Derivatives trading | From 0.02% (maker) / 0.06% (taker) | From 0.015% (maker) / 0.05% (taker) |
For derivatives trading, KuCoin and Gate.io offer some of the lowest fees around, with Gate.io offering slightly lower fees. Kucoin does offer rebates for the highest volume derivative traders, as well as KCS holders.
Winner: Draw.
Both platforms offer competitive fee schedules, with KuCoin offering low spot trading fees for large-cap coins, and Gate.io offers lower derivatives trading fees. Both offer rebates to top traders and market makers as well.
KuCoin vs. Gate.io: Mobile App
The KuCoin mobile app is available on Android and iOS devices, offering a ton of features in a well-designed layout. The Android app has been downloaded over 5 million times and has a 4.4/5.0 score based on over 100,000 reviews. Based on our reviews, the KuCoin is intuitive and responsive, with access to almost everything the web platform offers.
The Gate.io app is available on Android and iOS mobile devices and offers an advanced trading experience and access to dozens of features. Some of the features listed in the app do not work and say “coming soon”, such as liquidity mining. The Android app has been downloaded by over 1 million users and has a 3.6/5.0 based on over 25,000 reviews. Based on our reviews, the Gate.io app offers a lot of features but isn’t very responsive, and some features simply don’t work.
Winner: KuCoin.
The KuCoin app offers a ton of features and is very well designed. In fact, it is one of our top 10 crypto apps that we have reviewed. Everything in the app is quick and intuitive, and though the number of features available might feel overwhelming, everything is designed for ease of use. Gate.io has functional issues and poor reviews that should be addressed.
KuCoin vs. Gate.io: Security
Both KuCoin and Gate.io offer great security for both data and digital asset protection with their crypto wallet, although both cryptocurrency exchanges have been hacked in the past. While Gate.io requires KYC to withdraw assets from the platform, KuCoin allows users to trade without KYC (though at a very limited daily volume). Both platforms also offer Two-Factor Authentication (2FA), the ability to whitelist withdrawal addresses, and cold storage for digital assets.
KuCoin was hacked in 2020 and lost over $275 million, and Gate.io was hacked in 2019 and only lost about $200,000 in assets. KuCoin recovered most of the funds and replenished users in full, and Gate.io recovered some of the lost user funds. Hacks are unnerving, but both exchanges have since beefed up security. For a full list of hacked crypto exchanges, read this article.
Winner: Draw.
Both exchanges have been hacked in the past, but now employ very strong security measures, keeping most assets in offline cold storage, and allowing users to whitelist withdrawal addresses.
KuCoin vs. Gate.io: Customer Support
Both KuCoin and Gate.io have comprehensive help centers with FAQs and tutorials on how to use the platform. KuCoin has an automated chatbot to answer common questions but does not offer live human support. KuCoin does have a web ticketing system, but email responses may take a while.
Gate.io offers 24/7 live chat support, which was very responsive when we tested it out. There is also a web ticketing system for more formal issues, with the ability to track issues and correspond over email.
Winner: Gate.io.
KuCoin only offers basic support which is very inconvenient for users, while Gate.io has a responsive chat support team available 24/7 making it the better exchange for customer service.
Final Comparison Scores
To conclude this comparison of which exchange is better between KuCoin and Gate.io, each crypto exchange has been scored using simple evaluation criteria as shown below.
| Comparison Criteria | Winner |
|---|---|
| Supported Countries | KuCoin |
| Supported Fiat & Deposit Methods | KuCoin |
| Available Markets & Supported Currencies | Gate.io |
| Trading Volume & Liquidity | KuCoin |
| Earning Interest on Crypto | KuCoin |
| Buying & Selling NFTs | Gate.io |
| Ease of Use | KuCoin |
| Trading Experience | Draw |
| Trading Fees | Draw |
| Mobile App | KuCoin |
| Security | Draw |
| Customer Support | Gate.io |
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Jacob Wade
Jacob Wade has been a nationally-recognized personal finance expert for the past decade. As a cryptocurrency enthusiast and investor since 2020, Jacob enjoys researching and writing about the latest in crypto and blockchain technology. Jacob's work has been featured in several publications like CBS News, MSN Money, Forbes, NASDAQ, Yahoo! Finance, Go Banking Rates, The Balance, Investopedia, New York Times and AOL Finance.
