dYdX Alternative With Lower Fees: 6 Venues Cost-Tested
Last Updated: September 15, 2026
A dYdX alternative with lower fees cuts the cost of a $10,000 BTC round trip from $10.00 at dYdX's base tier to $9.00 on Hyperliquid or EVEDEX, $8.00 on Aster and $0 on a Lighter standard account, as of September 15, 2026. Liquidity differs even more: Hyperliquid carries $14.18 billion in open interest, dYdX Chain $44.2 million.
Fee pages rarely answer the question traders actually ask: what will this trade cost me, and will the book absorb it? A cheaper headline rate can hide slower execution, borrow fees or thin order books that add more slippage than the fee saves, which is why crypto order types such as limit and post-only orders matter. This page works through the numbers. It compares base-tier fees, the dollar cost of the same trade on six venues, open interest and 24-hour volume, then runs three trader scenarios with calculations, including a week-long hold where funding decides the cost; our guide to perpetual futures vs spot explains when spot is cheaper to hold. For how each exchange is built, including custody and settlement design, see the architecture comparison of dYdX alternatives on this blog.
dYdX Alternative With Lower Fees: Cost and Liquidity Table
The table covers six venues; for a wider view beyond dYdX and its closest rivals, compare the best crypto futures exchange options.
| Venue | Base maker / taker fee | $10,000 BTC round trip, market orders | Open interest and 24-hour volume | Drawbacks |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EVEDEX | 0.015% maker and 0.045% taker; up to 35% cashback cuts them to 0.00975% and 0.02925% | $9.00 in taker fees, or $5.85 at the maximum cashback level; $3.00 with limit orders both ways | $678.6M open interest and $647.6M 24-hour volume across 52 perpetual pairs | Only 52 pairs and no spot or options |
| dYdX (baseline) | 1.0 bps maker and 5.0 bps taker below $1M monthly volume; maker rebates start at $100M | $10.00 in taker fees; $2.00 with limit orders on both sides | $44.2M open interest and $34.2M 24-hour volume across 119 perpetual pairs | Highest base taker fee in this table, and about 0.3% of Hyperliquid's open interest |
| Hyperliquid | 0.015% maker and 0.045% taker at tier 0; discounts need over $5M in 14-day volume or HYPE staking | $9.00 in taker fees; $3.00 with limit orders on both sides | $14.18B open interest and $9.54B 24-hour volume across 404 perpetual pairs | Volume tiers are out of reach for most retail traders |
| Lighter | 0% maker and 0% taker on standard accounts; premium accounts pay 0.004% and 0.028% | $0 on a standard account; $5.60 in taker fees on a premium account | $1.06B open interest and $1.97B 24-hour volume across 209 perpetual pairs | Standard accounts add 300 ms to taker orders |
| Aster | 0% maker and 0.04% taker on USDT perpetuals; paying fees in ASTER saves 5% | $8.00 in taker fees; $0 with limit orders on both sides | $2.42B open interest and $2.78B 24-hour volume across 570 perpetual pairs | DefiLlama removed its perp volume data in October 2025 over wash-trading concerns, and matching runs off-chain |
| GMX | 0.04% or 0.06% position fee to open and close, depending on long-short balance, plus network fees | $8.00 to $12.00 in position fees, before borrow fees, funding and closing price impact | GMX V2 on Arbitrum: $31.8M open interest and $21.9M 24-hour volume across 15 markets | Borrow fees run about 45–55% a year at optimal pool use, and closing price impact can reach 1,000 bps |
Data as of September 15, 2026. Round-trip cost = position size × fee rate × 2, before funding and slippage. Open interest, volume and pair counts: CoinGecko derivatives. Fees: EVEDEX, dYdX, Hyperliquid, Lighter, Aster and GMX documentation. Aster data caveat: The Block.
Three Trader Scenarios With Calculations
The same fee schedule produces very different bills depending on how you trade. The three profiles below use base-tier rates and a BTC price of $76,888 on September 15, 2026.
Scenario 1: the scalper. Twenty $10,000 round trips a day with market orders is $400,000 of daily volume, or roughly $12 million a month. At that size dYdX moves to tier 3, with a 4.0 bps taker fee: 40 fills × $4.00 = $160 a day. Hyperliquid stays at tier 0 until 14-day volume passes $5 million, which this trader reaches after about two weeks; before that the cost is 40 × $4.50 = $180 a day. EVEDEX costs the same $180 before cashback, or $117 at the maximum 35% level. Aster costs $160. A Lighter standard account costs nothing, but each taker order waits an extra 300 milliseconds, which matters most to exactly this kind of trader.
Scenario 2: the patient maker. A trader who enters and exits with limit orders, $100,000 of volume a month, pays $10 on dYdX at 1.0 bps, $15 on Hyperliquid or EVEDEX at 0.015%, $9.75 on EVEDEX at maximum cashback, and $0 on Aster or Lighter. At this size, fees are small next to spreads, so order book depth decides execution quality.
Scenario 3: the swing trader. A $10,000 long held for seven days pays opening and closing fees once, so holding costs dominate. On GMX, a borrow rate of 50% a year on the larger side of the pool adds about $13.70 a day, or roughly $96 for the week, on top of $8 to $12 in position fees. On order book venues, the holding cost is funding, which changes every period. As an illustration only, a rate of 0.01% per eight hours would cost $3 a day, or $21 for the week; in a crowded long market it can be several times higher, and in a short-heavy market longs receive it. Before holding for days, check the venue's funding history for your pair. Our guide to perpetual futures vs spot explains when funding makes spot cheaper to hold.
Why Liquidity Can Outweigh a Lower Fee
A 1 bps fee difference on a $10,000 order is $1. A book that moves 5 bps against you on the same order costs $5. That is why open interest and volume belong next to fees. Open interest shows how much capital sits in positions, and 24-hour volume shows how actively the market trades; together they indicate whether a large order will find counterparties near the current price. On September 15, 2026, Hyperliquid's open interest was about 320 times that of dYdX Chain, Aster's about 55 times and EVEDEX's about 15 times.
These figures cover all pairs, so check the market you trade. Depth on BTC and ETH is usually many times deeper than on smaller altcoins, and a venue with strong total open interest can still show thin books on a new listing. Two practical tests help: place a small market order and compare the fill with the mid price, and look at the visible depth within 0.1% of the mid before sending a larger order. Use crypto order types such as limit and post-only orders to control slippage when the book is thin.
How to Choose a Cheaper dYdX Replacement
- Price your real pattern Multiply your monthly volume by the maker and taker share you actually use, not the best-case rate.
- Check tier thresholds dYdX tiers use 30-day volume, Hyperliquid uses 14-day weighted volume, and cashback on EVEDEX depends on your level and Prime subscription.
- Add holding costs Funding on order books and borrow fees on oracle pools can exceed trading fees for positions held longer than a day.
- Test execution speed Zero-fee accounts with added latency suit patient traders, not scalpers.
- Confirm access Every venue in this table restricts some countries in its terms.
Cutting Trading Costs on EVEDEX
EVEDEX is a hybrid exchange for perpetual futures, with order matching off-chain and settlement on-chain on Arbitrum L2. Its fees are 0.015% maker and 0.045% taker before cashback. Cashback of up to 35% on your own trades combines a base rate from the gamification level, a fixed boost for Prime subscribers and a Trader Skills bonus, which brings effective fees to 0.00975% maker and 0.02925% taker at the maximum. The 52 perpetual pairs include BTC, ETH, SOL, gold, silver, WTI oil, FX and US stocks, all tradable 24/7, with a minimum order of 5 USDT. Leverage reaches 200x only on BTC-USD, ETH-USD and SOL-USD for positions up to $50,000 notional. Funding is calculated every eight hours and charged hourly, and all positions use cross margin. For a wider view of venues, compare the best crypto futures exchange options. Perpetual futures carry a high risk of loss.
