⛽ Ethereum & Layer-2 gas
₿ Bitcoin transaction fee
💵 Cheapest network for USDT
Ł Litecoin transaction fee
How fees work, in one line
Most chains charge by the size and complexity of the transaction, not the amount you send — moving $10 or $10,000 costs the same. The price per unit (gwei on EVM chains, sat/vByte on Bitcoin) is set by demand for limited block space, so it swings with network activity. Layer-2s settle to Ethereum for a fraction of the cost; Bitcoin is cheap when quiet and brutal when busy. More networks coming — Litecoin, Tron and Dogecoin next.
On EVM chains the fee you pay has two parts: a base fee that the protocol burns and auto-adjusts every block, plus an optional priority fee (tip) you add to jump the queue when the mempool — the waiting room of unconfirmed transactions — is backed up. On Bitcoin there's no tip mechanism, just one sat/vByte rate; miners simply pick the highest-paying transactions first, so a low fee can sit unconfirmed for hours during a busy stretch.
Trading leverage rather than moving coins? Your real risk is liquidation. Check it with the liquidation calculator and size from risk with the position size calculator.
Typical cost, so you know what's normal
Live numbers are in the cards above — this is the order of magnitude to expect on a quiet vs. a congested network, so a quote doesn't catch you off guard.
| Network | Simple transfer | Swap / contract call |
|---|---|---|
| Ethereum mainnet | $1 – $15 (spikes $30+) | $5 – $40+ |
| Arbitrum / Optimism / Base | <$0.01 – $0.20 | $0.05 – $0.50 |
| Polygon | <$0.01 – $0.05 | <$0.01 – $0.10 |
| Bitcoin | $0.50 – $3 (busy $10 – $30+) | — |
| USDT on Tron | ~$1 – $2 flat | — |
| Litecoin | <$0.01 – $0.05 | — |
Ranges, not quotes — use the live cards above for what a transaction costs right now.
How to cut your fees
- Time it. Ethereum mainnet is usually calmer late at night (US time) and on weekends — the same transfer can cost 3-5x less than during a weekday NFT mint or airdrop rush.
- Use an L2 when the app supports it. Arbitrum, Optimism and Base settle to Ethereum but charge a fraction of mainnet gas for the same action.
- Pick the right USDT network. Check whether the receiving exchange accepts TRC-20 (Tron) before sending ERC-20 — the fee difference is often $1 vs $10+.
- Don't overpay Bitcoin upfront. Use a wallet that supports RBF (replace-by-fee) — start with a moderate sat/vByte and bump it only if the transaction is actually stuck.
- Batch where you can. DEX aggregators and multicall contracts combine several steps (e.g. approve + swap) into one transaction instead of paying the base fee twice.
Frequently asked questions
Why did my Ethereum gas fee suddenly spike?
Ethereum auto-adjusts a base fee every block under EIP-1559: if the previous block was more than half full, the base fee rises for the next one; if it was under half full, it falls. A single popular NFT mint, airdrop claim or memecoin frenzy can fill blocks and push the base fee up within minutes — it comes back down just as fast once demand drops.
What's the difference between gas price and the fee I actually pay?
Total fee = gas used × (base fee + priority fee). A plain ETH transfer always uses 21,000 gas, while a token swap or NFT mint can use 100,000-300,000+ gas depending on the contract — so the same gwei price gives very different dollar costs depending on what you're doing.
Why are Layer-2 fees so much lower than Ethereum mainnet?
Layer-2s like Arbitrum, Optimism and Base execute transactions off the main chain and only post compressed data back to Ethereum. Since the March 2024 Dencun upgrade, that data travels in cheap "blobs" instead of expensive calldata, so L2 fees usually stay a fraction of a cent even when mainnet gas spikes into double-digit gwei.
Is sending USDT on Tron really free?
Not free, but close. Tron uses an energy and bandwidth resource model instead of a per-transaction gwei price. If the sender doesn't have enough staked TRX for energy, the network burns a small amount of TRX to cover it — in practice usually $1-2 flat, versus several dollars or more for the same USDT transfer on Ethereum during normal load.
Do Bitcoin fees really spike when the network is busy?
Yes. Bitcoin blocks have a fixed weight limit and arrive roughly every 10 minutes, so when more transactions compete for that space than fit, users bid up the sat/vByte fee to get included sooner. If a transaction is stuck with too low a fee, most wallets support RBF (replace-by-fee) to bump it without waiting for it to fail.