The spread is a toll on every trip
Wide spreads quietly tax entries and exits, especially on small-cap coins. Post limit orders on the passive side to avoid paying it. See the full cost stack on the slippage calculator.
The fee nobody itemizes
The spread — the gap between best bid and best ask — is a cost you pay on every market order, and it appears on no fee statement. Cross a 0.05% spread with a $10,000 market buy and you paid $5 before exchange fees. Do that twice a day and spread costs out-earn your fee bill.
Spread scales with illiquidity and chaos. BTC/USDT on a major exchange runs 0.01% or tighter; a small-cap alt can sit at 0.3–1%. During news candles, spreads widen exactly when you're most tempted to market-order in. That panic entry on a 0.8% spread costs 0.8% instantly — often more than the move you were chasing.
Limit orders sidestep spread entirely (you earn it instead of paying it), at the cost of possibly not filling. For anything outside the top-20 coins, that trade-off usually favors the limit order.