Crypto exchange affiliate programs compared (2026): rates, cookies, payouts

Coinbase pays affiliates 50% of a referred customer’s trading fees for the first three months, then nothing. Bybit advertises lifetime commissions, and its FAQ lets it end the relationship after 180 days without a trade. Both statements sit on the programs’ own pages, which we read on 23 September 2026: Coinbase’s affiliate page and Bybit’s affiliate FAQ. They are different revenue propositions before the percentage is even discussed, and the percentage is what every landing page leads with.

We compared ten exchange affiliate programs on what an affiliate can actually price: the rate you start on rather than the ceiling, what that rate is applied to, how long the attribution survives, and when the money becomes money. A headline “up to” figure is useful in a negotiation. It is a poor campaign budget.

How we compared

Everything below comes from each program’s own landing page, help centre and affiliate agreement, read on 23 September 2026. We did not open accounts, so this is a comparison of published offers, not a test of approval or of payment in practice. Where a program runs two schemes, we mean the professional affiliate program, not the customer referral promotion; the difference matters most at Crypto.com and Binance. “Not stated” means the public documents do not say; it does not mean the benefit does not exist, only that you will need it in writing. Every rate is a share of eligible trading fees or revenue, never a share of deposits or turnover.

Rates, attribution and payouts compared

The duration column is about how long a referred account keeps paying you, not about a browser cookie. None of the ten programs publishes a numerical click-to-registration window or a first-click versus last-click rule on the pages we read; ask for both before you put a value on unconverted clicks. The same gap exists outside exchanges: KAST publishes a spend commission to the basis point and no attribution rule at all, per our KAST affiliate program review.

Program (primary source)	Published rate and starting position	Commission duration and attribution	Crediting or payment schedule	Currency and destination
Binance	Up to 50%; starts at 20% spot and 10% futures, affiliate status from the 30% tier	Futures capped at one year below the 30% tier, uncapped above it, subject to re-evaluation every three months	Calculated hourly, credited within six hours	USDC to the spot account
Bybit	Up to 50%; starting rate not stated	“Lifetime”, but the FAQ allows termination after 180 days without a trade	Daily by 04:00 UTC	Affiliate balance, moved to the trading account before any external withdrawal
OKX	30% default; adjusted on performance	Ongoing; users inactive for 180 days can be re-attributed to another channel	EEA page says hourly; global cadence not stated	USDC (EEA page)
Bitget	0% until activation; then 40%, 45%, 50% by monthly tier	Ongoing under platform policy	Daily, credited T+1 from 15:30 UTC+8	Spot account; BTC, ETH, USDT, USDC paid in kind, everything else converted to USDT
KuCoin	40% on entry; 50% and 60% tiers; 15% after two failed quarters	Landing page says permanent; the rate itself is reassessed quarterly	T+1	KuCoin master account; payout asset not stated
MEXC	Up to 70%; starting rate not stated	Lifetime for active referrals, per the landing page	Agreement, clause 5.6: credited after each trade; landing page talks about monthly earnings	Cryptocurrency to the affiliate account
Gate	No number on the page	“Permanent commission rebates”	Not stated	Not stated
Kraken	Up to 50% for top creators on the in-house track; rates negotiated per partner; Impact rate not stated	Not stated; depends on the track and the signed agreement	In-house: monthly by default or on demand at a threshold; Impact: the 29th of the following month; general agreement says weekly	In-house: USDC to a Kraken account; Impact: bank transfer in the account’s currency
Coinbase	50%; EU/EEA MiFID activity may differ	First three months of the referred customer’s trading fees	Not stated on the public page	Local currency by PayPal or bank
Crypto.com Exchange	Up to 50%; commission package chosen at onboarding	Perpetual, per the FAQ	Daily: tally at 03:00 UTC, payout at 06:00 UTC	USDC to the Exchange account

Nobody in this table publishes a cash-out minimum for affiliates. Kraken’s in-house page mentions a threshold without an amount, and Bitget’s FAQ says plainly that external withdrawals are subject to minimum limits and identity verification. We would not read either silence as “no minimum”. Kraken in-house page; Bitget withdrawal FAQ.

The starting rate matters more than the ceiling

Binance runs its commission-based Referral Pro mode as a rolling three-month evaluation, spot and futures scored separately. New referrers start at 20% on spot and 10% on futures; the 30% tier, which needs 200,000 USD of referred spot volume and three referred traders in the window, is what upgrades a user to affiliate status; the top tier pays 50%. Futures commission is limited to one year per referred user until the affiliate reaches 30%, and every tier is kept only “as long as the user continues to meet the criteria in subsequent evaluations”. Neither the maximum rate nor the uncapped futures duration is something to assume at signup. Binance Referral Pro FAQ, updated 5 August 2026.

Bitget is blunter. An approved affiliate’s default rebate is 0%. To reach 40% the affiliate must complete identity verification, invite new users and bring 10,000 USDT of their combined trading volume within any 30-day window; that 40% is then kept for as long as the verification stands. The 45% tier needs at least 50 trading users and 30 million USDT of monthly volume; 50% needs 100 users and 150 million USDT, and the rate is re-evaluated every month. Affiliates who came in through a business contact keep whatever that contact agreed. Approval and activation are two different events, and only the second one pays. Bitget rules, August 2026.

KuCoin’s September 2025 guide, still the page its landing page links to, gives new affiliates the 40% tier and then assesses them. The quarterly top tier needs both 100 new invited users and 20 million USDT of trading in the quarter; missing the entry target for two quarters running drops the rate to 15%. The guide’s own headline promises “over 60%” while its tier table stops at 60%; the landing page says “up to 60%”. We plan on the published table, not the headline.

Gate publishes the least. Its page lists spot, futures, Alpha, Web3, CFD and options as commission sources and promises “permanent commission rebates”, but gives no percentage anywhere. Permanence is not a price, and we would want a written offer before comparing Gate’s economics with anyone else’s. Gate affiliate page.

What the percentage is applied to

Bybit’s FAQ, updated 19 September 2026, defines the base as trading fees minus market-maker rebates minus bonuses and coupons, and says both maker and taker volume may count. Its affiliate landing page still describes a share of “taker volume” fees. Those are two different bases from the same company; we go with the newer, dated FAQ and would have an account manager confirm which products are eligible. Bybit FAQ; landing page.

Bitget calculates on net fees when the counterparty is on a negative fee rate, pays nothing on zero-fee pairs, and, if the referred user paid with a fee voucher, pays the rebate in voucher form. Crypto.com subtracts the referee’s own fee rebate before applying the affiliate rate, and folds CRO lockups and volume discounts into the calculation. Bitget fee FAQ; Crypto.com settlement definition.

The arithmetic is simple and unkind. Fifty percent of 100 USDT in eligible fees is 50 USDT; if deductions cut the eligible base to 60 USDT, the same 50% pays 30. Budget per acquired trader on fees after deductions, not on turnover, and not on the rate. The rate can mislead in the other direction too: KCEX pays 100% of a 0.01% taker fee and nothing on its zero-fee spot and meme-futures pairs; see our KCEX affiliate program review. Ourbit advertises 50% with the same hole, since its spot fee is 0% and only its 0.04% futures taker fee pays; see our Ourbit affiliate program review.

Sub-affiliate percentages need the same care. MEXC’s explainer illustrates a 10% sub-affiliate commission as 10% of the downstream user’s trading fees; clause 5.5 of its agreement grants 10% of the sub-affiliate’s commissions, a much smaller number. Get the applicable one in writing. MEXC explainer; affiliate agreement, effective 10 January 2022. Bybit’s master-affiliate override is 10% of the sub-affiliate’s rebate, and the two together are capped at 50% on VIP clients; a sub-affiliate already on 50% leaves nothing for the master on that client. Bybit override FAQ.

Cookies and the limits of “lifetime” attribution

Three different questions hide behind the word “lifetime”: how long after a click a registration is still yours, who wins when two referrers claim the same user, and how long a registered account keeps generating commission. A promise about the third says nothing about the first two. Some programs sidestep all three: Myriad, a prediction market, credits builders per purchase on-chain and promises nothing beyond it; see our Myriad affiliate program review. PRED, a sports prediction exchange, publishes a plain publisher schedule (60% of trading fees for six months, then 20% to month 24) but no legal entity; see our PRED affiliate program review. Limitless, a prediction market on Base, publishes both a 10–40% ladder and a named Panamanian operator, and pays daily from $1 once the market resolves; see our Limitless affiliate program review.

OKX lets affiliates reactivate any user with no deposit, trade or withdrawal in the previous 180 days. A qualifying login through another referral channel creates a new relationship and ends the old one, and the rules warn existing affiliates that their own dormant users can be picked up the same way. OKX rules, updated 7 September 2026.

Bybit’s terms, effective 20 February 2026, are more precise than its FAQ: clause 7.7 declares any account registered on or after 1 September 2025 “inactive” once it fails to generate one US dollar of trading volume in any 180 consecutive days, and hands all future commission on that user to whichever channel reactivates it. There is a reclaim window of 180 days if Bybit’s own channels did the reactivating, none if another affiliate did. The FAQ’s simpler “no trades for 180 days” is the same clause with the numbers removed. Neither version is unconditional lifetime ownership. Bybit affiliate terms, clause 7.7.

Kraken’s Impact track adds a practical constraint: the referred user must click and sign up on the same device and browser, and Kraken says it will not manually attribute users whose browser or extensions block Google Analytics or cookies, naming Brave and Ad Block Plus. A reader who finds you on a desktop and signs up on a phone is, by that rule, not yours. Kraken Impact attribution FAQ.

Account credit is not cash in your wallet

Crypto.com’s daily USDC settlement lands in the Exchange account. Bitget’s T+1 settlement lands in the spot account, and an external withdrawal from there is subject to the ordinary minimums and verification. Bybit’s affiliate balance has to be moved to the trading account before it can leave. All of these schedules tell you when a balance appears; none tells you the network fee, the chains supported, or when the money reaches a wallet you control. Crypto.com FAQ; Bitget payout FAQ; Bybit withdrawal FAQ.

Kraken needs clarifying in writing. The in-house creator page says USDC “monthly by default, or on-demand at threshold”. The Impact guide, updated 16 June 2026, says revenue appears in the Impact account by the 15th of the following month and is paid 14 days later, on the 29th, to a bank account. The general affiliate agreement, which carries no revision date, defines a “Weekly Fee” paid “on a weekly basis”. Three documents, three cadences; the one in your signed offer is the one that counts.

MEXC’s agreement, clause 5.6, credits commission “after each trade”, while its landing page talks about monthly commissions. Monthly may describe the reporting period rather than the payment; either way, no public MEXC page gives a withdrawal timeline. For contrast, Lighter, a perp DEX, publishes a weekly Monday payout calendar and a $1 minimum; see our Lighter affiliate program review.

The contract can shorten the revenue stream

Binance’s affiliate terms, version 2, effective 1 July 2026, let Binance terminate “effective immediately, without cause” (clause 11.1). Clause 11.3 keeps outstanding payment obligations alive after termination, and clause 4.4 separately lets Binance withhold and recover commission on a breach. Accrued commission and future commission are therefore two different assets, and only the first survives a termination. Casino contracts are blunter still: Thrill ends commission on every referred player the day a 30-day notice runs out, from either side; see our Thrill affiliate program review. BlockBet goes a step further: the player terms that govern its referral money require that the account holder is not an affiliate at all; see our BlockBet affiliate program review. Binance affiliate terms.

Kraken’s affiliate contracts with Payward, Inc., a Delaware corporation. The agreement allows termination for convenience on written notice, stops fees accruing from that date, pays fees “properly earned and unpaid” subject to adjustments, and lets Kraken reverse any fee it decides was based on an invalid referral, bad data, fraud or error. Kraken affiliate agreement.

MEXC gives one narrower assurance: clauses 5.2 and 10.2 say a change to the commission ratio does not retroactively affect commission already earned or pending. The same document, at clause 11.4, keeps the right to withhold, recalculate or recover commission on suspected fraud or breach. Protection from rate changes is not protection from clawback. MEXC agreement.

Paid search is where affiliates get terminated. Bitget forbids buying its brand keywords (“Bitget”, “Bitget login”, “Bitget official”) and says violators forfeit their rewards. OKX’s EEA rules forbid brand-keyword advertising on Google, Bing, Yandex, Yahoo and Naver, and self-inviting through multiple accounts. Approval as an affiliate is not permission to bid. Bitget promotion rules; OKX EEA rules.

Geography and program identity come before traffic

The brand name does not tell you who you are contracting with. Binance’s July 2026 agreement names three Abu Dhabi entities, Nest Exchange Limited, Nest Clearing and Custody Limited and Nest Trading Limited, all regulated in the Abu Dhabi Global Market. OKX’s agreement says the counterparty is whichever OKX entity onboarded you as a customer. A licence the brand holds somewhere is not a licence for your campaign anywhere. Binance terms; OKX agreement, updated 23 August 2026.

Region can change the commission model itself. OKX’s clause 5.2 says Spanish affiliates “may only be paid on a fixed fee model”. MEXC’s explainer lists the United States and Canada among the places it accepts neither traders nor applications from, alongside mainland China, Singapore, Indonesia and others. These are the restrictions the pages volunteer, not a complete country matrix. OKX agreement; MEXC eligibility note.

Product labels matter too. Crypto.com’s ordinary Exchange referral scheme pays trading commission for 12 months, in CRO, and its App and Exchange referral links are not interchangeable; the affiliate program pays perpetually, in USDC. Coinbase’s invitation-only Pro Affiliate program negotiates its terms off-platform, separately from the 50%-for-three-months public offer. Crypto.com referral rules; affiliate FAQ; Coinbase Pro application guide. Off the exchanges the label problem is sharper still: GMGN’s memecoin terminal markets a 10% to 30% “KOL” rebate while its terms restrict referral links to people you personally know; see our GMGN affiliate program review.

What affiliates report

The one affiliate-specific public complaint we found worth citing is a thread on r/MEXC_official, read on 23 September 2026, in which a user reports earning less after moving from the ordinary referral scheme to the affiliate portal despite a higher advertised percentage, with other commenters saying the same. These are unverified accounts. Nobody in the thread reconciles a trade, its actual fee, the deductions, the applicable rate and the amount credited, and without that a lower balance cannot be told apart from lower trading, a different fee base, or an error.

We treat it as a question to put to MEXC, not a finding against it, and we draw no conclusion about payment reliability across the other nine programs from testimonials. Reddit, Bitcointalk and the affiliate forums carry plenty of exchange complaints; almost all of them are about trading accounts, not affiliate accounts.

Who these programs suit

Publishers who need bank settlement have two published routes in this set: Kraken’s Impact track, paid in the bank account’s currency on the 29th, and Coinbase’s public offer, paid by PayPal or bank. Both are short on stated duration, Coinbase by design at three months and Kraken by omission, so the signed term is the number to model. Kraken Impact; Coinbase.

Trading communities can build a provisional model on Bitget and KuCoin, because both publish the user and volume thresholds behind every tier, and on OKX, because it publishes a starting rate. What none of them publishes is whether your audience will trade enough to hold the tier, or stay attributed to you if it goes quiet for 180 days. Bitget schedule; KuCoin schedule; OKX default. For a decentralised perpetuals venue that publishes the same kind of tier schedule and far fewer payment terms, see our GRVT affiliate program review; for one that pays 10% by default and asks for $100 million of referred volume before it pays 20%, see our Aster affiliate program review.

Media buyers should treat the approved commercial offer as the only document that exists: permitted countries and channels, the net commission base, the attribution rule, the withdrawal conditions and what happens to accrued earnings on termination. Until those fields are filled in, the maximum percentage is a sales figure; our GRVT affiliate program review shows how many of those fields a young perpetuals exchange leaves blank. Where the traffic comes from is a separate decision; our ranking of crypto ad networks covers the buying side.

FAQ

Which crypto exchange pays the highest affiliate commission?

Of the ten programs, MEXC advertises the highest ceiling at up to 70%, followed by KuCoin at up to 60%. Both are ceilings, not starting rates; KuCoin’s published entry tier is 40%, and MEXC does not publish a starting rate at all. Flipster, a smaller perpetuals exchange, publishes only an up-to-60% ceiling and no tiers at all; see our Flipster affiliate program review. LeveX, another small perpetuals exchange, prints up to 70% on its landing page while its own FAQ and KOL guide say 30%; see our LeveX affiliate program review. MEXC explainer; KuCoin guide.

Does “lifetime commission” mean a lifetime cookie?

No. Lifetime commission describes how long a registered account keeps paying you. A cookie window describes how long after a click a registration is still credited to you. None of the ten pages we read gives a numerical cookie window, and two of the “lifetime” programs, Bybit and OKX, re-attribute users who go 180 days without activity.

Is Coinbase’s 50% affiliate commission permanent?

No. The public affiliate page limits it to the referred customer’s first three months of trading fees, and notes that EU/EEA activity under MiFID may run on different terms. Anything longer is a negotiated arrangement under its own agreement. Coinbase affiliate page.

Which exchange affiliate programs pay daily?

Bybit (by 04:00 UTC), Crypto.com Exchange (tally 03:00 UTC, payout 06:00 UTC), Bitget (T+1 from 15:30 UTC+8) and KuCoin (T+1) credit daily; Binance credits within six hours of the hourly calculation. All of these credit an exchange account, not an external wallet, and Bitget’s FAQ makes clear that withdrawing from there is subject to the platform’s minimums and verification. BloFin goes further than any of them on paper, settling hourly into the Funding account, though its own pages also say daily and six-hourly; see our BloFin affiliate program review.

If no payout minimum is published, is there none?

Do not assume so. A commission balance, permission to withdraw it, and the minimum for the asset you withdraw are three separate things, and Bitget’s FAQ says external withdrawals carry minimum limits and identity requirements. Ask for the figure before you plan on small monthly withdrawals. Bitget withdrawal FAQ. Outside the exchanges the gap can be total: Yeet, a crypto casino, publishes its rates and its formula and no payout minimum, schedule or date at all; see our Yeet affiliate program review.

Can an affiliate lose future revenue without doing anything wrong?

Yes. Binance’s terms allow termination “effective immediately, without cause”, and Kraken’s allow termination for convenience. In both, commission already earned is paid, subject to adjustments, and nothing accrues after the termination date. Binance terms, clause 11; Kraken agreement.

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