A 0 fee label answers one question and raises another: if the exchange charges nothing, what does the order actually cost you? The fee is only part of the cost. This guide adds up all four lines on aA 0 fee label answers one question and raises another: if the exchange charges nothing, what does the order actually cost you? The fee is only part of the cost. This guide adds up all four lines on a
Learn/Trading Guide/Futures/Does 0 Fee Mean Free? Trading Fees vs. Slippage and Your Total Trading Cost on Futures
Does 0 Fee Mean Free? Trading Fees vs. Slippage and Your Total Trading Cost on Futures
A 0 fee label answers one question and raises another: if the exchange charges nothing, what does the order actually cost you?
The fee is only part of the cost.
This guide adds up all four lines on a $100,000 futures order, in dollars and as a share of your margin.
Key Takeaways
- Total trading cost on futures adds up four lines: the trading fee, the bid-ask spread, slippage, and any funding paid while the position is open.
- As of November 2026, MEXC lists maker and taker fees from 0.00% on selected stock futures for eligible users; rates vary by region and promotion, and a pair returns to its standard rate when its 0-fee period or quota ends.
- One basis point is $10 on a $100,000 order, so an assumed 0.05% taker fee ($50.00) costs more than the $11.20 median slippage on a $100,000 SPCX sell in TokenInsight's August 2026 report.
- A round trip is two fills, so every one-side slippage figure doubles, and any fee is charged on both legs.
- At 20x leverage, each basis point of slippage difference is 0.4% of margin per round trip, so the same saving matters more as leverage rises.
- Funding is paid or received only when a position is held through a settlement time, and the schedule and rate differ by pair.
What makes up your total trading cost?
Total trading cost on futures adds up four lines: the trading fee charged on order value at the fill, the bid-ask spread you cross to get filled, the slippage between the price you expected and your average fill price, and the funding paid or received while a position stays open through a settlement time.
Two of them appear on your statement; the other two hide inside your fill price.
Start with the bid-ask spread, the gap between the best bid and the best ask.
You pay it the moment a market order crosses the book.
A buy fills from the ask side, not at the mid price.
Slippage shows up when your order is bigger than the size resting at the best price.
Part of it fills at worse levels.
Measured against the mid price, as in MEXC's October 28, 2026 comparison, slippage already includes the spread, so do not count the spread twice.
Funding is a periodic payment between long and short holders, set by the funding rate, that keeps a perpetual near its underlying price.
What are maker and taker fees?
Maker and taker fees are the two trading fee rates an exchange charges depending on what your order did to the order book: a maker order rests on the book and adds liquidity for others to trade against, while a taker order fills against resting orders and removes that liquidity.
A limit order placed away from the current price usually waits on the book, so when another trader fills it, you are the maker.
Order | What it does to the book | Fee side |
Limit order away from the current price | Rests until another order matches it; adds liquidity | Maker |
Market order | Fills at once against resting orders; removes liquidity | Taker |
Limit order priced through the best bid or ask | Fills at once, like a market order | Taker |
Which rate you pay depends on how the order matched, the order type, your fee tier and the rules in force at the time.
What does MEXC charge on futures?
As of November 2026, MEXC lists maker and taker fees from 0.00% on selected stock futures for eligible users; rates vary by region and promotion, and a pair returns to its standard rate when its 0-fee period or quota ends.
The 0-fee terms, as published, set four limits.
- The 0 rate applies to selected pairs across futures, spot and fiat, not to every pair.
- Some pairs carry a validity period, and some carry a maximum eligible trading volume that each fill uses up; once that quota is fully used, trades on the pair revert to the standard fee rate.
- Institutional accounts, market makers, project teams and API users are not eligible.
- Zero fees do not apply to liquidation.
MEXC's fee overview adds that maker and taker rates may vary with platform events or user region.
When MEXC launched stock futures in July 2025, its limited-time "Double 0" promotion offered 0 trading fees and 0 funding rates as a launch offer, not a standing rate.
Funding on MEXC futures is paid or received only by positions held through a settlement time, and the amount is position value × funding rate.
MEXC's guide to how funding is settled on MEXC futures puts the general schedule at every eight hours, at 00:00, 08:00 and 16:00 UTC, and notes that settlement times may vary by pair.
The SK hynix contract SKHYNIXSTOCKUSD1, for example, has settled funding every four hours since September 1, 2026, with the rate capped at plus or minus 3.00% per settlement.
Check the pair's page for its schedule and current rate before you hold a position overnight or over a weekend.
How much is one basis point of fees or slippage worth?
One basis point of fees or slippage is worth your order size divided by 10,000, so 1 bp is $1 on $10,000, $10 on $100,000, $50 on $500,000 and $100 on $1,000,000, and the arithmetic is the same whether the basis point comes from a fee rate or from slippage.
The formula is cost in dollars = order size × basis points ÷ 10,000, and 1 bp equals 0.01%.
Order size | 1 bp as a percentage | 1 bp in dollars (order size × 1 ÷ 10,000) |
$10,000 | 0.01% | $1 |
$100,000 | 0.01% | $10 |
$500,000 | 0.01% | $50 |
$1,000,000 | 0.01% | $100 |
Fee rates are quoted in percent, so convert them first.
A 0.05% fee is 5 bp, or $50.00 on $100,000, against $11.20 of median slippage in the SPCX example below.
Same unit, then compare.
How much does slippage add on a $10K and a $100K order?
Slippage adds very little at $10,000 and more at $100,000: in TokenInsight's August 2026 Equity Perpetuals Market Report, which sampled five centralized exchanges on weekdays from July 29 to August 6, 2026, every venue kept median slippage under 0.02% on simulated $10,000 sells, while MEXC's lowest $100,000 median was 0.0112%, on SPCX.
At $10,000, MEXC had the lowest median in that sample on SK hynix, SOXL and SPCX, between 0.0008% and 0.0024%.
At $100,000, MEXC again had the lowest median on those three in the five-exchange sample, 0.0112% on SPCX, 0.0130% on SOXL and 0.0170% on SK hynix, with P90 readings of 0.0230%, 0.0278% and 0.0241%.
On SNDK and INTC, MEXC did not lead at $100,000 in that sample, placing second and third.
The median is the typical fill; the P90 is the level nine fills in ten stayed under, so budget with it.
MEXC's rank in every 2026 liquidity report, including the measures where it placed second or third, is tracked in the liquidity hub.
In MEXC's own comparison of order-book snapshots against four other major centralized exchanges, averaged over three days to October 28, 2026, simulated slippage is the average of a buy and a sell against the snapshot mid-price, excluding fees and funding; each MEXC figure is set against the best of the four on that asset and size, and every figure is one side, so a round trip is twice it.
In that comparison, a $100,000 AAPL order showed $1.66 of simulated one-way slippage cost against $14.27 on the best other book, a saving of $12.61 or 88%.
The full eight-stock slippage table at $100,000 is in the guide to slippage at your order size.
What does a $100K order cost from start to finish?
A $100,000 SPCXUSDT sell on MEXC would have cost about $11.20 on a typical fill and about $23.00 on a rough one, using TokenInsight's August 2026 median and P90, with the trading fee at $0.00 for an eligible user while the pair is in a 0-fee period, as of November 2026, and no funding unless a settlement time is crossed.
Cost line | How it is counted | Amount |
Trading fee | Order value × your rate; 0.00% where the pair is in a 0-fee period for an eligible user, as of November 2026 | $0.00 |
Bid-ask spread | Paid inside the fill price and already included in mid-price slippage; no separate line | Included below |
Slippage, median | $100,000 × 0.0112% | $11.20 |
Slippage, P90 | $100,000 × 0.0230% | $23.00 |
Funding | $0 if no settlement time falls between open and close; position value × the rate at the time if one does | $0.00 |
Total, one side | Median fill; P90 fill | $11.20; $23.00 |
Now assume a 0.05% taker fee, an assumption for the arithmetic that belongs to no exchange.
The fee line alone would be $100,000 × 0.05% = $50.00 before any slippage.
That one line exceeds the P90 slippage in this example.
On a liquid pair, a non-zero fee can be the biggest line on the bill.
Does a full trade cost more than a single order?
A full trade costs more than a single order because it is two fills, one to open and one to close, and each fill carries its own spread and slippage, so every one-side figure in this guide doubles over a round trip, and any trading fee is charged on both legs as well.
Funding is added for every settlement time held through between the two fills.
For the $100,000 AAPL order in MEXC's October 28, 2026 comparison, the saving is the best other book's cost minus MEXC's cost, $14.27 minus $1.66 = $12.61, and over a round trip it is $12.61 × 2 = $25.22.
Position size = margin × leverage, so a $100,000 position at 20x needs $5,000 of margin, and $25.22 ÷ $5,000 = 0.50% of that margin.
Share of margin ≈ leverage × slippage difference in basis points × 2 ÷ 10,000, so at 20x every 1 bp of slippage difference is 0.4% of margin per round trip (20 × 1 × 2 ÷ 10,000 = 0.4%).
The table runs the same arithmetic for six orders at an illustrative 20x.
Scenario | Order | One side: MEXC / Best of 4 others / Saving | Margin × leverage | Round-trip saving | Share of margin |
Popular US stock | AAPL $100K | $1.66 / $14.27 / $12.61 | $5,000 × 20 | $25.22 | 0.50% |
Popular US stock | MSFT $100K | $6.80 / $21.45 / $14.65 | $5,000 × 20 | $29.30 | 0.59% |
US stock index | SPY $500K | $7.34 / $83.60 / $76.25 | $25,000 × 20 | $152.51 | 0.61% |
Large US stock order | AMD $500K | $141.57 / $307.00 / $165.43 | $25,000 × 20 | $330.86 | 1.32% |
Large core-asset order | ETH $500K | $2.61 / $13.63 / $11.02 | $25,000 × 20 | $22.04 | 0.09% |
Large core-asset order | SK hynix $500K | $44.04 / $162.35 / $118.31 | $25,000 × 20 | $236.62 | 0.95% |
The share of margin runs from 0.09% on ETH $500K to 1.32% on AMD $500K.
The slippage gap in basis points drives it, not the dollar size of the order.
Leverage changes the margin, not the slippage.
With the notional fixed, a higher leverage only shrinks the margin, as the same AAPL position at three leverages shows.
Keep the margin fixed and raise the leverage instead, and the notional grows, so slippage has to be measured again at the larger size and the saving does not scale in a straight line.
These are three-day snapshot figures that exclude fees and funding.
They cannot promise the same saving on every future open and close.
How do you keep total cost low?
Keeping total cost low comes down to four habits: post limit orders where you can, so you sit on the maker side and do not cross the spread; size each order to the depth you can see; read the book before you trade; and stay away from thin hours, when the same order slips further.
Limit orders trade execution certainty for price certainty.
That is the right trade when you are not in a hurry.
Sizing to depth is the cheapest fix, because slippage grows with order size, as the jump from $10,000 to $100,000 above shows.
Splitting a large order keeps each piece inside the size resting at the best price.
Reading the book means checking how much rests within 0.01% of the mid price, and the guide to order book depth by price band shows where that depth sits.
Thin hours matter because weekend equity perpetuals volume in TokenInsight's August 2026 sample was 9.9% of the weekday level, and the guide to liquidity when Wall Street is closed covers what that does to an exit.
Once the fill is cheap, leverage decides how much of your margin the round trip takes, and the guide to how leverage tiers cap position size is the next step.
FAQ
Is 0 fee really free?
No; a 0 fee removes the trading fee line, but the spread, slippage and any funding still apply, and the 0 rate covers only selected pairs for eligible users.
What is the difference between maker and taker fees?
A maker fee applies to an order that rests on the book and adds liquidity, a taker fee to an order that fills against resting orders and removes it, and the rate you pay depends on which side your order ended up on.
How much is 1 basis point on a $100,000 order?
One basis point is 0.01%, so on a $100,000 order it is $100,000 × 0.01% = $10, whether it comes from a fee or from slippage.
Does the spread count as a cost on top of slippage?
Not when slippage is measured against the mid price, because that figure already includes the spread, so adding the spread again counts it twice.
Why is my breakeven price not my entry price?
Because closing the trade costs a second fill plus any fee, so the price has to move past your entry by the round-trip cost before the trade is flat.
Does MEXC charge funding on stock futures?
Funding on a MEXC stock future is paid or received only if you hold through one of its settlement times, and the schedule and rate are set per pair, so check the pair's page first.
What is the taker fee on MEXC futures?
As of November 2026, MEXC lists maker and taker fees from 0.00% on selected stock futures for eligible users, rates vary by region and promotion, and the rate charged on each fill shows in your trade history.
Which costs more, trading fees or slippage?
The fee rate and order size decide it: an assumed 0.05% taker fee is $50.00 on $100,000, more than the $23.00 P90 slippage on a $100,000 SPCX sell in TokenInsight's August 2026 report.
How do I calculate my trading cost?
Multiply order size by your fee rate, add order size times expected slippage (the P90 for a safe budget), double both for the round trip, then add any funding for the settlement times you hold through.
Conclusion
A 0 fee is a real saving, and on a liquid pair it removes the line that is often the biggest.
It is not the whole bill: the same $100,000 order still pays slippage twice, funding at each settlement time it crosses, and at 20x every basis point of difference is 0.4% of margin.
Run the four lines at your own size and rate before you trade.
Trading crypto assets is high-risk; prices can be highly volatile and you may lose everything you put in. No security measure removes all risk, and MEXC does not promise principal protection or absolute security. This article is not investment advice.
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This article is provided by MEXC Learn Team for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Cryptocurrency markets involve significant risk. Please conduct independent research or consult a qualified professional before making any investment decisions. The views expressed do not necessarily represent those of MEXC or its affiliates.
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