Binance review: what to think of the leading crypto exchange in 2023?
Binance is a cryptocurrency exchange that provides a platform for trading various cryptocurrencies. As of January 2018, Binance was the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world in terms of trading volume. It offers the lowest transaction fees in the market and allows you to trade more than 600 cryptocurrencies.
| Number of cryptocurrencies | 600+ |
| Types of crypto-assets | Cryptos, tokens and NFT |
| Transaction fee | 0.10% |
| Minimum deposit | $50 |
| Deposit fee | From 0 - bank transfer - up to 1.8% by credit card |
| Maximum leverage | 125x |
Join Binance and get 20% cashback on all your trading fees plus up to 100 USDT in bonus.
What is Binance?
Binance is going to celebrate its fifth anniversary with its 90 million registered users on the 8th of June as it was established in 2017. Initially, the company started in China, but later on shifted to Japan, Vietnam, and Malta as well. The founder of Binance, Changpeng Zhao, claimed that the exchange has no headquarter because it aims to be decentralized – just like Bitcoin. In 2019, Binance launched a separate version – Binance.us – that complies to the regulation of the country.
Binance provides a multitude of facilities that enable traders to buy, sell, and hold crypto. In its updated version, it has two position modes, one-way mode, and hedge mode, which helps traders to hold positions. In one-way mode, you can only hold positions in one direction under one contract or else, the software will automatically cancel one. In hedging mode, you will be allowed to hold both long and short position.
How to register and verify on Binance?
Building a portfolio on Binance is easy, and you can fund your account after going through a quick registration and verification processes. The registration button can be located easily on the homepage of the website/app as shown in the picture below.
Visitors are allowed to register through Apple and Google IDs as well as the traditional form filling option. The registration form is extremely simple as it only requires the phone number or email address of the applicant. Users can conveniently toggle between the email option and phone number option to register. Binance confirms your email/phone within a minute by sending a confirmation code.
We should mention here that all traders are required to read the terms of services and privacy policy and then tick the relevant box since it has been made mandatory by the exchange. After verifying your phone number or your email, you will be logged in to your Binance account. You will be able to make trades but with access to limited features. You will have to verify your identity to make sure that you, your information, and your money remain safe. You will have to undergo an identification process. You can find the identification page link on the user center as shown in the picture below.
The identification process mainly revolves around KYC (Know Your Customer) and AML (Anti Money Laundering) policies.
Binance verification process – Part 1: Address confirmation
First, Binance will ask you to provide proof of residence (country) as its services may be restricted in some countries or it may ask you to use Binance US if you reside in the United States of America. Binance will ask you to submit address details such as your country, city and postal code. It will also ask you to confirm your address by uploading a pictorial proof which can be a utility bill or your bank statement.
Binance verification process – Part 2: Compliance questions
After uploading your proof of your address, Binance will take you to the next part in which you will be asked some compliance questions. These compliance questions help the Binance to understand your needs. You will be asked the following four questions.
- What will you use Binance for?
- What is your source of income?
- What is your employment status?
- How much do you expect to trade?
Binance verification process – Part 3: Facial recognition
After answering all these questions, you will move towards the last but crucial part of the user verification process which involves ‘facial recognition’. For facial verification, you need to turn your face right and left in front of your phone’s or computer’s camera. We strongly advise you to make sure that you’re somewhere where there is no problem with lighting. After successfully submitting the form, you will be informed that your application for verification is under review and you will receive an email confirmation within the next two working days.
What are the available cryptocurrencies and crypto-assets on Binance?
Binance is a platform that grants access to more than 600 cryptocurrencies. The higher number of available cryptocurrencies enables its users to diversify their portfolios and reduce the risks by investing in various assets at once. For example, you can buy, sell or trade Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Tether, Cardano, Dogecoin, Polkadot, Solana, Polygon, and many more. At the time of writing this article, Binance had recently added KOLnet, SuperStep, Nody, MetFi, and Bee Finance as it keeps updating its cryptocurrencies list frequently. Various types of altcoins are being offered by Binance such as mining-based, stablecoins, security tokens, initial exchange offerings, and utility tokens. In addition to these crypto properties, Binance has also started support for non-fungible tokens (NFT).
As you can see on this picture, Binance’ “Markets” tab lists a wide variety of cryptocurrencies and crypto-assets. They are sorted by kind – Metaverse, Gaming, DeFi, Innovation, NFT…
Trading on Binance
Binance is a versatile platform and it not only offers hundreds of cryptocurrencies to buy or sell but also enables traders to test their hands on different trading methods. At the moment, traders are allowed to trade on Spot, Margin, and Futures markets.
Spot Trading: Spot trading allows you to simply buy or sell crypto-assets without providing any kind of leverage. The advantage of Spot trading is that your funds are not locked and you can send or move them to your wallet whenever you want.
Margin Trading: In Binance’s margin trading option, you can trade by borrowing funds and you can leverage between 3x to 10x the amount you effectively engage. Margin trading thus multiplies your trading results, whether you gain or you lose money.
Futures Trading: In futures trading, you sign an agreement to buy or sell a specific asset at a fixed price in the future. In this trading method, traders are allowed to opt between going short or long. In this trading method, you will be able to get the highest leverage and on top, Binance allows you to switch between Isolated Margin and Cross Margin.
Warning: It is advised to all readers not to send any unsupported cryptocurrency to your Binance portfolio (or any other exchange) as it will be lost. Make sure your cryptocurrency is supported and that you send it through the right blockchain before engaging in any deposit transaction on your Binance account.
Fees on Binance
Binance has different fees for spot trading, margin trading, and futures trading. For spot trading, the fee is 0.1%. For margin and futures trading, the fees start at 0.02% and go as low as 0.001% for high volume traders. Binance also offers discounts for users who hold their native token, BNB. Overall, Binance provides an extremely competitive fee structure that is among the best in the industry.