Gate vs Kraken

Kraken is good because the money arrives real; Gate because new tickers land there earlier.

Puffit editorial · · about authorship and sources

Compared by the numbers

Collected straight from the exchanges. Volume is deliberately left out: venues count it differently, and on some the top of the list is tokenised equities. The last row is our advertisement scanner’s coverage, not the venue’s full currency list, which is wider.

GateGate KrakenKraken
USDT pairs2,03844
Futures contracts1,070209
Networks for USDT26—
Cheapest USDT withdrawal0.0500 ARBITRUM—
P2P currencies in our scanner72 currencies—

In short: the difference

First in the pair, Gate, is the place where new coins show up first. On the market since 2013, jurisdiction: Panama, its own GT token.

Second in the pair, Kraken, is an exchange with bank rails attached. On the market since 2011, jurisdiction: San Francisco, USA.

What Gate gives you

Against a regulated venue, Gate wins on other things: One of the oldest venues, running since 2013, and first in our coverage for withdrawal networks: twenty-four for USDT alone. Two thousand spot pairs and a thousand perpetuals. There is P2P, savings and staking, Startup launches, copy trading, bots and its own GT token with fee discounts.

Strong sides: 24 USDT withdrawal networks, more than anyone, 2000 spot pairs, running since 2013.

What Kraken gives you

Early listings are not the only argument; Kraken answers with its own: The oldest venue we cover, running since 2011 under US regulation. Its distinction is real money: around seven hundred dollar pairs and five hundred and forty-six euro pairs, more than anyone here. There is spot, perpetual futures with hourly funding, staking and institutional services. Kraken is how we compute the live dollar rate in our stablecoin section.

Strong sides: 546 euro pairs and around seven hundred dollar ones, age and regulation, hourly funding.

What decides it

  • Jurisdiction. Gate sits in Panama, Kraken in San Francisco, USA. It shapes both the checks you pass and what the venue has to disclose.
  • Native token. GT on Gate cuts fees and opens launches; Kraken has no such lever.
  • Strengths side by side. Gate: 24 USDT withdrawal networks, more than anyone, 2000 spot pairs, running since 2013; Kraken: 546 euro pairs and around seven hundred dollar ones, age and regulation, hourly funding.
  • Which job. Gate is for anyone who values freedom of choice when moving coins between chains, while Kraken is for settling in real dollars and euro rather than stablecoins.
  • Worth remembering. Gate: the interface is dense with sections: finding the right one takes a while. Kraken: entry-level fees run higher than neighbours — it pays off at larger volumes.

Which one fits you

Gate — for anyone who values freedom of choice when moving coins between chains.

Kraken — for settling in real dollars and euro rather than stablecoins.

What people ask most

Gate: Are there many coins? One of the widest listings on the market, comparable to MEXC. As there, breadth calls for caution: check a pair's volume before trading.

Gate: What is proof of reserves? A Merkle-tree procedure letting you verify your balance is counted in the exchange's liabilities and those liabilities are covered by assets. It does not reveal off-balance-sheet obligations.

Kraken: Why does Kraken show so few pairs in your spot arbitrage? Because we take only USDT pairs, and Kraken has fewer than fifty: nearly everything is quoted in real dollars. Mixing USD pairs with other venues’ USDT pairs would present USDT’s deviation as arbitrage.

Kraken: Why check the network before sending? Kraken does not support every network for every coin, and a deposit sent on an unsupported network is usually unrecoverable. The supported list is in its funding help pages.

Kraken: How do I fund an account if there is no P2P? Only by bank transfer or crypto from another wallet. Limits depend on your country and verification level, and the exchange publishes them on a page of its own — linked above.

Both at once

Most people end up keeping both: one for daily trades, the other for what the first one lacks. Fiat comes in through the regulated venue, while a small sum sits on the early-listing one for new coins: the money arrives clean and the tickers do not pass you by.

Live numbers

Everything in the table above is recomputed together with the rest of the site — pairs, contracts, P2P, networks and the withdrawal fee. Gate and Kraken can be compared on facts rather than promises.

What the numbers say

Gate gives 46.3× the choice on spot: 2,038 USDT pairs against 44. The futures list runs longer on Gate: 1,070, against 209. Our scanner reads P2P on Gate only — 72 currencies. Gate is the one of the two with a published USDT withdrawal: 0.0500 on ARBITRUM.

Snapshot from 31 October 2026; on the page the figures refresh on every visit.

Gate ↗Kraken ↗

Frequently asked

Kraken or Gate — which should you pick?
It is the same choice whichever way round you write it. The comparison above is built on what can be measured: fees, pair counts, withdrawal chains and funding routes. Look less at which venue is "better" in general and more at which of those matters to you.

Other comparisons and walkthroughs

MEXC or GateThe two exchanges with the widest coin selection. A look at how they differ when both listings are enormous.KuCoin or GateBoth live off coins the top three do not carry. A look at how they differ from each other.Binance or KrakenThe largest crypto exchange against the oldest regulated one. These are two different ways to hold money — here is both.Kraken or WhiteBITTwo venues with genuine registration rather than an offshore address. The difference is which money they are tied to.WEEX vs KrakenThese two venues solve different problems, and choosing between them is really choosing how your money gets into crypto. On WEEX that means other people’s ads in almost ninety currencies; on Kraken, a transfer straight from your bank.Toobit vs KrakenChoosing between these two is not a matter of better or worse but of timing. On Toobit a new coin appears within days; on Kraken, after a review — and both of those speeds are what somebody needs.Binance vs GateGate catches new listings first; Binance lets you fill a large order without slippage. That is the whole fork.Bybit vs GateYou go to Gate for new listings and to Bybit for leverage. Picking one is rarely necessary — people keep both.How to trade on GateRunning since 2013, with twenty-four networks for USDT withdrawals — more than any other venue in our review.Trading on KrakenOne of the oldest exchanges in the world and one of the few quoting in real bank dollars rather than a stablecoin. Here is who it suits.