Poloniex and Bitfinex are consistently among the top 20 most popular cryptocurrency exchanges by daily trade volume. The platforms cater to two different audiences: Poloniex is a cryptocurrency-only exchange with a diverse library of altcoins, while Bitfinex is a platform geared toward serious traders that supports fiat currency and comparatively fewer cryptocurrencies. As we’ll see, however, the platforms do have one thing in common: spotty security records.

In this cryptocurrency exchange comparison we’ll explore each platform in greater detail while covering the following topics:

Poloniex is an exchange platform based in Wilmington, Delaware and first launched in 2014. With no support for fiat currency, Poloniex is used primarily for trading among a range of alternative coins. Poloniex was once in contention to be the number one exchange in the world by daily trade volume, but is now ranked significantly lower, 17th at time of writing. This fall in the rankings is largely due to security and user experience concerns, which will be explored in greater depth later in this guide.

Bitfinex is an exchange platform for serious, high-volume cryptocurrency traders: users must deposit funds worth over 10,000 USD before they can begin trading. The platform is based in Hong Kong and Taiwan and has been operating since 2012. Despite its popularity, Bitfinex has also suffered its share of security issues, including a couple of substantial hacks. Bitfinex is the number 5 exchange by daily trade volume at time of writing.

Before we get into the details of both platforms, it’s worth pointing out that Bitfinex stopped serving U.S. individual users in late 2017, so if you’re living in the US, you can immediately remove Bitfinex from your consideration.

As mentioned above, much of Poloniex’s decline in daily trade volume is a result of issues with regard to security and user experience. Poloniex users have encountered a wide variety of problems with the platform: missing funds, frozen accounts, and even withdrawals that took weeks or months to process. These issues were eventually resolved, but not without significantly damaging Poloniex’s reputation in the process.

While some platforms like Kraken have a long history free from any hacks on user funds, Bitfinex, has suffered two notable hacks in the last five years. The 2016 hack saw roughly 120,000 Bitcoins (valued at $72 million at the time) stolen from users’ wallets. Bitfinex’s solution to this crisis was to remove 36% from all Bitfinex user accounts and give customers an IOU in the form of ‘BFX tokens’. The company later repaid these IOUs, but many users were unsatisfied because the value of Bitcoin had greatly increased since the hack, but they were only repaid for the value of Bitcoin at the time of the hack.

Bitfinex has since improved their security practices. Their track record, however, does not instill a lot of confidence in the platform.

Poloniex’s user interface is intuitive and easy to use. Most pertinent information can be found on the main exchange page, and making trades is straightforward. The layout feels a little cluttered compared to other platforms and the color scheme leaves something to be desired, but it gets the job done.

Bitfinex offers a sleeker, darker UI that is consistent with their goals of being a platform for ‘serious traders’.

Poloniex supports 99 unique cryptocurrencies for users to trade between.

Bitfinex, on the other hand, supports 62 cryptocurrencies. This is obviously fewer than what Poloniex supports; however, it is a substantially larger library than what is offered by most other exchanges with fiat support. This is Bitfinex’s biggest advantage in the exchange market.

Poloniex is a cryptocurrency-only exchange, which means that users can only make deposits and withdrawals in cryptocurrencies. Users must first convert their fiat currency to cryptocurrency on an exchange with fiat support before they can begin trading on Poloniex.

Bitfinex allows users to make deposits and withdrawals in cryptocurrency and bank wire transfer.

Poloniex, like many exchange platforms, follows a maker-taker fee schedule in which user fees decrease as their 30-day trade volume increases. The maximum fee is 0.25% and the minimum is 0.15%.

Bitfinex also follows a maker-taker fee schedule but offers cheaper fees than Poloniex: 0.1%-0.2%.

In this comparison, we’ve gone over the pros and cons of Poloniex and Bitfinex. These platforms have distinct offerings from one another and are clearly targeted toward different user bases. In the end, however, we at Unhashed wouldn’t recommend you use either platform. Both Poloniex and Bitfinex have had several scandals which seriously call into question their trustworthiness. Users looking to trade a wide variety of altcoins would be better off using Binance or Bittrex. Users looking to make deposits and withdrawals in fiat would be better off using a platform like GDAX or Coinbase before transferring their cryptocurrency to an altcoin exchange.

The post Poloniex vs Bitfinex | Detailed Cryptocurrency Exchange Comparison appeared first on UNHASHED.

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