How to calculate the real cost of a transfer
"Zero fee" transfers are rarely free, and a "1% fee" is sometimes the cheapest option. The only number that tells the truth is how much arrives compared with what the market rate would give. Here is how to compute it.
Two ways to charge: fee and spread
A fee is shown explicitly: "2 EUR per transfer" or "0.5% of the amount". A spread is hidden in the exchange rate: the service buys at the market rate and sells to you a little worse. Most services use both, and many advertise the fee while making their money on the spread.
Fixed vs percentage
A fixed fee hurts small transfers: 3 EUR on a 50 EUR transfer is 6%, on 1,000 EUR it is 0.3%. A percentage fee scales with the amount and often has a minimum and a cap. Because of this, the cheapest service for 100 EUR is often not the cheapest for 2,000 EUR. Always compare for the amount you actually send.
The formula
Take the mid-market rate (the one you see on financial sites, with no markup). Multiply your amount by it: that is what you would get in a world without fees. Then look at what the service will actually pay out. The difference, divided by the market amount, is the total cost as a percentage:
loss % = (market amount − received amount) ÷ market amount × 100
This single number folds in the fee, the spread and any network cost the service passes on, so services with different pricing models become comparable.
A worked example, live
Sending 500 EUR and receiving USDT through the services in our catalogue, right now:
| Market rate | 1 EUR = 1.1381 USDT |
| 500 EUR at market | 569.03 USDT |
| Plasma One pays out | 568.53 USDT |
| Loss with Plasma One | 0.5 USDT (0.09%) |
| YouHodler pays out | 567.74 USDT |
| Loss with YouHodler | 1.29 USDT (0.23%) |
In other words, with Plasma One you lose about 0.44 EUR of your 500 EUR, or 0.09%. The second line for another service shows how much the same transfer can differ.
How "Loss vs market" works in the app
The converter takes the mid-market rate as the median of several public sources, so a single broken feed cannot skew it. For each service it then applies that service's own rules: the deposit rail you would use (card, bank transfer), its exchange rate or spread, its fees and the withdrawal cost. The result is the amount that arrives, and the percentage next to it is exactly the formula above. Services are sorted by that amount, best first.
What the number does not include
Charges on the receiving side, such as your bank's fee for an incoming international transfer, and card-issuer markups on a foreign-currency card payment are outside any sender's control and are not in the estimate. When a service does not publish a fee for a route, the app says so rather than guessing.
Rates and fees in this article are live estimates and change all the time. Check the final amount in the provider's app before sending. This is general information, not financial advice.