The fastest route and almost always the most expensive one. The advertised fee is rarely the only fee, and a credit card adds a charge the exchange never sees.

A card takes minutes and works from a phone in a queue. That convenience is real, and it is priced accordingly: on most platforms this is the most expensive way to buy anything, and the cost is spread across three places so that no single number looks alarming.

How it works

Your card does not pay the exchange directly. A payment processor sits in between — it charges your card, takes its cut, and passes the rest on. That is why card purchases often go through a screen that looks like a different company: it is a different company.

The consequence worth knowing: two platforms with identical advertised fees can charge very different amounts, because the processor's margin is added on top and is not always shown.

The three fees

1. The platform's card feeTypically a few percent, and usually the only one advertised.
2. The exchange rateYou are quoted a single price for the coin. The gap between that price and the market price is a second fee wearing a different hat.
3. Your card issuer's chargeMany issuers treat crypto as a cash advance. That means a separate fee and interest starting on day one, with no grace period.

The third one is the one that catches people, because it arrives on a statement weeks later and does not mention crypto anywhere. If your card is a credit card, check with the issuer before the first purchase rather than after it. A debit card avoids the cash-advance question entirely.

There is a fourth, quieter charge when your card is denominated in one currency and the platform bills in another: the currency conversion is done by somebody, at a rate they choose.

Verification

Full identity verification, plus the card's own checks: the 3-D Secure step from your bank, and often a photograph of the card or a selfie holding it. Cards belonging to somebody else are refused as a matter of course, and attempting it is what account closures are made of.

What goes wrong

The issuer declines it. Card networks tag crypto purchases with their own category code, and a great many banks block that code by default. A decline is usually the bank, not the platform, and calling the bank is the only thing that changes it.

The chargeback trap. A card payment can be reversed for up to months. Crypto cannot. Platforms know this, so they hold withdrawals after card purchases, and a chargeback filed against a completed purchase ends with the account closed and, where the amount is large enough, a debt collector rather than a refund.

There is no "I changed my mind". The consumer protections that make card payments safe elsewhere assume goods that can be returned. A coin that has already been credited is not returnable, and the price it was bought at is not coming back either.

When the price is worth paying

Small amounts, first purchases, and situations where the local bank rail is broken or takes days. The percentage that looks outrageous on a large purchase is a couple of units of currency on a small one, and paying it to find out how a platform works is a reasonable trade.

What is not reasonable is using it as the default for every purchase afterwards, which is exactly what the convenience encourages.

Where it works

Read next

What activity costs puts the numbers here next to every other fee on this site, and buying your first coin walks the whole sequence end to end.

The other four routes

• Bank transfer
• Peer-to-peer
• Crypto ATM
• Cash desk / OTC

Which of them exists where you live is on your country page.