What are the best zero-fee crypto trading platforms?

A quick honesty note before the list: no major platform is truly zero-fee on everything. "Zero-fee" in practice usually means one of three things — a DEX with a 0% protocol fee (you still pay gas), a CEX that eats spread instead of a fee, or a platform with a low/flat maker-taker structure. Here's what the data actually shows, split by category.

Spot DEXs (0% protocol fee, gas-only)

Spot DEXs come closest to "zero-fee" — Uniswap charges no protocol fee (its fee revenue is literally $0), you just pay network gas for each swap.

• Uniswap (V4 + V3) — the dominant spot DEX, ~$1B in 24h volume across V4 alone, $0 protocol revenue (true zero-fee structure, gas-only). Runs on Ethereum, Base, and many other chains.
• PancakeSwap — ~$731M daily volume, low-fee AMM on BNB Chain, Ethereum, Base, Solana.
• Aerodrome (Base) — the main Base liquidity hub, ~$479M daily volume.
• Orca (Solana) — ~$307M daily volume, Solana's lightweight AMM.

For a spot DEX, "fee" is mostly gas — the protocol cut is often near-zero. Swap on Uniswap

Perpetual DEXs (low-fee, orderbook-based)

Perp DEXs are the other "low/zero-fee" camp, but they still charge taker/maker fees. The leaders by fee revenue (per DefiLlama):

• Hyperliquid — the biggest perp DEX by far, ~$4.1M daily fees (its fee share covers a network incentive rebate system — effective rates are very low, often ~0.035% taker / 0.01% maker). Hyperliquid
• Jupiter Perps (Solana) — ~$750M TVL, oracle-priced, low fees. Jupiter
• Lighter — orderbook perp DEX with verifiable matching/liquidations. Lighter
• Aster — perp DEX, up to 1001x leverage in Simple Mode. Aster
• edgeX — orderbook-based perp DEX. edgeX
• GMTrade (Solana) — crypto + RWA perp markets. GMTrade
• GMX — the long-running perp protocol on Arbitrum/Avalanche. GMX

The curated directory has no DEX-aggregator entry, so for spot routing via aggregators there's no zero-fee listing to point you to.

The bottom line

• Truly zero-fee: a spot DEX like Uniswap (0% protocol fee, gas-only).
• Effectively near-zero-fee: Hyperliquid for perps (its fee rebate structure is the closest perps get to free trading).

If you tell me your region, how much KYC you're comfortable with, and whether you want spot or perps, I can narrow this to the platforms actually available to you.

Also tracked: LighterTrade Now, AsterTrade Now, GMTradeTrade Now, edgeXTrade Now, GMXTrade Now, FomoDownload App.