The formula
Profit = (amount invested ÷ buy price) × sell price − amount invested − fees on both sides. ROI = profit ÷ amount invested × 100.
A worked example you can check by hand
Put $1,000 into bitcoin at $60,000. That buys 0.016667 BTC. Sell at $75,000 and the position returns $1,250.03, so the headline profit is $250.03 and the ROI is 25%. Now add a 0.05% taker fee: $0.50 on the way in, $0.63 on the way out. Real profit is $248.90, real ROI 24.9%. On a single winning trade the fee looks like a rounding error, which is exactly why it gets ignored.
Run the same trade at 0.1% and the fee is $2.25. Run it on a card-purchase route charging 2.5% and it is $56. The trade did not change. The venue did.
Fees come off twice, and they scale with the position
Every round trip pays on entry and on exit. The table below is the same $1,000 trade at different published rates, showing what the round trip costs before price does anything at all.
| Fee per side | Round trip on $1,000 | Cost over 100 trades | Typical of |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0.00% / 0.05% | $0.50 | $50 | MEXC spot (maker / taker) |
| 0.08% | $1.60 | $160 | OKX, Bybit with token discounts |
| 0.10% | $2.00 | $200 | Standard spot tier on most venues |
| 0.60% | $12.00 | $1,200 | Simple or instant buy widgets |
| 2.50% | $50.00 | $5,000 | Card purchase routes |
The last two rows are where most beginners actually buy, because the instant-buy button is the easiest one on the screen. Compare the venues properly on the crypto fee calculator before you decide that a strategy does not work.
Your break-even price is above your buy price
Because fees apply on both legs, a position is underwater the moment it opens. Break-even is buy price × (1 + buy fee) ÷ (1 − sell fee). At 0.1% per side, a coin bought at $100 needs roughly $100.20 to be flat. That gap is trivial on a swing trade targeting 20%, and fatal on a scalp targeting 0.15%. Knowing the number tells you which strategies the venue can actually support.
ROI, and the version of it that is honest
A 25% return is excellent in a month and mediocre over three years. Annualised return - roughly ROI scaled to a yearly rate - is how you compare a trade against simply holding, or against a savings rate. A trade that gained 8% over nine months annualises to about 10.8%; the same 8% in three weeks annualises past 250%, which is also a warning that it probably involved risk you have not priced.
Comparing trades fairly is what the R multiple exists for. If you are logging results, the trading journal expresses every trade in units of what it risked, which strips account size out of the comparison entirely.
What this calculator deliberately does not do
- Leverage. A leveraged position has a liquidation price and pays funding. Both change the result more than fees ever will. Use the liquidation price calculator and the funding rate calculator.
- Slippage. A market order on a thin pair fills worse than the quote. The calculator assumes you got the price you typed.
- Network withdrawal fees. Flat per transaction, so they punish small positions hardest.
- Multiple entries. If you bought in several tranches, your real entry is the weighted average, not the midpoint. The average cost and DCA calculator handles that correctly.
- Tax. A disposal is usually a taxable event. Treat the output as gross profit.
Four mistakes that make a losing trade look like a winner
Averaging the prices instead of the position. Buying $500 at $95,000 and $500 at $72,000 gives an average entry near $81,700, not the $83,500 midpoint. Averaging prices flatters the entry by almost two thousand dollars.
Counting unrealised gains. A position up 40% on screen has returned nothing until it is closed. The only number that pays rent is the realised one.
Ignoring the spread. The fee is published; the spread is not. On illiquid pairs the gap between bid and ask can cost more than the fee schedule does.
Forgetting the losers. One 25% winner means little next to the three trades before it. Expectancy across every trade is the only honest scoreboard, and most people never calculate it.
Where this number goes next
Profit is the output. The input is position size, decided before entry from your stop distance and the percentage of the account you are willing to lose - that is the position size calculator. In between sits the venue you chose, which quietly sets your break-even on every trade you will ever place. We open accounts with our own money and measure spreads and withdrawal times before writing about them: see the crypto exchange reviews, or rehearse the whole loop with no money at stake in the Practice Arena.
Frequently asked
How do you calculate crypto profit?
Coins bought = amount invested ÷ buy price. Exit value = coins bought × sell price. Profit = exit value − amount invested − fees on both sides. ROI = profit ÷ amount invested × 100. Worked example: $1,000 at $60,000 buys 0.016667 BTC; selling at $75,000 returns $1,250.03, so profit is $250.03 before fees, or about $248.90 after 0.05% taker fees on both legs, which is a 24.9% ROI.
What is the formula for crypto ROI?
ROI = (sell price − buy price) ÷ buy price × 100, or equivalently profit ÷ amount invested × 100. The two give the same answer on a simple spot trade. ROI matters more than the dollar figure because a $200 gain is a 20% trade on $1,000 and a 2% trade on $10,000, and only one of those is worth repeating.
Should I include trading fees in profit calculations?
Always. Fees are charged when you buy and again when you sell, so they come off twice. On a 0.1% taker venue a round trip costs 0.2% of position value before the price has moved at all; at 0.05% it is 0.1%. Across a hundred trades that difference is often larger than the entire edge a strategy has.
What is my break-even price in crypto?
Break-even is the sell price at which profit is exactly zero after fees: buy price × (1 + buy fee) ÷ (1 − sell fee). At a 0.1% fee on both sides, a coin bought at $100 needs about $100.20 just to be flat. Anything below that is a loss even though the chart shows green.
Does this calculator account for leverage or futures?
No. It models a spot trade: you buy an asset, you later sell it. Leverage adds a liquidation price and funding payments, both of which change the result far more than fees do. Use the liquidation price calculator and the funding rate calculator for those, and size the position with the position size calculator first.
Does it include network or withdrawal fees?
No, and that gap matters on small positions. Exchange trading fees are a percentage, but a blockchain withdrawal is a flat amount set by the network, so moving $50 can cost proportionally more than moving $5,000. Add the withdrawal fee by hand if you intend to move the coins off the venue.
What counts as realised versus unrealised profit?
Unrealised profit is what the position is worth on screen while you still hold it. Realised profit is what landed in your balance after you sold. Only the second one is real, and in most jurisdictions only the second one is a taxable event. Traders who count unrealised gains as income tend to discover the difference the hard way.
Do I pay tax on crypto profit?
In most countries a disposal - selling to fiat, swapping to another coin, or spending it - is a taxable event, and the rules differ enormously by jurisdiction. We are not tax advisers and this calculator does not model tax. Treat the figure it gives as gross profit and check your local rules before you count it as yours.
Is this crypto calculator free?
Yes, with no sign-up and no email wall. It runs entirely in your browser, so the numbers you type never reach us. The same is true of every calculator on this site.
Crypto is highly volatile and most retail traders lose money. This tool is a simple estimate for education only, not financial advice.