How Much Does It Cost to Build a Crypto Exchange?

The Number Everyone Wants (And Why It’s Wrong)

I get asked this question at least five times a week. “How much does it cost to build a crypto exchange?” And every time, I watch the person’s face when I tell them the honest answer: it depends so wildly on your approach that the question is almost meaningless without context.

The internet is full of articles throwing out numbers like “$50,000 to $100,000” as if building an exchange is like ordering a car with options packages. It’s not. The actual range stretches from under $10,000 to well over $500,000, depending on whether you’re building from zero, licensing turnkey software, or assembling something from open-source parts. And that’s just the initial build — the ongoing costs are where most founders get blindsided.

After years of working with exchange operators across dozens of countries, I’ve seen every approach tried. I’ve seen $300K custom builds that never launched. I’ve seen $5,000 white-label setups generating real revenue within weeks. And I’ve watched enough founders run out of money to know exactly where the budget traps are hiding.

So here’s the real breakdown. No hand-waving, no “contact us for a quote” nonsense. Actual numbers.

Path 1: Custom Development — The Expensive Road

Building a crypto exchange from scratch is the route that looks most appealing on a whiteboard and most painful in practice. You get complete control over every line of code, every design decision, every architectural choice. You also get complete ownership of every bug, every security vulnerability, and every late-night emergency when something breaks at 2 AM on a Sunday.

What the Development Actually Costs

A minimum viable exchange — spot trading, basic wallet support, user authentication, a functional UI — requires a team that typically looks something like this:

• 3-4 backend engineers (matching engine, wallet infrastructure, API layer)
• 2-3 frontend engineers (trading interface, admin panel, user dashboard)
• 1-2 blockchain engineers (wallet integration, node management)
• 1 DevOps engineer (infrastructure, deployment, monitoring)
• 1 security engineer (because skipping this is how you end up on the news)
• 1 QA engineer
• 1 project manager

That’s 10-13 people for 12-18 months. At US market rates, you’re looking at blended costs of $150K-$200K per engineer per year. Even going fully offshore with a team in Eastern Europe or South Asia, the blended rate drops to maybe $40K-$80K per person per year — but the timeline often stretches to 18-24 months because of communication overhead and timezone gaps.

Realistic custom development costs:

Team Location	Timeline	Cost Range
US/Western Europe	12-18 months	$500K - $1.5M
Eastern Europe	14-20 months	$200K - $500K
South/Southeast Asia	16-24 months	$150K - $350K

And here’s what those cost estimates don’t include: the three rounds of rewrites when your first matching engine can’t handle concurrent orders properly. The wallet integration for each blockchain that turns out to be twice as complex as your lead dev estimated. The month you lose when your blockchain engineer quits and you scramble to find a replacement who can actually understand the existing codebase.

I’m not trying to scare anyone away from custom development. I’m trying to make sure you budget for reality, not the rosy estimate your dev shop gave you to win the contract.

The Timeline Problem

Time is the hidden cost nobody puts on the spreadsheet. Every month you spend building is a month you’re burning cash with zero revenue. If your custom build takes 15 months instead of the estimated 12, that’s three extra months of developer salaries, office costs, and opportunity cost.

More importantly, it’s three months where your competitors are live and acquiring users. In crypto, market timing matters enormously. The operator who launched in January and caught the bull run built a user base. The operator who launched in October with a “better” custom platform launched into a market that had already moved on.

Path 2: White-Label and Turnkey Solutions — The Fast Lane

A white-label crypto exchange is a complete, production-ready platform that you license, brand as your own, and deploy on your infrastructure. The software already exists. The matching engine already works. The wallet system already supports dozens of blockchains. You’re not building — you’re configuring and launching.

What It Actually Costs

White-label exchange software typically ranges from $3,899 to $15,000 for the license, depending on the features included and the vendor.

At Codono, our packages start at $3,899 for a full-featured crypto exchange platform with spot trading, wallet management, admin panel, KYC integration, and a professional trading interface. Higher tiers add features like futures trading, P2P marketplace, staking modules, and a mobile trading app.

“Wait, $3,899? For an entire exchange?” Yes. The economics work because the development cost is spread across hundreds of operators using the platform. You’re not paying for the years of R&D that went into the matching engine — you’re paying for a license to use software that’s already been built, tested, broken, fixed, and battle-hardened by real exchanges handling real money.

The Timeline Advantage

This is where white-label really pulls ahead:

• Week 1: License acquired, platform deployed, basic server configuration
• Week 2-3: Branding, domain setup, trading pair configuration, fee structure
• Week 3-4: KYC provider integration, payment gateway setup, internal testing
• Week 4-6: Beta testing, compliance review, soft launch

You’re live in 4-6 weeks. Compare that to 12-18 months for custom development and the ROI math gets very simple very fast.

What About Source Code?

The biggest objection I hear: “But I don’t own the code.” It’s a valid concern — if it were true. Codono provides full source code access with every license. You deploy on your own servers. You can modify anything. If you need custom features down the road, your developers can build them directly into the platform. You’re not locked into a SaaS dependency — you own the code and operate independently.

Path 3: Open Source — The “Free” Option That Isn’t

Open-source exchange software exists. Projects like OpenDAX, Peatio, and a handful of others give you a starting codebase for free. On paper, this sounds like the best of both worlds — custom control at zero cost.

In practice, it’s the approach that produces the most frustrated founders I talk to.

The Real Cost of “Free”

The open-source code gives you a skeleton. Making it production-ready requires:

• Security hardening: Open-source exchange code is a known target. Every vulnerability in the public repo is a vulnerability on your exchange. Budget $20K-$40K for a thorough security audit and the remediation work that follows.
• Feature development: Most open-source projects lack critical features like advanced order types, a proper admin panel, mobile support, or modern KYC integration. Building these out costs $30K-$60K depending on scope.
• Wallet infrastructure: Getting multi-blockchain wallet support working reliably — with proper hot/cold separation, withdrawal queues, and deposit confirmation logic — is a $20K-$40K project on its own.
• UI/UX overhaul: The default interfaces on most open-source projects look like developer prototypes, because that’s what they are. A professional redesign runs $10K-$25K.
• Ongoing maintenance: Open-source projects get abandoned. Contributors move on. Forks diverge. You’ll need at least one full-time engineer dedicated to maintaining and updating the platform, which is $60K-$120K per year.

Total realistic cost to make open-source production-ready: $50,000 - $100,000 plus $60K-$120K annually for maintenance. And the timeline is typically 3-6 months of focused engineering work.

It’s not a terrible option if you have a strong technical cofounder and a modest budget. But calling it “free” is like calling a fixer-upper house “free” because someone gave you the keys — the renovation costs are very real.

The Hidden Costs That Catch Everyone Off Guard

This is the section I wish someone had written for every exchange founder I’ve met who went over budget. The software cost — whether custom, white-label, or open-source — is maybe 30-40% of your actual total spend. Here’s where the rest goes.

Licensing and Legal ($10K - $100K+)

You need a legal entity and, in most jurisdictions, some form of licensing to operate a money services business. The cost varies dramatically by jurisdiction:

Jurisdiction	Approximate Cost	Timeline
SVG / Marshall Islands	$5K - $15K	2-4 weeks
Lithuania / Poland	$25K - $60K	2-4 months
Dubai (VARA)	$30K - $80K	3-6 months
Estonia	$40K - $80K	3-6 months
Singapore (MAS)	$100K - $300K	6-18 months
UK (FCA)	$100K - $250K	6-12 months
US (state-by-state MTL)	$100K - $500K+	6-24 months

Plus ongoing legal counsel at $2,000-$5,000 per month. Don’t skip this. The founders who try to figure out crypto regulation on their own are the ones who get enforcement letters.

Server Infrastructure ($2K - $10K/month)

Running an exchange requires more horsepower than a typical web application. You need:

• High-availability database clusters (failover is not optional when you’re handling money)
• DDoS protection (crypto exchanges are constant targets)
• CDN for global performance
• Separate environments for staging and production
• Monitoring and alerting infrastructure
• Backup and disaster recovery

Budget $2,000-$5,000/month for a smaller exchange, scaling to $5,000-$10,000/month as traffic grows. Cloud providers like AWS, GCP, or dedicated hosting through Hetzner or OVH are all viable options.

KYC/AML Provider ($0.50 - $2 per verification)

Every regulated exchange needs identity verification. Providers like Sumsub, Jumio, or Onfido charge per verification — typically $0.50 to $2.00 depending on the level of verification and your volume.

This sounds cheap per-user, but it adds up. If you’re onboarding 5,000 users in your first few months (and you should be, if your marketing is working), that’s $2,500-$10,000 just in verification costs. Plus most providers charge monthly minimums of $500-$3,000.

Security Audits ($15K - $50K)

A proper third-party penetration test and security audit before launch costs $15,000-$50,000 depending on scope. You need this. I don’t care if your CTO is a former Google security engineer — external audits catch things internal teams miss, and they give your users and partners confidence that someone independent has validated your security infrastructure.

Plan for annual audits after that, at similar cost.

Legal Setup and Ongoing Compliance ($20K - $50K initial)

Beyond licensing, you need legal work for:

• Terms of service and privacy policy (crypto-specific, not a generic template)
• User agreements and risk disclosures
• AML compliance program documentation
• Ongoing regulatory monitoring and updates
• Banking partner negotiations (this alone can take months and significant legal fees)

Monthly Burn Rate: What Running an Exchange Actually Costs

Once you’re live, here’s what the monthly operational costs look like:

Category	Small Exchange	Mid-Size Exchange
Server infrastructure	$2,000 - $4,000	$5,000 - $10,000
Customer support (2-5 staff)	$3,000 - $8,000	$8,000 - $20,000
KYC/AML provider	$500 - $2,000	$2,000 - $8,000
Legal retainer	$2,000 - $3,000	$3,000 - $5,000
Software updates/maintenance	$1,000 - $3,000	$3,000 - $8,000
Marketing	$2,000 - $5,000	$10,000 - $30,000
Liquidity operations	$2,000 - $5,000	$5,000 - $20,000
Insurance and misc	$500 - $2,000	$2,000 - $5,000
Monthly Total	$13,000 - $32,000	$38,000 - $106,000

These numbers are real. If someone tells you that you can run an exchange for $2,000 a month, they’re either lying or running something that will get them in regulatory trouble.

The silver lining: exchange revenue from trading fees can be substantial even at modest volumes. A 0.1% taker fee on $1M in daily trading volume generates $30,000/month in revenue. Hit $5M daily volume and you’re at $150,000/month. The economics work — you just need to survive long enough to get there.

ROI Comparison: Custom vs. White-Label

Let me put the two main approaches side by side over a three-year period, because that’s the realistic horizon for evaluating an exchange investment.

Custom Development Scenario

• Months 1-15: Building. Zero revenue. Burning $25K-$50K/month on development.
• Month 16: Launch (optimistic). Starting to acquire users.
• Months 16-24: Growing slowly. Revenue starting to trickle in but not covering costs.
• Months 24-36: Potentially profitable if everything went well.
• Total investment by month 36: $800K - $1.5M
• Time to first revenue: 15-18 months
• Break-even point: 24-36 months (if you make it)

White-Label Scenario

• Months 1-2: Setup, configuration, launch. Total software cost: $3,899-$15,000.
• Month 2: Live and accepting users.
• Months 2-6: Growing, iterating, building liquidity.
• Months 6-12: Steady growth, approaching or reaching profitability.
• Total investment by month 36: $150K - $350K (including all operational costs)
• Time to first revenue: 1-2 months
• Break-even point: 6-12 months (realistic)

The white-label operator has 13-16 months of head start on revenue. That’s not just a financial advantage — it’s a survival advantage. In an industry where most exchanges fail within 18 months, being profitable at month 12 instead of still building at month 12 is the difference between success and a post-mortem.

Real-World Cost Scenarios

Let me map out three realistic budgets for launching an exchange. These include everything — software, legal, infrastructure, initial marketing, and enough runway to reach revenue.

The Bootstrap Budget: $50,000

This is tight but doable if you’re scrappy and strategic.

• Exchange software: $3,899 (Codono white-label license) — check pricing here
• Legal/licensing: $10,000 (offshore jurisdiction like SVG, basic legal setup)
• Server infrastructure (6 months): $9,000 ($1,500/month)
• KYC integration: $3,000 (provider setup + first few months)
• Security audit: $5,000 (focused penetration test)
• Branding/customization: $3,000 (logo, color scheme, basic modifications)
• Marketing (6 months): $10,000 (community building, social media, content)
• Liquidity capital: $5,000 (market making for key pairs)
• Contingency: $1,100

This gets you a legitimate, licensed exchange with professional software, a proper security posture, and enough marketing budget to build an initial user base. You’ll need to do a lot of the work yourself — community management, customer support, marketing — but plenty of successful exchanges started exactly this way.

The Mid-Range Budget: $100,000

This is the sweet spot for most serious operators.

• Exchange software: $5,899-$9,899 (mid-tier package with futures or P2P)
• Legal/licensing: $35,000 (mid-tier jurisdiction like Lithuania or Dubai)
• Server infrastructure (12 months): $30,000 ($2,500/month)
• KYC integration: $5,000
• Security audit: $20,000 (comprehensive third-party audit)
• Branding/customization: $5,000
• Marketing (6 months): $20,000
• Liquidity capital: $15,000
• Customer support (2 staff, 6 months): $18,000
• Legal retainer (6 months): $12,000
• Contingency: $5,000

With this budget, you’re launching with a legitimate mid-tier license, a well-tested platform, professional marketing, and enough operational runway to reach profitability. You can hire part-time support staff and maintain a legal retainer for ongoing compliance.

The Enterprise Budget: $300,000+

For funded startups going after serious market share.

• Exchange software: $9,899-$15,000 (full suite with mobile app, futures, P2P, staking)
• Legal/licensing: $80,000-$150,000 (premium jurisdiction, comprehensive legal setup)
• Server infrastructure (12 months): $60,000 ($5,000/month, high-availability)
• KYC integration: $10,000
• Security audits: $40,000 (multiple rounds, including smart contract audit if needed)
• Custom development: $30,000 (specialized features built on top of white-label base)
• Branding/design: $15,000 (professional brand identity and UX customization)
• Marketing (12 months): $60,000 (multi-channel campaign)
• Liquidity capital: $50,000
• Team (support, operations, compliance): $60,000 (12 months)
• Legal retainer (12 months): $30,000
• Contingency: $15,000

This budget delivers a premium exchange experience with a credible license, deep liquidity, professional marketing, and a team to operate it properly. You’re competing with mid-tier established exchanges, not just other startups.

How to Minimize Costs Without Cutting Corners

After watching hundreds of launches, here are the cost-saving strategies that actually work — as opposed to the ones that just create problems down the road.

Start with white-label, customize later. Launch on a proven crypto exchange platform and invest in custom development only after you’ve validated your market and have revenue to fund it. This is the single highest-impact cost decision you’ll make.

Choose your jurisdiction strategically. Don’t overspend on a premium license before you’ve proven the business model. Start with a jurisdiction that’s affordable and credible enough for your target market. Upgrade later when revenue justifies it.

Use integrated KYC instead of building your own. Platforms like Codono come with pre-built Sumsub integration that works out of the box. Building a custom KYC flow from scratch costs $30K-$50K and takes months. Using an existing integration costs nothing extra.

Leverage aggregated liquidity from day one. Don’t try to build organic liquidity before you have users. Connect to liquidity aggregators so your order books look healthy from launch. Real organic liquidity will build as your user base grows.

Don’t hire for scale before you need scale. Start with a lean team. One person can handle customer support, community management, and basic operations for the first 1,000 users. Hire when the workload demands it, not before.

Invest in security upfront. This sounds counterintuitive in a cost-minimization section, but a security incident is the most expensive thing that can happen to an exchange. A $15K audit that catches a critical vulnerability before launch is infinitely cheaper than the $500K+ cost of a breach (stolen funds, legal liability, destroyed reputation, lost users who never come back).

Skip the mobile app at launch (but plan for it). A responsive web interface works fine for your first few thousand users. Add a mobile trading app once you have traction and know your user base actually wants one. If you’re on a white-label platform that offers mobile, you can add it later without rebuilding.

Negotiate everything. KYC providers, hosting, legal fees, marketing services — everything in the exchange ecosystem is negotiable, especially if you can commit to volume or longer terms. I’ve seen operators cut their KYC costs in half just by asking for a volume discount.

The Bottom Line on Exchange Costs

Here’s what I’d tell a friend who asked me this question over coffee:

If you’re building custom from scratch, budget $200K-$500K for an MVP and give yourself 12-18 months before you see a single dollar of revenue. If you have that capital and patience, more power to you.

If you want to actually launch a business in the near term, get a white-label solution. You’ll spend $5K-$15K on software, another $40K-$100K on everything else (legal, infrastructure, marketing, operations), and you’ll be live in weeks instead of months. Your total first-year cost will be a fraction of what the custom route demands, and you’ll be generating revenue while the custom builders are still debugging their matching engine.

The exchange business is fundamentally about execution, not technology. The operators who win are the ones who launch fast, iterate based on real user feedback, and obsess over liquidity and user experience. The technology just needs to work reliably and securely — and a good white-label platform delivers exactly that.

Check out Codono’s pricing to see what the actual numbers look like for your situation. We’ve been doing this long enough to give you an honest assessment of what it’ll take, even if the answer isn’t “buy our software.”

The crypto exchange market still has enormous room for new entrants, especially in underserved regions and niches. The barrier to entry has never been lower. The question isn’t whether you can afford to build an exchange — it’s whether you can afford to spend six figures more than necessary when a proven, battle-tested alternative exists.