Hyperliquid vs Lighter
Lighter is cheaper: a $1,000 buy-and-sell costs $0.00 in platform fees vs $0.86 on Hyperliquid. Pick Hyperliquid if you are perps traders outside the US who want onchain order-book trading from their own wallet, with fees that drop by volume and HYPE staking. Pick Lighter if you are non-US, non-UK retail perps traders who want zero trading fees and can accept slower taker execution than paid accounts.
Checked 2026-10-16 · both venues' fee pagesHyperliquid is a layer-1 blockchain whose HyperCore layer runs fully onchain perpetual futures and spot order books, with a HyperEVM smart-contract layer alongside. It targets active perps traders who want order-book trading from a self-custodied wallet.
Lighter is an order-book perpetuals and spot exchange running as a ZK rollup on Ethereum, operated by Elliot Technologies, Inc. Its default Standard account trades with zero maker and taker fees; lower-latency Premium and Plus accounts pay fees.
Lighter saves $0.86 per $1,000 round trip.
Side by side
| Hyperliquid | Lighter | |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Perp DEX | Perp DEX |
| Status | live | live |
| Chains | Hyperliquid | Ethereum |
| Platforms | web | web, ios, android |
| Custody | non-custodial | non-custodial |
| KYC | none | none |
| Platform fee, round trip | 0.09% | 0% |
| $1,000 round trip | $0.90 | $0.00 |
| Sign-up perk | 4% discount on fees for the first $25M of volume | 10% discount on fees paid, rebated every Monday; first week of Premium/Advanced fees rebated |
| Perps taker / maker | 0.045% / 0.015% | 0% / 0% |
| United States | Not available | Not available |
| United Kingdom | Unverified | Not available |
| European Union | Unverified | Unverified |
| Launched | 2023-02 | 2025-10 |
| Reported incidents | 4 | 2 |
Features
| Feature | Hyperliquid | Lighter |
|---|---|---|
| perps | ✓ | ✓ |
| spot | ✓ | ✓ |
| order book | ✓ | ✓ |
| limit orders | ✓ | — |
| vaults | ✓ | — |
| staking discounts | ✓ | — |
| builder codes | ✓ | — |
| HIP-3 builder-deployed perps | ✓ | — |
| outcome markets | ✓ | — |
| HyperEVM | ✓ | — |
| API | ✓ | ✓ |
| zero-fee standard account | — | ✓ |
| RWA perps | — | ✓ |
| pre-IPO markets | — | ✓ |
| public pools | — | ✓ |
| LLP vault | — | ✓ |
| multi-asset margin | — | ✓ |
| sub-accounts | — | ✓ |
"—" means the feature was not in the sources we checked, not proof it's missing.
Hyperliquid: watch out for
- The Terms bar US and Ontario residents and prohibit VPN use to get around that.
- The HLP vault has absorbed manipulation losses, including a reported $4.9M on POPCAT in November 2025.
- Validators delisted the JELLY market and settled it at a fixed price in March 2025, an intervention critics questioned.
Lighter: watch out for
- Free Standard accounts carry 300 ms taker latency versus 140 ms on paid Premium accounts.
- The Terms exclude US, Canadian and UK residents, among others.
- A roughly four-hour outage during the October 2025 crash left users unable to manage positions.
FAQ
Is Hyperliquid better than Lighter?
Lighter is cheaper: a $1,000 buy-and-sell costs $0.00 in platform fees vs $0.86 on Hyperliquid. Pick Hyperliquid if you are perps traders outside the US who want onchain order-book trading from their own wallet, with fees that drop by volume and HYPE staking. Pick Lighter if you are non-US, non-UK retail perps traders who want zero trading fees and can accept slower taker execution than paid accounts.
Which is cheaper, Hyperliquid or Lighter?
Lighter. On a $1,000 round trip: Lighter $0.00 vs Hyperliquid $0.86, platform fees only.
Can I use Hyperliquid or Lighter in the US?
Hyperliquid: not available. Lighter: not available. Based on each venue's own terms.
Sources
Last checked . Fees and terms change often; the venue's own page wins if it disagrees with ours.
- Hyperliquid Docs: Fees — checked 2026-10-16
- Hyperliquid Docs: Referrals — checked 2026-10-16
- Hyperliquid Docs: Builder codes — checked 2026-10-16
- Hyperliquid Terms of Use (last updated June 15, 2026) — checked 2026-10-16
- Hyperliquid Docs: About Hyperliquid — checked 2026-10-16
- Hyperliquid Docs: Core contributors — checked 2026-10-16
- Lighter Docs: Trading Fees — checked 2026-10-16
- Lighter Docs: LIT Fee Credits — checked 2026-10-16
- Lighter Docs: Referral Program — checked 2026-10-16
- Lighter Docs: Introduction — checked 2026-10-16
- Lighter Terms of Service (last updated December 29, 2025) — checked 2026-10-16
- Lighter Mobile on the App Store (linked from app.lighter.xyz) — checked 2026-10-16