What a trade actually costs, and the win rate you need to come out ahead.
Read: how to buy a dollar for 80¢ on Kalshi, and why it still doesn't work →
Selling before expiry means a second fee. Enter your exit price to see the round trip.
Kalshi has no native NO order. Buying NO is entered as a sell of YES, so the screen shows a price you didn't type. Both rows below are the same trade.
| What you mean | What Kalshi shows | API |
|---|---|---|
| — | — | — |
NO price = 100 − YES price. It follows that buying both
sides at the touch always costs exactly 100¢ — which is why "capture the spread by buying
both sides" cannot work on a binary market, no matter how the trade is dressed up.
Kalshi publishes this as a multiplier column in a PDF appendix. Nothing in the trading interface tells you which tier a market is in.
Taker pays, maker is free. The maker multiplier defaults to 0,
so resting orders cost nothing. Covers most of the exchange, including all crypto
hourly and 15-minute markets.
Maker and taker both pay. Maker fee is 25% of the taker fee. Applies to most sports and the headline economic releases — 76 series in total, listed below.
No fees at all. Ten series trade completely free in both directions. Nothing on the trading screen indicates this.
Both multipliers are zero, so neither side pays anything. Ten series, as of the 7 July 2026 schedule.
If a series isn't on this list, it uses the standard schedule — you pay as a taker, and resting orders are free. Search by name or ticker.