Disclosure: Deploy Finance publishes this page and offers a competing product that appears in it.
Not financial advice. Crypto, DeFi and perpetual-futures strategies can lose money, including your whole deposit. Yields are variable, and past or backtested results do not predict future returns. Read the risk disclosure.
Most people earn their first crypto yield on an exchange. Binance, Coinbase, Kraken, OKX, Bybit, Bitget, KuCoin, Gate, Crypto.com, and Nexo all pay you for leaving assets in your account, through savings products, staking, or rewards on stablecoin balances. You click once and the rate starts accruing.
Deploy Finance asks for a few more clicks and changes two things. Your USDC moves to a wallet you own instead of staying with an exchange, and the return comes from a trading strategy instead of a rate the exchange publishes. This page compares the exchange programs with each other and with that approach.
How exchange earn programs compare
| Program | Who holds your assets | Who sets the rate | Main products | Lock-up |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Deploy Finance | You, in a self-custodial wallet | The market: funding paid by leveraged traders | Income: Funding Rates and Superstar agents | None documented; revoke and withdraw |
| Binance Earn | Binance | Binance, per product; flexible rates can change by the minute | Simple Earn (flexible and locked), staking, Dual Investment, onchain yields | Locked products; early exit deducts rewards paid |
| Coinbase | Coinbase | Coinbase | Staking (with a commission on rewards), USDC rewards | Network unstaking queues |
| Kraken | Kraken | Kraken | Auto Earn across staking, opt-in, and stablecoin rewards; a higher USDC rate for Kraken+ | No lock-up on USDC rewards |
| OKX | OKX | Borrowing demand on its lending market, less a 15% service fee | Simple Earn, which lends your assets to borrowers on the exchange | Flexible |
| Bybit | Bybit | Bybit; floating for flexible, locked in for fixed term | Easy Earn flexible and fixed-term savings | Fixed-term products |
| Bitget | Bitget | Bitget, per product | Flexible savings (daily interest) and fixed savings | Fixed terms such as 7, 14, 30, or 60 days |
| KuCoin | KuCoin | KuCoin, per product; frequent capped promotions | Simple Earn (flexible and fixed), staking | Fixed products redeem at maturity |
| Gate | Gate | Borrowing demand for Simple Earn; Gate for fixed products | Simple Earn, HODL and Earn (flexible and fixed) | Fixed-term products |
| Crypto.com | Crypto.com | Crypto.com, by term | Earn with flexible, 1-month, and 3-month terms; higher limits for CRO lockup tiers | 1- and 3-month terms |
| Nexo | Nexo | Nexo, by loyalty tier | Flexible and fixed-term savings, with higher rates for NEXO token holders | Fixed terms up to 12 months |
What exchange programs have in common
Every program above is custodial. The exchange holds your assets for as long as they earn, and your claim is against the exchange. That brings real convenience: no wallet to set up, no gas, no keys to store, and rewards that land in the same account you trade from.
It also brings three things to understand:
- The rate is a decision. Exchanges set or pass through the rate, change it when markets or promotions change, and sometimes reserve the best rate for paid tiers or token holders.
- The terms vary by product. Flexible and locked products, tiered rates, caps, and early-exit rules all differ, often within the same exchange.
- Access follows the exchange. Identity verification is required, and products differ by country. Whether US platforms may pay rewards on stablecoin balances is also an open policy question after the CLARITY Act failed a Senate procedural vote in September 2026.
The programs, one by one
Binance Earn
Binance Earn bundles Simple Earn flexible and locked products, ETH and SOL staking through WBETH and BNSOL, Dual Investment, and onchain yields. Flexible rates follow a real-time APR that can change every minute. Redeeming a locked product early deducts the rewards already paid from your principal.
Coinbase
Coinbase pays staking rewards on eligible assets and takes a commission from them, commonly cited at 25–35% of gross rewards. It also pays rewards on USDC held in an account, tied in the US to a paid Coinbase One membership.
Kraken
Kraken's Auto Earn allocates eligible balances to its staking, opt-in, and stablecoin rewards programs automatically. USDC earns a variable rate, higher for Kraken+ subscribers, that accrues daily and pays weekly. Kraken funds it as a loyalty program, and it was available in the US, Canada, Australia, and the UK as of October 2026. USDC stays tradable and withdrawable while it earns.
OKX
OKX Simple Earn pools your assets and lends them to borrowers on the exchange, including margin traders and loan customers. Interest from borrowers is shared across all eligible subscriptions, OKX keeps 15% of returns as a service fee, and redemption is available at any time.
Bybit
Bybit's Easy Earn offers flexible savings at a floating rate with no lock-up, and fixed-term savings where the rate and duration are locked when you subscribe.
Bitget
Bitget's flexible savings pay daily interest and redeem anytime. Fixed savings lock the asset for a set term, such as 7, 14, 30, or 60 days depending on the asset, for a higher rate. Bitget also offers staking and Dual Investment alongside them.
KuCoin
KuCoin's Simple Earn has flexible products you can redeem anytime and fixed products that redeem automatically at maturity. Stablecoin rates often come as time-limited promotions with caps per user, such as a 2026 USDG campaign capped at 1,000,000 USDG.
Gate
Gate's Simple Earn works like a savings account funded by borrowers on the exchange, with instant redemption. HODL and Earn adds fixed-term lock products next to the flexible ones.
Crypto.com
Crypto.com Earn offers flexible, 1-month, and 3-month terms, with the rate locked at allocation on fixed terms. Higher allocation limits are tied to tiers that require locking up CRO, Crypto.com's token, for a year.
Nexo
Nexo pays daily interest on flexible and fixed-term savings across dozens of assets, with fixed terms of up to 12 months. Its best rates depend on loyalty tier, which rises with the share of your portfolio held in NEXO tokens, and on choosing to take interest in NEXO.
Where Deploy Finance differs
Deploy moves the asset out of the exchange and replaces the rate with a strategy.
Custody. You sign in with email or Google and Deploy creates a self-custodial wallet on Privy's embedded-wallet infrastructure, with keys you can export. The agent receives a session key that can trade but cannot transfer or withdraw. Leaving never depends on an exchange processing a request.
Return. Income: Funding Rates holds roughly 75% of capital as the spot asset and uses 25% to back a 3x perpetual short of matching notional on Hyperliquid. It collects funding that leveraged longs pay every hour and rebalances automatically. There is no quoted rate. The return rises when traders want leverage, shrinks when they do not, and the agent closes positions rather than paying when funding turns negative.
Terms. There is one custody model and no product menu, no tier, no lock-up table, and no token to hold for a better rate. Deploy charges no subscription and no management fee; gas and trade fees apply.
Deploy also offers Superstar, a directional agent that takes long or short positions under a defined strategy, from the same wallet.
When one of them fits better
- Binance or Bybit if you want a wide menu of flexible, fixed, and structured products on assets you already hold there.
- Coinbase or Kraken if you want rewards on USDC without leaving an exchange you already use, and accept their membership terms.
- OKX if you want your idle balance lent to margin borrowers at a market rate inside the exchange.
- Bitget, KuCoin, or Gate if you already trade there and want flexible or short fixed-term savings in the same account.
- Crypto.com if you are already in its CRO tiers and want term deposits of one or three months.
- Nexo if you hold NEXO tokens and want fixed-term rates tied to its loyalty tiers.
Learn more
- Income: Funding Rates overview
- How to earn yield on USDC without giving up custody
- Best way to earn interest on crypto
- Deploy Finance vs Binance Earn
- Deploy Finance vs Coinbase Earn
- Deploy Finance wallets
Start with Deploy Finance
Create a self-custodial Deploy Finance wallet and review the live agents.