Luno fees explained

The short answer

What Luno charges a South African account depends far more on which screen you use than on which coin you buy. On the Luno Exchange order book, a Tier 1 account pays 0.60 % as a taker or 0.40 % as a maker on crypto/ZAR pairs such as BTC/ZAR, but only 0.20 % as a taker on USDT/ZAR and USDC/ZAR, where makers receive a 0.01 % rebate. Buying or selling from the Portfolio screen (instant buy or sell) costs 2 % each way. Funding by ordinary bank transfer (EFT) carries no Luno fee, while the instant rails cost between 1.25 % and 2.5 %. A normal rand withdrawal is free; an express withdrawal costs R20.00 to a real-time-clearing bank or R80.00 to any other bank. Staking keeps 20 % to 40 % of your rewards, and sending crypto out of Luno carries a dynamic network-based fee that is only shown on the confirmation screen.

Every figure below is copied from Luno’s “fees and limits in South Africa” page (last updated 3 September 2026) and its supporting help-centre articles, all read on 6 September 2026. Where Luno does not publish a number, we say so.

Who this guide is for

It is for anyone holding or opening a Luno account verified in South Africa who wants the total cost of a transaction rather than the headline trading fee. South African customers contract with Luno (Pty) Ltd (registration 2013/075107/07), which the FSCA lists as a licensed crypto asset service provider under FSP 53314 (entry 166 of the December 2025 list). A licence says nothing about price, so the rest of this page is only about rand.

How we evaluated the fees

We read the published fee schedule and the help-centre pages on bank-transfer deposits, express withdrawals, withdrawal limits and Exchange trading, and recorded each number as printed. We have not opened an account or placed orders, so nothing here is based on our own transactions, and the worked examples are arithmetic on Luno’s published rates under assumptions we state. Our methodology explains what “verified” means on this site.

Luno Exchange trading fees: three pair classes and 13 tiers

Three things set the fee on the Luno Exchange: your 30-day trading volume, whether your order is a taker or a maker, and which class the pair belongs to. A taker order executes immediately at the market price; a maker order is a limit order that waits in the order book. Luno sums your trading across every Exchange market over the previous 30 days, excluding the current day, converts it to your primary currency and recalculates the total once a day at midnight GMT. Your current tier is displayed on the My Orders screen.

At Tier 1, which covers R0 to R20,000 of 30-day volume and therefore applies to most new accounts, the rates are:

• USDT/ZAR and USDC/ZAR: 0.20 % taker; maker orders receive a 0.01 % rebate (shown as −0.01 %).
• Other crypto/ZAR pairs (BTC/ZAR, ETH/ZAR, SOL/ZAR and so on): 0.60 % taker; 0.40 % maker.
• Crypto/crypto pairs (BTC/USDT, ETH/BTC and so on): 0.10 % taker; 0.08 % maker.

Rates step down through 13 tiers. Tier 2 (R20,000 to R200,000) trims the crypto/ZAR rates to 0.50 % taker and 0.30 % maker and the crypto/crypto maker rate to 0.07 %, with everything else unchanged. The crypto/ZAR maker fee reaches 0 % at Tier 7 (R10,000,000 to R20,000,000), and at Tier 13 (over R300,000,000) the taker fee is 0.05 % on both ZAR classes and 0.03 % on crypto/crypto pairs. Until 3 November 2026 the USDT/ZARU and USDC/ZARU pairs carry a promotional 0.05 % taker fee at every tier.

Worked example: a R10,000 bitcoin purchase at Tier 1

Assumptions: the account is at Tier 1, the order fills in full and the price does not move between orders.

• Market (taker) order on BTC/ZAR: 0.60 % × R10,000 = R60.00.
• Limit (maker) order on BTC/ZAR that later fills: 0.40 % × R10,000 = R40.00.
• Two-step route: buy USDT on USDT/ZAR as a taker (0.20 % = R20.00), then buy BTC on BTC/USDT as a taker (0.10 % of the remaining R9,980 = R9.98). Total R29.98, before any spread or price movement on the second market.

If your 30-day volume were R50,000 you would sit at Tier 2, and the same R10,000 BTC/ZAR trade would cost R50.00 as a taker or R30.00 as a maker.

Instant buy and sell: 2 % each way

Buying or selling from the Portfolio screen costs 2 % of the transaction for buys and 2 % for sells. ZAR Supercoin (ZARSC) is the exception: 0 % to buy and 3 % to sell. Per-transaction limits in rand run from R1.00 to R1,500,000, with no limit on the number of transactions. These costs do not apply to orders placed on the Luno Exchange. The same page lists an “instant buy with card” option at 3.9 % (minimum R15.00, maximum R30,000 per transaction) but states that the feature is currently unavailable.

Worked example: R10,000 in and out

Assumptions: the 2 % is charged on the rand value of each transaction and the price is unchanged when you sell.

• Instant buy R10,000: 2 % = R200.00. Instant sell the resulting R9,800: 2 % = R196.00. Round trip: R396.00, about 4 % of the amount you started with.
• Exchange taker orders both ways at Tier 1: R60.00 on the buy, then 0.60 % of R9,940 = R59.64 on the sell. Round trip: R119.64, about 1.2 %.

Whether Luno’s instant quote includes any spread on top of the 2 % is not stated on the fee page, so treat the 2 % as the published floor rather than the full cost.

Deposit fees: EFT is free, instant rails cost 1.25 % to 2.5 %

Every cell below is copied from Luno’s South African fee page.

Method	Luno fee	Limit
Bank transfer (EFT)	Free	No limit
Instant deposit	1.4 %	R100,000
Absa Pay	1.4 %	R100,000
Capitec Pay	1.25 % under R1,000; R9.00 over R1,000	R100,000
Apple Pay	2.5 %	R50 to R30,000

Bank transfers carry no Luno fee, but Luno notes that your own bank may charge EFT fees. Because Luno banks with Standard Bank, EFTs from a Standard Bank account reflect near-instantly; from other banks a deposit can take up to two business days, and longer over weekends and public holidays. Capitec and Absa customers cannot make an ordinary EFT to Luno at all and must use Capitec Pay, Absa Pay or another rail. Cash deposits are prohibited by the Terms of Use; Luno says it charges R20.00 plus 5 % on any that arrive and may suspend an account after more than one. International deposits are reversed and may attract a bank reversal fee. Our Luno data profile flags that a second Luno article quotes a different Capitec Pay limit (R150,000), so confirm the limit in the app before relying on it.

Worked example: funding R5,000

• EFT: R0.00 from Luno (your bank’s EFT fee, if any, is unknown to us).
• Instant deposit or Absa Pay: 1.4 % = R70.00.
• Capitec Pay: R9.00 flat, because R5,000 is over R1,000 (0.18 %). A R800 Capitec Pay deposit would instead cost 1.25 % = R10.00.
• Apple Pay: 2.5 % = R125.00.

Withdrawal fees: normal is free, express is R20.00 or R80.00

A normal rand withdrawal is free and reflects in your bank account up to two business days after Luno processes it, sooner for Standard Bank. An express withdrawal arrives the same day and costs R20.00 if your bank is a real-time-clearing (RTC) participant or R80.00 if it is not. Luno’s current RTC list is ABSA, Access Bank, African Bank, AlBaraka Bank, Bidvest Bank, Capitec Bank, Discovery Bank, Finbond EPE, Finbond Mutual Bank, First National Bank, HBZ Bank, Investec Bank, Nedbank, SASFIN, Standard Bank, Standard Chartered, Tymebank and UBank LTD; every other supported bank pays R80.00. Express withdrawals below R250,000 are processed around the clock, including weekends and public holidays; above R250,000 they are processed Monday to Friday between 00:00 and 15:45. Standard Bank customers are not offered the express option because their withdrawals reflect in about 15 minutes between 08:00 and 17:45, Monday to Saturday.

The minimum rand withdrawal is R10, the fee is added on top of the amount you enter, and rand can only go to a South African bank account in your own name. One wording to be aware of: Luno’s general withdrawal article says it only charges a fee if your bank charges Luno a fee, whereas the South African fee page simply lists normal withdrawals as free. The confirmation screen shows the exact fee before you approve, so check it there.

Two express examples: R20.00 on a R2,000 withdrawal to an RTC bank is 1 % of the amount, and R80.00 on the same withdrawal to a non-RTC bank is 4 %; on R50,000 the R20.00 fee is 0.04 %.

Staking: 20 % to 40 % of rewards

Luno charges nothing to stake or unstake, but it keeps a service fee from every reward payment: 20 % on ADA, 30 % on ETH, 35 % on DOT, NEAR, SOL and AVAX, and 40 % on ATOM. Rewards land in your Staking Wallet with the fee already deducted, and the annual rewards percentage shown before you stake is net of it. As an illustration only, not a Luno rate or a forecast: if a staked ETH position earned gross rewards worth R400 in a year, Luno’s 30 % would take R120.00 and R280.00 would reach your wallet. Staking also carries protocol and lock-up risks that Luno documents separately.

Sending crypto: a dynamic fee you only see at confirmation

Luno charges a dynamic send fee that combines the live blockchain fee with what it calls its operational costs; XRP is the single exception at a fixed 0.03 %. No per-coin fee table is published, so the rand cost of withdrawing BTC, ETH or USDT is unknown until the confirmation screen shows it. Receiving crypto is free, except that BTC receipts below 0.00000546 BTC incur an equivalent anti-dust fee. Send limits depend on verification level: USD 2,400 per 24 hours and USD 12,400 per 30 days at Level 1, USD 12,000 and USD 60,000 at Level 2, and USD 120,000 and USD 600,000 at Level 3, with Luno noting that actual limits are tailored and may differ.

Other products on the same fee page

Tokenised stocks and ETFs cost 1 % per trade (minimum R20.00, maximum approximately R180,000). Bundles cost 1 % to buy, 1 % to sell and a 2 % per-annum rebalancing fee charged quarterly. Luno Pay at Pick n Pay is free between R1.00 and R100,000. Prediction-market positions carry fees set by the third-party Limitless protocol (0.03 % to 3 % to buy, 0 % to 1.5 % to sell) plus a network fee on payouts. The OTC desk, which our data profile records as starting from about USD 50,000, publishes no pricing.

What Luno does not publish

• The rand cost of sending any coin other than XRP.
• Whether the instant buy and sell quote contains a spread beyond the 2 %.
• Your bank’s own EFT fee for depositing.
• OTC desk pricing.
• When card purchases at 3.9 % will return.

Advantages and disadvantages, on fees alone

The strengths are a free rand rail in both directions, a cheap stablecoin market (0.20 % taker on USDT/ZAR and USDC/ZAR with a maker rebate from the first trade) and R20.00 same-day withdrawals to most banks. The weaknesses are a 0.60 % Tier 1 taker rate on BTC/ZAR, where VALR’s verified Tier 1 taker on the same pair is 0.35 %; a 2 % instant buy and sell fee against VALR’s 1.6 % simple buy; and staking fees that take up to 40 % of rewards. None of these figures includes spread, which is not published as a fixed number.

KYC and the limits that follow

Fees are the same at every verification level, but limits are not. Luno accepts a South African ID card (front and back), ID book, driver’s licence or valid passport, with no temporary IDs, plus a colour selfie when requested and proof of residential address dated within three months. Level 1 caps deposits and withdrawals at R15,000 over the life of the account, Level 2 at R50,000 per month, and full verification removes the rand limits. Verification is usually automatic within minutes.

Risks

Luno changes this page without notice (it was updated three days before we read it) and the ZARU promotion ends on 3 November 2026. Percentage fees are small on large amounts and stack quickly on small ones: the instant round trip above cost about 4 % before the asset moved at all. Crypto prices are volatile, staking rewards are not fixed and a send to the wrong address is irreversible. Nothing here is financial advice.

Next steps

• Put your own amounts through the fee calculator.
• Read the Luno data profile for licence, KYC and availability details.
• Compare with VALR’s fees, or see the two side by side in VALR vs Luno.
• For the last leg, see how to withdraw crypto to a South African bank account.