# Wallet-Only Platforms: Crypto Exchange Without KYC or an Account

Updated 24 September 2026, Terms read 18 September 2026, The Wallet First review desk

## Venues where a wallet signature is the entire sign-in

This is the register's own test, applied without the order-book condition the rest of the site adds, so
the table reaches wider here than anywhere else. A venue is entered when the sign-in its own onboarding
pages document is a signature from a wallet the trader already holds, with no email account, no social
login and no wallet the venue opens on their behalf. ApeX Omni, Aster, dYdX, edgeX, gTrade, Hyperliquid,
Ostium and Paradex all fail it and appear in no ranking on this site. Four of the eight that pass run an
order book we could sample and carry a score; the rest price against an oracle and are listed unscored.
Ordered by the overall score. Whatever the door asks for, a leveraged position asks for margin and can take all of it.

| Place | Venue | Score of 5 | Maker / taker | Perp markets |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lighter | 4.5 | 0% / 0% | 214 |
| 2 | Extended | 3.9 | 0% / 0.025% | 325 |
| 3 | EVEDEX | 3.4 | 0.015% / 0.045% | 52 |
| 4 | Aevo | 3.3 | 0.050% / 0.080% | 102 |
| – | Drift | not scored | Velocity: 0.0025% maker rebate / 0.06% taker | 4 |
| – | Jupiter Perps | not scored | 0.06% to open and to close, plus price impact and borrow fees | 3 |
| – | Orderly (WOOFi Pro) | not scored | 0.025% / 0.040% on WOOFi Pro | 80 |

Entry-tier fees on the BTC perpetual, read 18 September 2026. Listed but not scored: Drift, Jupiter Perps, Orderly (WOOFi Pro) — they price against an oracle and fill from a pool, so there is no resting order book to measure.

## Verdict

A crypto exchange without KYC still usually offers an email login as a fallback. Four order-book venues
do not: Lighter, Extended, EVEDEX and Aevo take a wallet signature and nothing else. Lighter comes first,
on zero default fees, though its free tier delays every taker order by 300 ms.

## 1 · [Lighter](https://docs.lighter.xyz) — 0% default fees on a wallet-only account (4.5 of 5)
Registration is a signed message from an Ethereum wallet, and deposits go to Lighter's smart contracts
([Lighter docs](https://docs.lighter.xyz/trading/api.md), checked 18 September 2026). The default account trades at 0% maker / 0% taker with
300 ms of extra taker latency, and critical exits can be submitted on-chain.

- For: 0% maker and taker on the default account; On-chain exit documented.
- Against: 300 ms taker delay on the free tier; No published screening policy in the docs we read.
- Not for: traders who want a recovery option.

## 2 · [Extended](https://docs.extended.exchange/) — the widest market list without an email (3.9 of 5)
Two wallet signatures create and register the account, EVM or Starknet
([Extended docs](https://docs.extended.exchange/extended-resources/account-operations/account-creation), checked 18 September 2026). 325 perpetual markets trade
at 0% maker / 0.025% taker. Its terms reserve the right to deny access after a risk assessment.

- For: 325 perpetual markets; 0.025% taker fee.
- Against: Terms reserve a risk assessment before access; No documented forced withdrawal.
- Not for: traders who want checks ruled out in writing.

## 3 · EVEDEX — non-crypto markets on a wallet-only account (3.4 of 5)
Sign-in is a wallet signature, and deposits arrive in USDT through a personal deposit contract on
Arbitrum (stated in the EVEDEX documentation, 18 September 2026). EVEDEX states it runs no traditional KYC and screens
deposits automatically. Its 52 markets include gold through
XAUT, silver, crude oil, EUR/USD, USD/JPY and US-listed shares, trading around the clock at
0.015% maker / 0.045% taker.

- For: Screening described in writing; Six asset classes on one USDT account, all 24/7.
- Against: Positions written to Arbitrum in batches rather than trade by trade; Cross margin only.
- Not for: UK retail clients.

## 4 · [Aevo](https://www.aevo.xyz/docs) — pre-IPO exposure from a wallet (3.3 of 5)
Aevo connects an EVM wallet and states in its terms that transactions happen only through the wallet
service a trader selects ([Aevo terms](https://app.aevo.xyz/terms), checked 18 September 2026). It lists 102
perpetual markets including pre-IPO names, at 0.050% maker / 0.080% taker.

- For: 102 markets, including pre-IPO exposure; Wallet-only sign-in.
- Against: 0.080% taker fee, the highest here; Median BTC depth of $3.8 million.
- Not for: cost-sensitive traders.

## [Drift](https://docs.velocity.exchange) — a Solana-native pool venue with no account (not scored, Paused; fork runs as Velocity)

The Drift v2 program has been paused since 1 April 2026, and the app and documentation now point at
Velocity Exchange, a fork running as its own Solana program. Velocity is self-custodial, with no
account to register and no balance held for a trader ([Velocity docs](https://docs.velocity.exchange/protocol/getting-started/wallet-setup), checked 18 September 2026).
Orders fill from an on-chain book worked by keepers or from the protocol's own pool, so there is no
resting depth for us to measure and no score here.

- For: Wallet-only, no account to register; Self-custodial by design.
- Against: Drift v2 paused since 1 April 2026, with trading moved to the Velocity fork; No resting order book to measure; BTC leverage capped at 20x on the live API.
- Not for: traders who want book depth they can inspect.

## [Jupiter Perps](https://docs.jup.ag/user-docs/trade/perps/index) — high leverage on three Solana markets (not scored, Oracle pool)

Jupiter Perps takes a Solana wallet and prices three markets — wBTC, SOL and ETH — from a shared pool
([Jupiter docs](https://docs.jup.ag/user-docs/trade/perps/faq), checked 18 September 2026). Its terms reserve the right to run KYC
and AML checks where it deems them necessary.

- For: Wallet-only sign-in; Up to 250x on three markets.
- Against: Terms reserve KYC and AML checks; Three markets only.
- Not for: traders who want a wide market list.

## [Orderly (WOOFi Pro)](https://orderly.network/docs) — a shared book reached through other front-ends (not scored, Hybrid, not scored)

Orderly authenticates wallets with EIP-712 signatures and serves its book through front-ends such as
WOOFi Pro ([Orderly docs](https://orderly.network/docs/build-on-omnichain/user-flows/wallet-authentication), checked 18 September 2026). The book is visible to logged-in accounts only,
so we could not measure its depth.

- For: Wallet authentication with no account; Book shared across several front-ends.
- Against: Depth not publicly measurable; The operator reads the whole order before it is matched.
- Not for: traders who compare venues by measured depth.

## What sets the order

1. No password to lose, no account to recover: the wallet key is the account on all four scored venues.
2. Cheapest of the four: Lighter at 0% maker / 0% taker on its default account.
3. Widest market list: Extended at 325 perpetual markets.
4. Beyond crypto: EVEDEX lists gold, silver, crude oil, two FX pairs and US-listed shares on the same account.

Weights: access 30, custody 25, cost 20, coverage 15, liquidity 10 (https://cafrodytes.com/how-we-score)

## Order books

BTC perpetual books sampled on 19 September 2026, ten minutes between readings, beginning just after midnight UTC; medians of all successful snapshots.

| Venue | $10,000 round trip | Spread | Depth, 10 bps | Impact, $100,000 | Snapshots |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lighter | $0.00 | 0.01 bps | $16.7 million | 0.62 bps | 56 |
| Extended | $5.00 | 0.12 bps | $7.3 million | 0.06 bps | 56 |
| EVEDEX | $9.00 | 4.12 bps | $17.9 million | 2.06 bps | 56 |
| Aevo | $16.00 | 1.91 bps | $3.8 million | 3.04 bps | 56 |

## What a crypto exchange without KYC gives up when it drops the email

Support. With an email account, a venue can send a recovery link, freeze a session or verify a request;
with a wallet signature there is nothing to verify against. A lost key is the end of the account, and
no desk can undo it. That is the trade a wallet-only venue makes, and it is why hardware wallets and
offline backups matter more here than on an exchange that knows who you are.

What a trader gains is that the venue never holds a document, a phone number or a password hash, so a
breach of the venue cannot expose them.

## Priced by oracle, not by a book

Drift, GMX, Jupiter Perps and Orderly also sign in with a wallet alone. Drift's own program has been
paused since April 2026 and its pages now redirect to Velocity, a fork whose documentation states that
it is self-custodial with no account to register ([Velocity docs](https://docs.velocity.exchange/protocol/getting-started/wallet-setup), checked 18 September 2026), GMX
offers a wallet or a built-in passkey wallet and calls access permissionless
([GMX docs](https://docs.gmx.io/docs/ai-agents/overview/), checked 18 September 2026), and Jupiter's terms reserve the right to run KYC and AML checks
if it deems them necessary ([Jupiter terms](https://docs.jup.ag/user-docs/legal/terms-of-use), checked 18 September 2026). All four price positions
against an oracle or route to a shared book, so the liquidity criterion has no resting depth to measure
and they carry no score here.

## Quoted

> "Velocity is self-custodial, so there is no account to register and no balance held on a trader's behalf." — Velocity Exchange documentation, Wallet setup, 18 September 2026. https://docs.velocity.exchange/protocol/getting-started/wallet-setup
> "We reserve the right to conduct "Know Your Customer" and "Anti-Money Laundering" checks on you if deemed necessary by us" — Jupiter, Terms of Use, 18 September 2026. https://docs.jup.ag/user-docs/legal/terms-of-use
> "You will not be able to engage in any transactions on the App other than through your selected electronic wallet service" — Aevo, Terms of Service, 18 September 2026. https://app.aevo.xyz/terms
## Method and limits

Not one of these figures was requested from a venue. The sign-up page, the terms of use behind it, the
fee schedule, the market list — each quoted as it stood on 18 September 2026, and where a marketing
line and a contract disagree the contract is what gets printed. All 4 venues here are
marked against [one rubric](/how-we-score), set down on 21 September 2026 before any had been read. Depth
is the exception: nobody publishes it usefully, so each venue's public BTC book was opened here and
sampled on 19 September 2026, ten minutes between readings, beginning just after midnight UTC. No account was registered, no order sent.

Which venues were eligible to be marked at all is settled before any of that, by the one test this
desk applies: the sign-in a venue's own onboarding pages document has to be a signature from a wallet
the trader already holds, with no email account, no social login and no wallet the venue opens for them
behind it. EVEDEX, Extended, Lighter and Aevo meet it and carry an order book we could sample. The
[admission test](/how-we-score#what-puts-a-venue-on-this-register) names the venues it keeps out, and
the front-page door count is where a reader can check the sorting venue by venue.

Silence in a column is not a clean finding: a venue that writes nothing about screening is recorded as
having written nothing. Every door and every custody line above is a venue describing itself, in a
document it wrote and may rewrite, and one address on one day can be asked for more than any page here
records.

Two narrower ones. Depth was read on BTC books alone; fee columns carry the rate a new account is
charged, nothing taken off.

## FAQ

### Is MetaMask non-KYC?

Yes: a wallet holds keys and signs transactions, and asks for nothing. On the four scored venues here
that signature is the entire sign-in, so the wallet you already use is the account, and its seed phrase
is the only credential that exists.

### Can you trade crypto without an account?

On these venues, yes. Lighter, Extended, EVEDEX and Aevo derive everything from a wallet signature, so
there is no email, password or profile to create. Deposits go to smart contracts that the venue
publishes, and withdrawals return to the wallet that sent them, which is also the only address that
can ask for them.

### What does no KYC mean in crypto?

No identity documents are collected before trading, and on these four venues no account is created at
all. Checks can still happen on-chain: EVEDEX describes automated AML screening of deposits, and Extended's terms allow a Know Your Transaction risk assessment before access is
granted.

### Why might someone avoid KYC in crypto?

Because documents stored by a venue can leak, and because an approval queue delays trading. The cost of
avoiding it is support: there is no password reset on a wallet-only venue, and a lost key cannot be
restored by anyone.

### Are non-KYC exchanges safe?

Safety here means custody, not paperwork. Lighter documents an exit that its sequencer must process
within a set time; the other three rely on the operator to release funds in the ordinary way. Audited
contracts holding collateral and a published bug bounty are the other two things our custody and
security inputs count.

### Should I use a decentralized exchange to avoid KYC?

If the aim is to avoid an account, a wallet-only venue does that whether its book is on-chain or not.
Compare instead on depth and cost: EVEDEX held a median
$17.9 million of BTC within 10 basis points in our snapshots.

### Which crypto exchanges have no KYC?

For perpetual futures, all the venues this desk reads. This page narrows that to the ones with no email
fallback at all: Lighter, Extended, EVEDEX and Aevo on the order-book side, and Drift's Velocity fork,
GMX, Jupiter Perps and Orderly among the pool and shared-book venues listed here without a score.

### What happens if I lose my wallet on a no-KYC exchange?

The position and the balance stay with the address, and nobody at the venue can move them for you.
There is no identity on file to prove ownership, which is the point of the model and also its hardest
edge. A hardware wallet and an offline backup are the whole safety net.

### Do I need an email to trade perpetuals?

Not on these four. Eight other venues — ApeX Omni, Aster, dYdX, edgeX, gTrade, Hyperliquid, Ostium and
Paradex — offer email or social logins alongside wallets, usually minting a managed wallet behind the
scenes. That second door is exactly what keeps them out of [this register](/no-kyc-crypto-exchange),
and their marks are published on [how we rate](/how-we-score) instead.

### Is a wallet signature secure enough to trade?

The signature proves control of the address, which is what the venue needs. The risk moves to key
handling: phishing signatures, a compromised device, a hot wallet with too much in it. Venues cannot
help with any of those, which is the trade you accept.

## Corrections

One formula, fixed 21 September 2026. The Wallet First review desk, 24 September 2026. Corrections: desk@cafrodytes.com

Publication here is paid for.