Instant crypto exchanges are the Paypals of crypto transfers. Unlike conventional exchanges, there’s no extremely long registration process, or even KYC norms — what you have is instant crypto transfers.

The conversion rates between cryptocurrencies change depending on their availability, demand and supply in the exchanges. A service that offers the highest conversion rate for exchange between one cryptocurrency pair might not offer the same for other exchange pairs. Therefore, to get the best deal, it is essential that you compare the rates across services. This is cumbersome if you have to visit every site to find the conversion rate.

Background

Crypto exchanges allow you to choose the coins you want to exchange and receive, type in the amount you want to exchange and voila! The amount of the other coin you’ll receive is instantly displayed.

You need to accept if you are okay with the exchange rate. Or keep refreshing every 10 seconds or so, because that’s how frequently the exchange rate changes. Or just visit another site. Or better yet, use a crypto exchange aggregator like CoinSwitch, which displays exchange rates across some of the best exchanges all at one place.

If you’re proceeding with the transaction, enter the address where you’d like to receive your coins and a refund address (coins you send are refunded here if exchange fails).

You’ll be shown a deposit address with a QR code. Send your coins to this address

Now that we’ve gotten how things work out of the way, let’s look at the pros and cons of each service and how they compare against each other.

Pros:

ShapeShift

Hassle free, fast service, no registration of any sort.

Much quicker transfers than conventional exchanges.

No hidden fee. Fixed miner fee is displayed.

Considered a reliable service by the crypto community.

Also offers fiat (USD/EUR) to crypto (Bitcoin) exchange feature powered by a third party service.

Supports over 50 cryptocurrencies.

Integrated with other crypto services like crypto wallets.

Changelly

Typically offers the highest exchange rate for most coin exchanges.

Supports 80 cryptocurrencies.

Fast hassle free exchange.

Supports fiat (USD/EUR) to crypto (Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash and Ether) conversion. Changelly has signed up with a third party service to provide the feature

Integrated with other services like crypto wallets.

Evercoin

Supports 20 cryptocurrencies.

Fast, hassle free service with no hidden fees.

Provided fix exchange rate for 10 minutes.

Cons:

ShapeShift

Conversion rates are often lower than that offered by Changelly and therefore gives a lower amount of coins in exchange than Changelly in general.

There have been major hacks in the past and cryptocurrencies have been stolen.

A Visa credit card denominated in USD/EUR is required to buy Bitcoin on the site.

Fiat to crypto conversion fee is high.

Changelly

Requires email ID to exchange cryptocurrencies.

Exact conversion rate isn’t offered. Only an estimated conversion rate is displayed before the exchange takes place.

A Visa credit card is required for fiat to crypto conversion.

Fiat to crypto conversion fee is high.

Evercoin

Has the lowest conversion rate among the three compared services. In other words, gives the lowest amount of coins in exchange when compared with the other services.

No fiat to crypto conversion service.

Not integrated with third party crypto services.

Final words:

A cryptocurrency exchange aggregator services can solve this problem of conversion rates and coins availability. CoinSwitch is one such service that can be used to find exchange rates for over 275 cryptocurrencies and 45000 exchange pairs across half a dozen popular exchanges including ShapeShift, Changelly and Evercoin. What’s more, CoinSwitch displays the best rates by not only comparing with ShapeShift, Changelly and Evercoin but we also support major exchanges like Bittrex, KuCoin, Cryptopia and many more.

If this is too daunting to you, you’re not alone. Which is why you can use a crypto exchange aggregator like us to find the best rates among a number of exchanges before you exchange your cryptocurrencies!