Security, Usability, Look & Feel – a great experience
CEX.IO started out life as one of the
best crypto mining platforms
ever, having achieved notoriety with its cloud-mining brand GHash.IO. However, when profitability began to dwindle, a rapid sidestep led to the development of the awesome CEX.IO global crypto exchange.
The previous mining experience shines through on this site, which is superbly laid out, fast-loading and an absolute pleasure to navigate. It makes no difference whether you are new to the crypto market or a seasoned crypto enthusiast, there’s plenty here to suit anyone.
There’s certainly nothing lacking in terms of security either. SSL encrypted web pages are present throughout the site, easily identified by the https:// URL and verified by hovering over the adjacent padlock icon.
In addition, at any point where you connect with CEX.IO’s trading platforms, multi-factor authentication is required and your connection with the site enjoys 256-bit AES encryption from that point onwards.
Lastly, our CEX.IO review has established that over 99% of users’ crypto is held in offline cold storage. However, we would always recommend that if you have a large holding, you should invest in one of the
top crypto hardware wallets. That way you always maintain full control of your valued crypto assets.
How to Trade – you can benefit from enhanced verification
Opening an account
Signing up for an account at CEX.IO is very straightforward. Initially, you’ll need to provide your name, email address, country of residence and decide on a password. Once you’ve submitted this information, you will need to verify your email address by inputting a confirmation code you’ll receive via email.
At this point your account is open and you can start exploring the CEX.IO platform, but you’ll need to complete a full registration before you can commence any trading activities, as CEX.IO does not support DeFi principles.
Three-level account verification:
1. Name
You can start trading just by providing verification of your full name. For this part you’ll need to upload a government-issued photo ID document appropriate to your country of residence. You’ll find full details of suitable documents listed for every country on the CEX.IO website.
2. Address
Once your personal ID has been verified, you’ll be assigned fixed deposit and withdrawal limits. At this point, you can commence trading, or you can opt to continue to the next level of the verification process, which is concerned with your permanent address. If you are successful with this enhanced verification, your deposit and withdrawal limits will automatically increase.
3. Enhanced
Once you have been using the CEX.IO crypto exchange for long enough to establish a regular trading volume, you can apply (or may be invited) to undergo an enhanced verification process. Your trading volume will include
leveraged crypto trading, as well as buying and/or selling crypto.
The exact requirements for enhanced verification are not disclosed, as each case is reviewed individually. What we can tell you though, is that if you are successful, you will not have any limitations placed on your account for deposits and withdrawals.
Payments – a great selection of payment options here
Our CEX.IO review found an excellent selection of payment options available for users. They might vary slightly depending on your country of residence, but these are the main ones:
- Visa and Mastercard (credit or debit)
- ACH (or equivalents like SEPA and Faster Payment)
- Bank wire transfer
- Skrill
- Neteller
- PayPal
Most of the payment methods listed will attract fees for making deposits and withdrawing funds from your CEX.IO account, which vary according to the payment method you select, the jurisdiction you are under and the fiat currency you are using.
Bank wire transfer is the costliest, attracting a 3.80% service charge, plus a $25 standard fee per withdrawal transaction. Conversely, ACH (or equivalent) transactions are all completely free of charge for all transactions.
The remaining options have variable commissions and fixed fees applied to deposits and withdrawals, so it definitely pays to give this some thought. However, we can’t say that CEX.IO is the
best PayPal cryptocurrency exchange, as using PayPal (where available) unfortunately comes at quite a high cost:
- Deposits: 2.99% service charge and 4.39% commission
- Withdrawals: 1% plus $5.00 fixed fee and 2% commission
Customer Service – full marks for customer support
Regrettably, we find that cryptocurrency exchanges do not always pay quite enough attention to this vital side of their businesses, but that is far from true here. Our CEX.IO review can find nothing but excellent all-round support for users of this crypto exchange.
The customer support team is available to contact 24/7 and CEX.IO provides plenty of ways to get in touch with them. The primary method is live chat which you can access by clicking on the friendly-looking robot waiting at the bottom right of your page.
If you use this method, you’ll get straight through to a human, there is actually no annoying bot to get past first, which is very refreshing. If you’re not a fan of live chat, or you have a more complex enquiry, you can make use of CEX.IO’s online support centre, use the dedicated phone number or an email address to get in touch instead.
Regardless of the method used, during our CEX.IO review we found responses fast and professional at all times and we rate the exchange highly in this regard.
License & Security – no compromises made on this site
Our CEX.IO review is happy to confirm that this crypto exchange is well-regulated and holds a number of licences, in various jurisdictions, which covers all 188 countries where it operates. CEX.IO also services a total of 48 US states and has obtained individual licensing for 30 of them.
CEX.IO is regulated by the GFSC (Gibraltar Financial Services Commission) as a DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology) Provider right across Europe.
In the US, CEX.IO is registered with FinCEN as an MSB (Money Services Business) and in addition, it holds 30 separate MTLs (Money Transmitter Licenses). The exchange is also registered as a MSB with FINTRAC, to cover its services in Canada.
At the time of compiling our CEX.IO review, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has granted CEX.IO temporary registration as a Crypto Asset Business, permitting it to carry out crypto asset activities until such time as the application is completed.
Security
Our CEX.IO review can confirm that this exchange has all of the right security protocols in place throughout the site. We can confirm that all web pages are SSL encrypted, giving you a secure connection between your browser and the website.
Additional 256-bit AES encryption is in place for all connections that involve financial transactions or the transmission of any personal information. This is backed up further by the implementation of multi-factor authentication for all crypto activities.
The security level exhibited here is very similar to our findings when we looked whether Coinbase is safe. And as Coinbase is considered the top crypto exchange in the world, it goes to show that CEX.IO is doing a great job.
All user funds held by CEX.IO are stored in offline cold wallets, the only exception to that being the time that elapses between when a deposit is made and the daily reconciliation procedure that moves them over automatically.
CEX.IO does state that a small percentage of the total crypto value on the exchange is held in hot wallets. But to be clear on that point, those funds are 99.99% company funds. In reality, if the site were to be hacked (which it never has been successfully), all user funds would be completely safe.
Reputation and Customer Feedback – suitably impressive
A part of our crypto exchange reviews involves checking out crypto forums and user reviews to get a general feel for how those using an exchange really feel about it. Unfortunately, we often find it does not make pleasant reading, but when we completed our CEX.IO review, we were in for a real surprise.
CEX.IO’s efforts to provide excellent customer support to its users has certainly paid off and it is evidently very well-liked by its customers. On Trustpilot, CEX.IO has achieved 4.7 out of 5 stars, making it one of the
best cryptocurrency exchanges
to engage with. A massive 79% of the reviews left gave it a five-star rating, which is exceptionally high for a cryptocurrency exchange.
We would also add that CEX.IO is also quite hot on keeping in touch with its user base on these channels and we observed plenty of polite, individual responses to many of the comments, which is another point very much in CEX.IO’s favor.
In summary, CEX.IO itself is not a scam, but always stay vigilant and verify the legitimacy of any requests or offers you receive
