Perps funding and swap fees explained (and why we charge swap, not funding)

Two ways to pay for holding a perp

Holding a perpetual future costs money. How much, and how predictably, depends on which of two models the venue uses:

• Funding. Longs and shorts pay each other a variable rate, set by the market.
• A swap fee. You pay a fixed rate for every hour a position is open.

Exchanges use funding. Prop firms are split: some pass exchange funding through to your simulated account, others charge a flat swap. Funded With Perps charges a flat swap. Here is how both models work, the math on each, and why we chose the one we did.

How funding works

A perp has no expiry date, so nothing forces its price to meet the spot price the way a dated future converges at expiry. Funding does that job.

When the perp trades above spot, the funding rate is positive and longs pay shorts. When it trades below, the rate turns negative and shorts pay longs. The payment is a percentage of your position's notional value, settled on a schedule: every eight hours on many centralized exchanges, every hour on Hyperliquid.

Three things follow:

1. The rate moves. It reflects how crowded one side of the market is. In a calm market it sits near a small baseline. When everyone wants to be long, it can run far above that for days.
2. It can pay you. If you are on the side that receives funding, holding earns you money.
3. It is hard to plan around. You know the rate for the current period. You do not know next week's.

You can see the live funding rate for every market we list on our markets page. We show it for reference only. It never touches your balance.

How a swap fee works

A swap fee is a fixed holding charge. Ours is 0.03% of the position's notional value per day, charged in hourly pieces (one twenty-fourth of the daily rate each hour) while the position is open. Long or short, the rate is the same, and it does not change with the market.

On top of that you pay a commission of 0.03% of notional on each fill: once to open, once to close.

The math, side by side

Take a $10,000 position. That is the notional value: $1,000 of margin at 10x, or $10,000 with no leverage at all. Fees are charged on the notional either way.

Funding is harder to put in a table, because the rate is variable. The honest answer is a range. When funding sits near its baseline, a week of holding on the paying side can cost about what a flat swap costs. When the market is crowded on your side, it can cost several times more. On the receiving side, you get paid instead.

So a swap fee is not always cheaper. On the receiving side of funding it always costs more, because a swap never pays you. What it always is, is known in advance.

Why we charge swap, not funding

Predictable costs. The rules of a challenge are fixed numbers: a 3% daily loss limit and a 6% max loss. A holding cost that jumps with the market makes those limits harder to plan against. With a flat swap you can work out what a position costs to hold before you open it, and that number does not change while you hold.

The same price for longs and shorts. Under funding, the cost of a trade depends on which side the crowd is on. With a swap, a long and a short pay the same, so your result comes from your trade, not from everyone else's positioning.

The challenge measures trading. Funding can be earned as well as paid. On a simulated account, that invites positions opened to collect funding rather than to trade the market. A flat fee paid by both sides removes that incentive.

One less thing to watch. You do not need to track funding settlement times or a payment landing just before the day resets.

The trade-off, stated plainly: if you like to sit on the receiving side of funding, an exchange would pay you and we will not. If that is a big part of your edge, a firm that passes funding through may suit you better. Our comparison pages show how other perps firms handle holding costs, where their own sites say so.

What this means for your trading

• Scalpers and day traders mostly pay commission. Swap only runs while a position is open, so a trade held for an hour pays one twenty-fourth of the daily rate.
• Swing traders should count swap in the plan. At 0.03% a day, a position held for 10 days costs 0.3% of its notional value.
• Leverage multiplies both fees, because they are charged on notional, not on margin. At 10x, one round trip costs 0.6% of your account in commission, and 10 days of swap on a full size position costs 3% of the account.

The short answer

Funding is a variable payment between traders. A swap is a fixed fee. We charge a 0.03% daily swap, charged hourly, plus 0.03% per fill, and nothing else, so you always know what holding costs. Every fee is on the rules page. The rules that fees interact with most, the daily and max loss limits, are covered in how to pass a crypto perps evaluation.

Keep reading

• How perpetual futures prop firms work
• How to pass a crypto perps evaluation: the rules that trip traders up
• Best crypto perps prop firms in 2026: how to compare them
• Funded With Perps FAQ