Network fees
Bitcoin transaction fee right now
What one Bitcoin transfer costs at this moment at the rate a public fee index recommends for confirmation within about three blocks, and why the fee depends on size, never on the amount.
Right now on Bitcoin
Read live from the network. Figures refresh about once a minute; the time of the last read is shown.
| One BTC transfer | Loading the live figure… |
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| Live rate | Loading the live figure… |
| What a transfer uses | Loading the live figure… |
| Read from | Loading the live figure… |
| Last read | Loading the live figure… |
What the fee pays for on Bitcoin
Bitcoin prices a transaction by its size in virtual bytes, not by its amount. A sender chooses a rate in satoshis per virtual byte; the higher the rate, the sooner miners include the transaction. The figure here uses the rate a public fee index currently recommends for confirmation within about three blocks, multiplied by the size of a one-input, two-output SegWit transaction.
A transaction with more inputs is larger and costs more at the same rate. Sending the exact invoice amount from a wallet that holds the funds in one output is the cheapest shape.
Who pays it, and what Unheld charges
The payer pays the Bitcoin fee from their own wallet, on top of the invoice amount; it goes to the network. Unheld takes 0% of the payment and charges the merchant a monthly plan priced by the number of payments, so the fee never changes what the merchant receives.
What the receiver needs on Bitcoin, and the first payment
The sender pays. The receiving address needs nothing, and a never-used address costs the same to reach as an old one.
Each payment lands as its own output. Spending it later means one more input in that transaction, paid at the rate of the day, which is why very small payments are uneconomic on Bitcoin.
Questions about Bitcoin fees
How much is a Bitcoin transaction fee right now?
The live figure is at the top of this page: a recommended rate in satoshis per virtual byte, multiplied by the size of a typical SegWit transaction, in BTC and in dollars.
Why is the Bitcoin fee not a percentage of the amount?
Bitcoin prices a transaction by its size in bytes, never by the amount it moves. A large payment in one input costs the same as a small one.
Can a payer choose a lower Bitcoin fee?
Yes. The rate is the sender’s choice; a lower rate waits longer for a block. The figure here is the rate a public index recommends for confirmation within about three blocks.
Does the receiver pay anything on Bitcoin?
No. The sender pays, and a never-used address costs the same to reach as an old one. Each payment becomes its own output, and spending it later costs one more input in that transaction.
Sources
Every figure on this page comes from one of these documents. Each was read on the date shown rather than recalled.