GMX Fees Explained (2026): Position Fees, Borrowing, Price Impact
Rates verified against official GMX docs, 2026-07-16/17. See our full GMX review for the exchange overview.
GMX doesn't run on a maker/taker spread. Its costs come from four separate mechanisms: a per-event position fee, a continuous borrowing charge while a position stays open, price impact tied to pool imbalance, and two-way funding. That's a different shape from order-book venues, not just a different number — comparing GMX to a single maker/taker percentage misleads, because how much you pay depends heavily on which side of the market you're on and how long you hold.
Position Fees
GMX charges a position fee every time you open, close, increase, or partially decrease a position. The rate is 0.04% of position size if the trade reduces the imbalance between long and short open interest on that market, or 0.06% if it increases the imbalance. In other words, trading the less-crowded side of a market is cheaper than piling onto the side that's already larger. Most GMX markets use these two rates; some TradFi and commodity markets carry different position-fee schedules — check the specific market's parameters before trading rather than assuming these numbers apply everywhere.
Borrow Fees
Holding a leveraged position costs a borrowing fee, but only if you're on the side with the larger open interest. If longs outweigh shorts on a given market, only longs accrue borrowing costs; shorts pay nothing until the balance flips. Rates follow a kink model tied to pool utilization: around the optimal utilization point of 75%, borrow rates typically run 45–55% annualized. Push utilization toward 100%, and rates climb sharply, typically reaching 100–130% annualized. The kink exists to discourage one-sided crowding and to compensate the liquidity providers funding the other side. A trader on the less-crowded side of a market can hold a position with no borrowing cost at all.
Price Impact
Trades also move an internal execution price based on how they change the long/short OI imbalance — conceptually similar to slippage on an order book, but driven by pool skew rather than a live book. Trades that reduce imbalance get positive price impact, capped around 0.4% (40 bps) on most markets. Trades that increase imbalance get negative price impact, a worse execution price, capped at 0.5% (50 bps) on major markets. The caps stop price impact from running away during heavy one-sided flow, but it still adds real cost to trades that push a market further out of balance.
Funding
On top of position and borrow fees, GMX applies funding, which accrues continuously — per second rather than on a fixed interval — and adjusts based on market conditions. Funding can run positive, meaning you earn it, or negative, meaning you pay it, and each market caps the rate so it can't spike indefinitely. For how this compares to funding on order-book perp exchanges, see our guide to funding rates.
Swap Fees
GMX's pools are also used for spot swaps, priced with the same balance logic as position fees:
| Swap type | Fee |
|---|---|
| Standard swap, improves pool balance | 0.05% |
| Standard swap, worsens pool balance | 0.07% |
| Stablecoin swap | 0.005%–0.02% |
| Atomic swap (standard markets) | 3.75% flat |
Atomic swaps trade single-transaction immediacy for a materially higher flat fee. They're a niche tool, not a default swap route.
What a Trade Actually Costs
Two traders can pay very different totals on the same GMX market, because the fee shape rewards behavior, not just size. A short scalp on the less-crowded, balancing side of a market touches only the lower 0.04% open and close position fees, pays no borrowing at all since that side isn't the larger-OI side, and may see favorable or capped price impact on entry. A multi-day hold on the crowded, imbalanced side of a market carries the higher 0.06% open and close fees, accrues borrowing every second the position stays open on top of that, and is more likely to hit the negative price-impact cap going in. Position size and leverage held equal, which side of the imbalance you're on and how long you hold matter more to total cost on GMX than they would on an order-book exchange.
Referral Discount
Trading through a GMX referral code discounts the position fees charged on opening and closing a leverage trade: 5% off at tier 1, 10% off at tiers 2 and 3. This discount applies only to those open/close position fees — it does not reduce borrow fees or funding, both of which accrue at their full published rate regardless of referral tier. See our GMX referral page for how the tiers work.
GMX vs Order-Book Venues
Because GMX bills per event plus time held, and order-book exchanges bill maker/taker on execution, there's no single number that translates cleanly between the two. A short, balancing-side trade can end up cheaper on GMX than an equivalent taker fee elsewhere; a multi-day, crowded-side hold can cost more once borrowing compounds. Neither shape is universally cheaper — it depends on your side, hold time, and how balanced the market is when you trade. See our full breakdown at Hyperliquid vs GMX for a side-by-side of the two fee shapes.
FAQ
Why did my fee differ between two similar trades?
GMX's position fee depends on whether your trade reduced or increased the long/short open-interest imbalance at the moment you traded, not on trade size or market alone. The same trade type can cost 0.04% one day and 0.06% another if the market's balance has shifted in between.
Do borrow fees ever stop?
No — they accrue continuously for as long as a position stays open, charged to whichever side, long or short, currently has the larger open interest in that market. Closing the position is what stops accrual; there's no time cap on how long borrowing can run.
Does the referral discount cover borrow fees?
No. Per GMX's documentation, the referral discount applies only to the position fees charged on opening and closing a leverage trade. Borrow fees and funding are charged at their full rate regardless of referral tier.
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