Aster vs Lighter

Aster or Lighter: which to use

Aster vs Lighter is a choice between breadth and fees. Both are order-book DEXs you trade from a self-custody wallet without ID, and both are closed to the same regions. Aster lists 588 markets, 133 of them real-world assets, allows up to 300x and charges 0 bp maker and 4 bp taker. Lighter lists 194 markets, 75 of them real-world assets, allows up to 50x, and its default Standard account pays no fees in exchange for a 300 ms wait on market orders. Pick Aster for the wider list and higher leverage, Lighter to trade without fees.

How each exchange is built

Aster runs on BNB Chain and Lighter on zkLighter. Both are decentralized exchanges that match orders on a central limit order book: resting bids and asks sit on a public book until they fill. You connect a wallet instead of opening an account with a company.

Fees and what they mean

Aster charges 0 bp maker and 4 bp taker, per Aster's fee page. A market order pays 4 bp to open and 4 bp to close, 8 bp per round trip in fees. A limit order that rests on the book pays nothing.

Lighter's fee depends on the account, per Lighter's fee page. The default Standard account pays 0 bp maker and 0 bp taker, and its market orders wait 300 ms. A Premium account waits 140 ms and pays 0.4 bp maker and 2.8 bp taker, 5.6 bp per round trip.

The fee is only part of the cost. Slippage, the price you move by eating through the order book, grows with size. The cost table above adds both at each size from $1k to $5M, and every exchange's trading cost is compared on one page.

Markets and leverage

As of 1 October 2026 Aster lists 588 active perps, 133 of them stocks, commodities, FX or other real-world assets. Lighter lists 194, 75 of them real-world assets. The list further down this page shows which markets both exchanges have and each one's funding rate.

Aster allows up to 300x and Lighter up to 50x on their highest-leverage markets; most markets allow less. Lighter pays funding every hour. Aster pays every hour, 4 hours or 8 hours depending on the market, so check a market's interval before you hold it: an hourly market settles funding 24 times a day, an 8-hour market three times.

Who can use them

Neither asks for ID to trade. Aster's terms keep a right to limited checks. Lighter's card deposit on-ramp is optional. Both are closed to the US, Canada, the UK, China, Russia, Ukraine and sanctioned countries.

Vaults, tokens and points

The two exchanges run different kinds of vaults. Aster's ALP (Aster Liquidity Pool) takes the other side of traders' positions, so depositors carry the traders' profit and loss; a burn is locked for 48 hours and minting or burning costs 0.25% ± 0.05%. Lighter's LLP (Lighter Liquidity Provider) makes markets and takes liquidations, takes USDC, has no lock and charges no operator fee.

Aster's token is $ASTER and Lighter's is $LIT. As of 19 September 2026 Aster's points program was at Stage 5 and Lighter's at Season 3; the points and airdrops page tracks both.

Reading the numbers on this page

Both exchanges publish open interest as one side of open positions, so the open interest row and chart above compare like with like. TVL above is DefiLlama's figure for each exchange's bridge, the deposits it holds. The funding chart shows one coin at a time; on Aster, a market with a 4 or 8-hour interval pays in fewer, larger steps than Lighter's hourly ones.

Which one fits you

• Pick Aster if you need more than 50x, on the markets that offer it.
• Pick Aster if you trade a long list of stocks, commodities and FX: 133 real-world markets against Lighter's 75.
• Pick Aster if you place limit orders, which pay 0 bp maker there.
• Pick Lighter if you want market orders without fees and a 300 ms wait does not matter to you.
• Pick Lighter if you want a vault without a lock or an operator fee.
• Pick Lighter if you want every market on an hourly funding schedule.