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Compare Money Transfer ProvidersPut two providers side by side and stop comparing fees; see which one sends more money

"Zero fee" does not mean a better deal. What decides whether the transfer is worth it is how much actually arrives. Enter provider A's and provider B's fee and rate, and this calculator works out the amount received and the effective cost for both at once, telling you which is the better deal and by how much. The maths runs in your browser; the numbers you enter are never uploaded.

How to fill it in: the "provider rate" = the number on each provider's quote page, "1 unit of send currency = ? receive currency"; the "market mid-rate" = the live rate for the same currency pair from a search engine or finance site, used only to estimate the margin. Make sure both providers use the same currency direction.
Provider A: amount received (receive currency)—
Provider A: effective cost—
Provider B: amount received (receive currency)—
Provider B: effective cost—
Which is the better deal—

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Reading the two columns

  • Amount received: (amount sent − fee) × provider rate. This is the only number worth comparing across providers. Compare this, not the fee.
  • Effective cost: what the recipient "should have" received at the market mid-rate, versus what they actually get; the lower the percentage, the better the deal. It rolls the stated fee and the margin hidden in the rate into one number.
  • Which is the better deal: simply compare the amount received; the higher one wins, and the tool shows how much more arrives. A common case is that the "zero fee" provider with a worse rate actually delivers less.

To understand how the fee and the exchange margin each eat your money, see how fees and the exchange margin eat your money; to compare apps side by side, see remittance apps compared; for the cheapest route overall, see the cheapest way to send money.

The result is an estimate based on the numbers you enter, and does not include intermediary-bank charges, receiving-bank credit fees, or other deductions that may apply at the receiving end; the actual amount received is whatever each provider's page shows at the time. Figures are illustrative only.

Two quotes an hour apart aren't a comparison

Rates move all day. Pull one provider in the morning and the other after lunch, and the difference you measure may be nothing but the clock. Take both quotes within a few minutes of each other, and keep the amount, destination country and delivery method identical across the two. Change any one of those and you're comparing different products.

Go all the way to the confirmation screen before writing anything down, too. Landing-page rates are frequently the best case; the number that applies to your specific transfer only appears at the last step.

The promotional-rate trap

"First transfer free" and "new customer rate" aren't traps in themselves. The trap is measuring a one-off promotional price against a rival's standard price and filing the result as a permanent conclusion. From the second transfer the price reverts, and by then most people have stopped checking.

If you send on a regular schedule, strip the introductory offer out before comparing. If this really is a one-time transfer, then of course the promotional price is the one that counts.

What to do with the answer

If the gap is a point or two, don't open an account somewhere you've never used to capture it: a new provider means fresh identity verification and re-entering recipient details, and the odds of a mistake outweigh the saving. A gap of five points or more is worth acting on.

When you do switch, send something small first and only trust it with the full amount once that has landed. The pre-send checklist has a tick-box version of what to verify before you move a provider.

This tool is a pure front-end estimator; the calculation happens in your browser and the numbers you enter are never uploaded. Exchange rates and fees are whatever each provider's page shows at the time. Updated 2026-09-08: added why both quotes must be taken together, how to treat promotional rates, and how big a gap justifies switching.