8 Differences Between eToro and OctaFX

What are the differences between eToro and OctaFX? Both these platforms, eToro and OctaFX are authorized to operate in the European Union at large but that does not mean you should choose any one of them without considering their features and tallying them with your crypto trading needs.

If you are unwilling to do some research on your own then you can at least go through this article to get an overview of these two trading platforms along with their functional differences.

Both OctaFX and eToro platforms offer multi-asset trading but OctaFX seems to offer a wider range of mobile solutions and platforms as compared to eToro.

However, while making a choice between the two platforms, you should look into several other aspects of them as well. Your choice may differ from that of the others and there is nothing wrong in it.

Since choices are subject to personal preferences, user comfort, trading style, and crypto knowledge, the differences in features and functionalities of the two platforms also play a significant role.

Here in this article you will find a direct comparison between the two trading platforms which will make it much easier for you to decide which one among OctaFX and eToro is the best platform that will serve all your purposes and meet all your crypto trading needs.

Moreover, the ‘Which is better’ section will allow you to make the right choice in the end. Check out Differences Between eToro and Kraken.

8 Differences Between eToro and OctaFX

When you make trades on the financial markets using either eToro or OctaFX, you will have to know about both of them and how exactly they compare to one another.

This knowledge should exceed the number of years in business and the reputation of each of these platforms in the market.

Here is the list of differences that will help you decide which among the two will match your trading needs more comprehensively.

This knowledge will assure that your money is handled by a reliable and efficient broker.

1. Basics

The eToro platform was launched in 2007. This company has its offices located in Cyprus and the United Kingdom as of now. However, US traders are welcome on this platform with some regulations.

On the other hand, the OctaFX platform was established in 2011. The offices of it are located in Saint Vincent, Grenadines and in the United Kingdom.

Though US traders are not welcome in this platform, it allows hedging, trading over phone and interest rates on funds as well as overnight interest rates or swaps.

2. Regulation and Licensing

The eToro platform comes with better regulatory control and licensing as compared to OctaFX. In fact, the eToro platform has two Tier 1 licenses that build high trust among the users.

The platform is ASIC or Australian Securities and Investments Commission authorized in Australia and Financial Conduct Authority or FCA authorized to operate in the UK.

In addition to that, it is also authorized by a Tier 2 license from the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission or CySEC.

It also follows the regulatory standards of FINRA, Markets In Financial Instruments Directive or MiFID and has an FRN or Financial Service Authority Registration Number of the United Kingdom.

On the other hand, the OctaFX platform comes with only a Tier 2 license from the CySEC that builds an average trust in comparison to eToro.

However, it also has FCA authorization to operate in the UK and IFSA for St. Vincent and Grenadines region and follows the regulations of IBC 2011.

3. Risk Factor

Based on the Trust Score of eToro and OctaFX, which is 93 and 99 respectively, eToro is considered to be a low-risk platform than OctaFX. It is found from previous track record and stats that nearly 67% of retail investor accounts lose money on eToro while trading CFDs.

On the other hand, as for OctaFX the same is about 54% though the amount of losses can exceed the deposits under a few specific circumstances.

4. Costs and Spreads

The average spread in EUR/ USD for eToro is 1 unit as on August 2021 whether it executes its role of a market maker or an agency broker. The minimum trade on this platform is $25 and the maximum is 20% of equity.

As for CFDs, the different spreads on eToro are 1 pt of FTSE, 2 pips for GBPUSD, 5 pts oil and 0.24% VAR variable of stocks spreads allowing a leverage of 1:100 and 1:30 EU.

While in comparison, the standard spread of OctaFX is just 0.6 for the same period and for the same role played. However, on this platform you can make minimum trades in 0.01 lots and maximum of 10 lots.

As for CFDs, the different spreads on OctaFX are 1.8 FTSE, 1.1 GBPUSD, 1.1 oil and variable stocks spreads allowing a leverage of 1:30.

5. Funding

When it comes to funding and making payments, the eToro platform needs a minimum deposit of $50 to $200 depending on your location.

As for OctaFX in comparison it is just between $5 and $100. However, OctaFX offers a deposit bonus of up to 50% which eToro does not.

As for making your deposits or withdrawals, both the platform supports wire transfer, Visa and Mastercard credit and debit card payments, and Skrill but eToro also supports PayPal for the same which OctaFX does not.

6. Fees

The OctaFX platform does not charge any fees from its users for making deposits or withdrawals. There are also no fees charged for an inactive account or any commissions.

In comparison, the eToro platform charges commissions from their users as well as has fees for making withdrawals or against an inactive account. However, there are no fees charged on deposits.

7. Payment Methods

As for the payment methods, both these platforms support a few similar but a lot of different options. As for OctaFX, it supports Visa and Mastercard credit cards, MoneyGram, wire transfer, Doku Wallet, Paysafecard, Vietcombank Transfer, Perfect Money, Western Union, and WorldPay.

On the other hand, the eToro platform supports Apple Pay, BPAY, Neteller, PayPal, Diners Club, JCB Card, Perfect Money, Swift, Visa, Webmoney, UnionPay, Rapid Transfer, Skrill, Venmo, wire transfer, and Yandex Money.

8. Some Other Notable Differences

Here are a few other differences between eToro and OctaFX that are also worth noting for differentiating between them.

As for the trading platforms, you can use both these proprietary platforms for social and copy trading but OctaFX can also be used as a desktop platform on Windows and it will also support cTrader, MetaTrader 4 and 5 but you cannot make margin trading on it as you can on eToro.

The trading instruments offered by these two platforms are also dissimilar. On OctaFX you can trade with forex, crypto coins, CFDs, indices, and commodities. On the other hand, eToro allows you to trade with CFD, forex, crypto, and stocks only.

As for the crypto coins, OctaFX supports the major coins such as BTC, LTC, ETH but eToro has a much larger and more diverse list of crypto coins including BTC, LTC, ETH, BCH, ETC, ADA, XRP, DASH, MIOTA, XLM, ZEC, BNB, EOS, NEO, and VET.

As for the trading tools, there are lots of tools offered by these two platforms to help in your trading such as drawing tools, charting indicators, watch lists and alerts but OctaFX also offers a special charting tool that allows you to trade from it by using a unique chart quote bar.

Most of the features of these two platforms are the same. However, there are a few that are unique for each platform. As for OctaFX, it supports scalping stock trading. The eToro platform, on the other hand, supports stop loss orders, trailing stops, and also offers trading signals.

When it comes to mobile trading, the mobile apps of these two platforms come with all the basic features to help in mobile trading but eToro comes with an additional feature that allows watch list syncing.

That of OctaFX comes with features and charts that will help in drawing trend lines, a forex calendar, as well as the drawings autosave feature.

For your education and research assistance, both these platforms also come with a lot of different tools that will help in knowing more about trading on them.

Though OctaFX does not provide any free education, all the basic tools for education are offered by eToro along with a few additional education tools such as advanced trading videos and a personal manager that you will not find on OctaFX.

Different trading platforms, features, and complements are also offered by OctaFX to facilitate trading such as mobile trading, one-click trading, browser based trading, trading through API, and pending orders. However, eToro offers only mobile trading and one-click trading and lacks the rest.

As for the accounts offered and supported by the two platforms, OctaFX offers micro accounts, zero spread accounts but does not support VIP accounts unlike eToro.

As for customer support offered, both these platforms are pretty similar and offer email and chat support but the languages in which these are provided differ significantly.

As for OctaFX it provides customer support in Chinese, English, German, Bengali, Hindi, Portuguese, Spanish, Indonesian, Malay, and Thai languages.

On the other hand, customer support by eToro is offered in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, German, Dutch, Finnish, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Norwegian, Polish, Spanish, and Swedish languages.

Which is Better – eToro or OctaFX?

There are lots of different aspects that should be taken into account in both eToro and OctaFX to answer his question.

Though most of these aspects are included in the list of differences above, it will need some further and more superior market research to find out which among the two offers a better user experience.

While eToro may excel in a few, OctaFX may do well in others, which will make it quite difficult to find a clear winner among them.

Especially, when you deal with CFDs you should be more concerned about the risk factors of the two platforms while making your choice.

Since CFDs are complex instruments, there is a high risk of losing all your money due to leverage.

Therefore, you should not only choose a low-risk platform to trade CFDs but also know how exactly the CFDs work.

Whichever platform you choose, you should be sure that you have a high risk appetite and can afford to lose your money.

In order to determine which among eToro and OctaFX is a better platform, which, as said earlier, is actually quite a difficult task, here are a few points that may influence your decision.

• Pricing: It is unwise to believe that all data of average spreads are published and available by all brokers, and the pricing structure varies as well. However, after comparing the trading costs of both eToro and OctaFX for CFDs and forex, OctaFX offers much better variable pricing for traders overall than eToro which is usually fixed.
• Safety: Based on the higher Trust Score and the fact that eToro holds two global Tier-1 licenses as opposed to none by OctaFX, eToro can be considered to be safer than OctaFX in that aspect though both hold on global Tier-2 licenses.
• Trading features: Users expect the platforms to offer everything that will facilitate their CFD trading efforts. Both these platforms are quite good and offer social and copy trading features but OctaFX offers a slight edge to the traders with its MT4 and MT5 support.
• Currency pairs: There are as many as 47 different types of currency pairs supported by the eToro platform as compared to 28 of currency pairs available on the OctaFX platform. Apart from that, eToro is also more favored by the traders for the 3056 available CFDs as opposed to only 52 of OctaFX.
• Ease of use: You will find that the copy trading feature of eToro is much better and easy to use. It offers more than 2000 instruments which includes forex, CFDs, exchange-traded securities, and popular crypto coins.

On the whole, the eToro platform seems to have a slight edge in comparison to OctaFX which offers its users only cTrader and vanilla MetaTrader trading experience mostly.

In addition to that, the OctaFX platform lacks regulation in most of the key jurisdictions over and above its European license in Cyprus.

This is a serious drawback of this platform in comparison to eToro as well as other major and trusted brokers.

Conclusion

After going through the comparison of eToro and OctaFX, you may find it easy to make a choice. However, this article should not be the only decisive factor for your final decision. It should ultimately be based on what and how you trade.