Benchmark Methodology

Ownership & disclosure

This benchmark is built and operated by OptionsLab, an independent crypto-options research studio. OptionsLab is a partner of ClickOptions, and ClickOptions is one of the venues measured here. We disclose that relationship openly.

The analysis is designed to be neutral and verifiable: every venue is shown unfiltered, from the same live order books, on the same matched contracts, by the fixed rules below. We publish the method so anyone can check the numbers — the benchmark is not a marketing claim, it is a measurement you can reproduce.

What we measure

The all-in cost of trading a crypto option: the bid/ask spread you cross, the premium you pay, and the top-of-book size behind the quote. All figures are top of book, captured live from each venue's public market data.

Venues

ClickOptions, Deribit, Binance and Bybit. OKX is excluded from the matched set for feed-quality reasons. Each venue is quoted in its own market and normalized to a common per-coin basis so the numbers are like-for-like (e.g. BTC premiums are put on a 1 BTC-equivalent basis).

Matched contract set

Spreads and premiums are computed only on contracts that exist on ClickOptions and at least one peer, so we always compare the same option across venues — never a venue's cheap contract against another's expensive one. The headline table uses the Top-5 most-traded contracts per asset (BTC, ETH), ranked by 24-hour volume.

Definitions

· Spread % = (ask − bid) / mid × 100, aggregated over the matched set as Σ(ask−bid)/Σ(mid).
· Premium = the ask (what you pay to buy), in USD on the common basis.
· 7-day average = trailing-week mean of the daily aggregate.
· “X% tighter” = 1 − (ClickOptions spread ÷ peer-average spread), where peer average is the mean of the other venues quoting that contract.
· Median vs average: the liquidity view offers both — median is robust to a few outsized quotes; average credits venues quoting big size across the chain. Both are shown so neither can flatter one venue.

Cadence & data

The benchmark regenerates on a daily schedule from live exchange market data; the compare-any-instrument card and the analytics pages read the same feed intraday. Each view stamps its snapshot time.

Limitations

Top-of-book only (depth beyond the best quote is not modelled); medians/aggregates over a finite matched set; venue feeds occasionally publish stale or one-sided quotes, which we surface rather than hide. This is market-structure research, not investment advice.