What is the bid-ask spread?

It is the gap between the highest price a buyer is offering (the bid) and the lowest price a seller will accept (the ask). Buying immediately means paying the ask; selling immediately means taking the bid.

Why does the spread matter?

It is a cost you pay on every trade that crosses it. For frequent or short-term traders, wide spreads can eat most of the profit.

When are spreads widest?

In thinly traded assets, outside main trading hours, and during fast or panicky markets, when market makers step back.

Guide · Basics

Bid Price vs. Ask Price: What Is the Spread?

Every tradable asset technically has two prices at once. The gap between them — the spread — is a hidden cost that's worth understanding before you place an order.

Sep 12, 2026

The bid price is the highest price a buyer is currently willing to pay for an asset. The ask price is the lowest price a seller is currently willing to accept. These two numbers sit on opposite sides of the order book, and they're almost never identical.

The gap between them is the bid-ask spread. If you buy immediately at the ask and then immediately sold back at the bid, you'd lose the spread even with the price unchanged — it's effectively the built-in cost of trading right now instead of waiting for a better price.

The size of the spread is itself useful information. A narrow spread usually signals a liquid, actively traded market with many buyers and sellers close to agreement on price. A wide spread signals thinner trading or higher uncertainty, since fewer participants are close to agreeing on what the asset is worth right now.

Trade2Spike's Spot Trading mode runs on zero artificial spread — you trade at the real market price directly — which makes it a clean way to see exactly how price, not a hidden markup, drives your result.