With leveraged crypto trading, the exchange closes your position automatically if the price moves too far against you – and your margin is gone. This calculator shows the liquidation price for your leverage, so you know exactly how much room the trade has.
Crypto Liquidation Price Calculator
Where a leveraged crypto position is liquidated, and what it can make.
Liquidation prices are approximate for an isolated-margin position: exchanges use their own maintenance margin tiers, fees and funding payments, which move the real price. Results are estimates for information only, not financial advice. Trading on leverage carries a high risk of losing money.
What Is Liquidation?
When you open a leveraged position, you put up margin – your collateral – and borrow the rest. With $1,000 at 10x leverage you control $10,000 of bitcoin. If the price falls, your losses come out of the margin. Before the margin is used up completely, the exchange closes the position. That is liquidation.
The exchange keeps a small part of the position value as a buffer, called the maintenance margin. That is why the position is liquidated slightly before the full margin is lost.
How To Use The Calculator
- Choose long (you profit if the price rises) or short (you profit if it falls).
- Enter the entry price, leverage and margin in USD.
- Enter the maintenance margin rate. 0.5% is common for bitcoin on large exchanges, but it varies by coin, exchange and position size.
- Enter an exit price (optional) to see your profit or loss and the return on your margin.
The calculator shows the liquidation price, how far it is from your entry, the position size and quantity, and the result at your exit price. If your exit price is beyond the liquidation price, it warns you that the position would be closed first.
The Formula
For an isolated-margin long: liquidation price ≈ entry × (1 − 1 ÷ leverage + maintenance margin rate).
For a short: liquidation price ≈ entry × (1 + 1 ÷ leverage − maintenance margin rate).
Example: a long at $65,000 with 10x leverage and 0.5% maintenance margin is liquidated at about $58,825 – a fall of 9.5%.
Why It Matters To Traders
Crypto prices can move 5–10% in a day. At 20x leverage, a move of under 5% against you is enough to wipe out the margin. Many traders are liquidated not because their idea was wrong, but because the leverage left no room for normal volatility.
Checking the liquidation price before you trade lets you pick a leverage where it sits well beyond your stop loss – so your stop, not the exchange, decides when you exit.
Tips
- The result is an estimate. Exchanges use tiered maintenance margins, fees and funding payments, which move the real liquidation price. Check the price shown by your exchange.
- Always place a stop loss well before the liquidation price.
- Lower leverage moves the liquidation price further away. Use the position size calculator to size the trade from your risk instead of from the leverage on offer.
Related Trading Calculators
Alternatively, see our full suite of free online trading calculators.
DayTrading.com’s free trading calculators are for education and planning only and are not financial advice. Trading with leverage is high risk, and you could lose any money you invest. Trade responsibly.