Top 10 Forex Brokers In 2025 And How to Choose the Right One

Summary:
• The top 10 forex brokers tick the boxes for regulatory compliance, spreads, security, customer support among other key indicators.

What Is A Forex Broker?

An FX broker is a type of financial service provider that facilitates trades in foreign currency. Foreign exchange/FX/forex, is simply buying and selling different currencies. Traders depend on brokers to access the FX market, place orders, and keep tabs on their trades.

Essentially, brokers facilitate transactions between market participants, bringing together buyers and sellers. The foreign exchange market is a decentralised system of interconnected banks all over the world, as opposed to centralised stock exchanges like the NYSE or London Stock Exchange

Forex Brokerage Regulations

Despite the lack of centralisation in the over-the-counter market, financial authorities in several countries do regulate forex brokers. As a trader, it is important that you only deal with brokers who have been duly licensed to operate in your location. Otherwise, you might risk losing not only your money but also important personal data. For instance, if you live in Malaysia, you should conduct your due diligence to find out which brokers are legal in Malaysia.

How Do Forex Brokers Make Money?

Brokers in the forex market often earn their profit from spreads, which is difference between buying and selling prices of currencies in a trading pair. Here, the broker makes a profit by purchasing at a lower price (the bid) and selling at a higher price (the ask). Also, some brokers charge commissions, overnight funding, and other fees. As a trader, you need to look for a forex broker with the lowest spread, because, ultimately, it could prove the difference between profit and loss.

How Does Forex Trading Work?

In forex trading currencies are traded in pairs, whereby each currency has a unique code. To buy one currency, a trader needs to know how much of the other currency is currently selling for on the market. For example, the price of the EURUSD currency pair shows how many US dollars it would take to buy one euro.

There is always one base currency and one quote currency in a currency pair. The base currency is the first currency in the pair, like the euro in the EURUSD pair. On the other hand, the quote currency is the second currency, like the US dollar in the EURUSD pair.

When you buy a currency pair, you’re essentially betting that the value of the base currency will increase in relation to the quote currency. Conversely, people who sell currency pairs do so because they anticipate a decline in the value of the base currency relative to the quote.

Types of Currency Pairs

FX pairs are categorized into three types: majors, minors, and exotics.

Major pairs: The majority of currency traders focus on major pairs. These currencies make up over 80% of all FX trades in the world; they are the currencies of some of the biggest economies in the world. Examples include EURUSD, GBPUSD, AUDUSD,USDCHF, USDJPY and USDCAD

Minor pairs: Also known as cross pairs, Minor pairs are currency pairs that don’t include the US dollar. Examples include CADJPY, EURCHF, EURGBP, GBPJPY etc

Exotics: Exotic currency pairs consist of a major currency and a much less traded one, such as the US dollar versus the South African Rand, USDZAR.

When Can One Trade Forex?

The forex market is open for business five days a week, from Sunday at 5 PM to Friday at 5 PM. The global forex market is divided into four key trading sessions, named after the four leading trading centers, Tokyo, Sydney, London and New York. Because of the time zone difference, these trading sessions overlap. 

How to Choose the Best Broker

Before you choose a broker, think about your needs and objectives, and see if the instruments they offer works for you.  Also, to avoid losing out on profitable opportunities, you should also think about the time difference between your location and the markets covered by your broker.

For instance, a trader in Hong Kong might find it more convenient to use a broker like ATFX because it offers access to the moderate trading activity reported during Hong Kong business hours and also enables access to US and European sessions, which have higher volatility and larger volumes of trading activities.

Choosing a Forex Trading Platform

The two most popular trading platforms are the MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5. Because of their suitability for social and copy trading, forex broker MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 platforms are widely popular among traders. However, some brokers have developed proprietary/third party trading software.

Top 10 Brokers

FXTM

FXTM has built a name for itself thanks to licensing by multiple reputable regulators, including FCA, CySEC, and FSC Mauritius etc. It offers its clients very high leverage, up to 1:1000. In addition, it provides access to deep liquidity, VPS hosting, and a variety of accounts. The popular MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 platforms, offered by FXTM, offer a feature-rich user interface with quick and easy order execution.  However, a major weakness on its part is that it charges inactivity fee and withdrawal fees.

OANDA

With a long history of serving traders all around the world and having licenses from respected bodies like the CFTC, ASIC, and FCA, OANDA has earned an impressive track record since its founding in 1996. OANDA provides its customers access to  wide range of marketplaces for trading and investment.

Offering floating spreads as low as 1.0 pips, this broker is a formidable competitor in the FX market. OANDA provides VPS hosting and trading on the MetaTrader 4 platform, allowing for fast trade execution. Nevertheless, the fact that it charges withdrawal fees is a key drawback for the company.

ATFX

Established in 2017, ATFX provides access to more than 350 tradable instruments through its multi-regulated forex and CFD platforms. Not only does it support standard MT4 services, but it also offers MT4 add-ons, as well as MT5 platform. To guarantee quick and secure execution, it comes with free VPS hosting.

Due to its rich supporting content and tools, it is an excellent choice for both pro and newbie traders. Also, the comprehensive education resources and outstanding customer assistance make ATFX stand out.

XM Group

This broker also acts as a market maker on the global financial markets. Therefore, traders can leverage XM Group’s competitive quotes because the company has direct access to liquidity. There are a variety of accounts available, including cent, normal, and ultra-low spreads, with loyalty minimum deposit requirements and leverage that meets the standards set by European regulators.

FBS

FBS has a wide presence across the globe, and is licensed and regulated by multiple financial authorities including FSC, CySEC, and ASIC. Aside from having zero commissions and floating spreads as low as 0.6 pips, this broker offers some of the most competitive rats in the market. In order to optimise the speed of trade execution, FBS also provides VPS hosting. As far as trading platforms go, the broker offers both MetaTrader 4 and 5. However, it has no proprietary platform.

CMC Markets

With average spreads of 0.61 pips on the EUR/USD pair, CMC Markets provides competitive pricing that scores above the industry average. CMC Markets provides a great trading experience with its low prices and high reputation globally. However, there are fewer trading symbols in CMC Markets’ MetaTrader 4 (MT4) product.

Pepperstone

Established in 2010, Pepperstone offers 65 different currency pairs for trading and is licensed by regulators across tiers 1,2, and 4 jurisdictions. With both MetaTrader and cTrader, it caters to both algorithmic and copy traders. It allows users to access TradingView, cTrader, and MetaTrader. Furthermore, it enhances its already impressive suite of platforms with a wide range of third-party tools and plugins.

Tickmill

Established in 2014, Tickmill has a high trust score thanks to its regulation in multiple jurisdictions, including by Tier 1 regulators. It supports trading in both MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 platforms.

In addition, Tickmill facilitates social trading and has a proprietary trading platform. It is also a good option for algorithmic trading and professional traders due to its trading and charting features. One big drawback of Tickmill compared to its rivals is the smaller number of markets it offers for trading.

IC Markets

With low average spreads and minimal minimum deposit requirements, IC Markets provides competitive pricing across its various account types. In addition, traders who trade more than 100 standard lots monthly are eligible for additional discounts. Along with offering excellent automatic copy trading strategies, it provides trading in 61 different currency pairs. However, its educational information is limited in scope, and it lacks a proprietary FX trading tool.

Swissquote

Swissquote boasts of deep liquidity, thanks to its network of Tier 1 banks and regional non‑bank liquidity providers. It offers trading in micro, mini, and standard lots across all platforms, and it offers trading in 80 different currency pairs. To help traders optimise their returns on investment, Swissquote provides leverage of up to 1:100.

Swissquote provides access to the flagship MetaTrader 4 and 5 platforms, enabling it to go head-to-head with its peers. Furthermore, it has integrated TradingView charts into its own CFXD platform, which is both easy to use and highly complex. While Swissquote offers commission-free trading, its spreads and swaps are above the industry average.

In Conclusion

Forex brokers are a central pillar in enabling the buying and selling of currencies. They offer a varied range of services and their competitiveness is based on factors like regulatory approval, spreads, fees, commissions, security, customer support, educational materials, user intuitiveness, among others.

Ultimately, your choice should be informed by your needs and objectives. The brokers discussed above are some of the best in the market, but it is important to conduct your due diligence before choosing which one to go for.