Ethereum Gas Fees Explained: What You Pay When You Withdraw ETH

Ethereum gas fees explained in one line: gas measures the work a transaction needs, and you pay the gas fee in ETH. When you withdraw ETH or a token from an exchange, the fee you are quoted is the exchange's price, which can differ from the gas fee the network charges. Find the fee and the amount that will arrive before you confirm, then compare them with the transaction afterward.

If you have not bought crypto yet, start with how to buy crypto.

How Ethereum gas works

Gas is the unit that measures how much computational effort a transaction needs. An ETH gas fee is always paid in ETH, Ethereum's own coin. Gas prices are usually quoted in gwei: one gwei is one-billionth of an ETH (0.000000001 ETH).

The Ethereum transaction fee is the units of gas used multiplied by the base fee plus the priority fee. The base fee is the network's price per unit of gas. The priority fee, or tip, is an optional extra per unit.

The base fee is burned, which removes it from circulation. The tip goes to the validator who proposed your transaction.

You can also set a max fee, the most you are willing to pay per unit. If the base fee plus tip comes in under it, the sender is refunded the difference. The gas limit is the most gas you are willing to use on the transaction.

A plain ETH transfer needs 21,000 units of gas. Sending a token uses more, because more complex actions such as interacting with a smart contract use more gas than simple ones.

An ERC-20 token is a token built on Ethereum. ethereum.org's chart (opens in a new tab) lists about 65,000 gas for sending one, an example figure and not a fixed one.

The fee is paid whether a transaction succeeds or fails. If it runs out of gas, the changes are reverted but all the gas provided is still consumed.

How exchanges set an ETH withdrawal fee

When you withdraw from an exchange or a broker app, the fee you see is set by that platform. It may include the network cost, so an ETH withdrawal fee need not equal the gas the network charges. For how every fee type fits together, read how crypto exchange fees work.

As of October 2026, three examples show how different the models are:

• Binance.US in the US says (opens in a new tab) a dynamic model sets its withdrawal fees, using the estimated market cost of gas, its own operational expenses and the withdrawal amount, among other factors. It also says the fee is shown before your transaction and may change from one transaction to the next.
• Newton in Canada says (opens in a new tab) you can pick a speed for Bitcoin or Ethereum-network withdrawals. A fast lane adds an extra fee on top of the network fee, a standard lane charges the network fee only, and a free lane is for non-urgent transfers where savings matter more than speed. Newton also says it covers network fees up to a limit on your first crypto withdrawal each day.
• Robinhood in the US says (opens in a new tab) it estimates the network fee and adds it to the amount you want to send. With its Send All option, the estimated fee comes out of the total instead. For ERC-20 tokens, it says you pay the network fee in ETH on chain, and it calculates the ETH equivalent and debits your token balance.

So the fee can be an estimate or a bundled price, and for a token withdrawal it may be charged in the token rather than in ETH. Other exchanges may work differently.

Before you confirm, find the fee, the coin it is charged in, and the amount you will receive; if any is missing, do not confirm and ask support first.

Read your withdrawal on a block explorer

A block explorer is a website where anyone can look up an Ethereum transaction. ethereum.org lists explorers (opens in a new tab) and defines the fields below. Use one to check what the network charged for your withdrawal; how to find a transaction on a block explorer has the full steps.

1. Get the transaction ID (also called the transaction hash) from your withdrawal history. If it is not there yet, follow find your transaction ID.
2. Open an Ethereum block explorer and paste the ID into its search box.
3. Find the gas limit, the most gas the transaction could consume, and gas used, the amount it actually consumed.
4. Find the gas price, the price set per gas unit. Multiply gas used by the gas price. The result should match the transaction fee the explorer shows.
5. For an ETH send, read the value field, the total ETH transferred. For a token withdrawal, look under tokens transferred, the list of tokens moved in the transaction.

The explorer shows what the network charged, not what the exchange charged you. If the exchange's fee is higher than the network fee, compare the gap with the fee types its fee page lists, and ask support if you cannot account for it. If the amount that arrived does not match the amount the withdrawal screen said would arrive, ask support with the transaction ID.

Example with made-up numbers

The figures below are made up and use gwei and ETH only.

• You withdraw ETH. The transaction uses 21,000 gas. The base fee is 18 gwei and the tip is 2 gwei.
• The gas price is 18 + 2 = 20 gwei. The network fee is 21,000 x 20 = 420,000 gwei, which is 0.00042 ETH.
• Of that, 21,000 x 18 = 378,000 gwei (0.000378 ETH) is burned, and 21,000 x 2 = 42,000 gwei (0.000042 ETH) goes to the validator.
• The max fee was 30 gwei per unit, so the sender is not charged 21,000 x (30 - 20) = 210,000 gwei (0.00021 ETH) of what it allowed. In a withdrawal the exchange is the sender, so this does not change what you pay.
• The exchange's withdrawal fee, shown on its screen, was a flat 0.0005 ETH. The explorer shows 0.00042 ETH. The 0.00008 ETH gap is the difference between the exchange's fee and the network's fee.
• Now a token withdrawal of 100 Coin T. The network fee is still paid in ETH on chain, but the exchange charges you 2 Coin T. Depending on the platform, the fee is added on top or taken from the amount, so check which on the screen.

On a real withdrawal, the explorer gives you gas used and the gas price to multiply.

Layer 2 fees

A layer 2 (L2) is a separate network built on top of Ethereum. Choosing between mainnet and a layer 2 is its own decision. On Base, for example, Base says (opens in a new tab) every transaction has two costs: an L2 execution fee and an L1 security fee, the estimated cost of publishing the transaction on Ethereum. Other L2s may split fees differently.

Before you withdraw to an L2 address, match the network to the address. Then check which coin pays fees on that network and that your wallet holds some there. See fees, minimums and the fee coin and choosing an Ethereum network when you withdraw ETH.

Gas fee misconceptions

• "Gas depends on how much I send." The gas formula has no term for the amount sent. An exchange's own fee can still depend on the amount: as of October 2026, Binance.US, a US exchange, lists (opens in a new tab) the withdrawal amount as a factor.
• "A failed transaction is free." It is not. Gas is spent even when the transaction fails.
• "The fee on the explorer is what the exchange charged me." It is what the network charged. The exchange sets its own fee.

Risks

• A demand for a separate "gas fee" before your funds are released is a scam signal. The US FTC warns (opens in a new tab) that on fake crypto investment sites you cannot withdraw your money at all, or only if you pay high fees. See how to spot a crypto investment scam.
• Withdrawals are hard to undo, so follow the network and address checks in how to send crypto to a wallet.

Next, read how to buy Ethereum before you buy, or compare with Bitcoin withdrawal fees.