KYC Levels on Crypto Exchanges: What Each Level Unlocks, Compared

The second step depends on the exchange. Proof of address is a level you apply for on two of the six. On three others it’s a request that reaches only some accounts, and on the sixth the higher level is a face scan instead of an address document. Checks on where your money comes from sit at the top on the five exchanges whose pages describe them, and those pages present them as something the exchange asks of you rather than a tier you choose.

We wouldn’t line the limit figures up against each other, because they’re counted in different units. Two exchanges count in USDT a day, one in bitcoin a day, one in cash dollars a month, and two print no figure at all.

KYC level 1: what it asks for and what it opens

Expect to give your legal name, date of birth and home address, a photo of a government-issued ID, and on most exchanges a live face scan. The details vary from one exchange to the next. Not every first level includes the face scan: on one exchange the first level is a photo of the document plus your nationality and document type, and the face scan comes at the second. Occupation is a common question (choose unemployed if you aren’t working, where the form offers it).

Some exchanges also ask about your source of income and how you plan to use the account. OKX’s beginner’s guide adds that it asks for an estimate of how much you plan to deposit, as a reference point, and that you can’t change that estimate later.

For the ID itself, passports, national identity cards, driving licences and residence permits are the usual choices. Each exchange shows the list for the country you pick, and that list is the one that counts. One exchange accepts only physical documents and turns down e-copies and scans. If you don’t have a passport, the ID documents exchanges accept instead goes through the alternatives one by one.

What the first level opens is deposits and trading, and on some exchanges P2P and capped withdrawals too. On Binance, existing accounts that never completed it are switched to “Withdraw Only”, which leaves withdrawals, cancelling orders, closing positions and redemptions. One exchange publishes a cap for unverified accounts: withdrawals only, up to 20,000 USDT a day and 100,000 a month.

So an unverified account is, at most, a way to take money out. If you have funds on an exchange and haven’t finished the first level, that’s the next job.

A level can also be half done. If you skipped the face step, your withdrawal limit can stay restricted until you finish the face check or give support the missing details, and incomplete information can pause withdrawals until you provide it.

The published review times for this first check run from immediate, when the check is automated, to 48 hours, and one exchange gives no figure. Each published time is worded as usual or typical, not as a promise.

KYC level 2: usually proof of address

Proof of address is a recent document, in your name, that shows where you live. Where it sits depends on the exchange:

• A level you apply for, on two of the six. One of them processes it only after the first level is complete, and you must use the same name at both levels.
• A request for some accounts, on two more, for regulatory and compliance reasons or because the account is flagged as higher risk.
• A case-by-case extra, needed only in some situations, at either level. In some countries a face photo replaces it when the address can’t be confirmed automatically.

Where proof of address is a named level, it raises the ceiling. On Bybit, Advanced doubles the daily withdrawal limit for accounts without VIP status (from 1 million to 2 million USDT a day), and it’s also where the payment card starts; buying crypto above a certain amount may need it too.

The rules for the document itself overlap more than they differ:

• Name. It has to match the name on your ID, or the name of the account holder.
• Date. Four of the six exchanges ask for a document issued within the last three months. On a fifth, the window is set by country, in a table that gives 2, 3 or 6 months depending on where you live.
• Mobile phone bills. Three exchanges refuse them outright, and a fourth refuses them outside a few jurisdictions. One lists telephone bills among the utility bills it accepts.
• P.O. boxes. Every exchange that mentions them refuses them.

Where a time is given, an address review takes up to 1–2 working days; you’ll be told the outcome, so there’s no need to contact support while you wait. For the full accepted and refused lists side by side, see what counts as proof of address on crypto exchanges, and what gets rejected.

Source of funds and enhanced due diligence: the top tier

This is the deepest check, and the one least like a level. Only one of the six gives it a level name, and that level carries the same withdrawal limit as the one below it, so reaching it adds no headroom.

Two terms come up every time. The FCA’s Financial Crime Guide describes source of wealth as how a person came to have their total wealth. Source of funds is the narrower term, covering where the money in a particular relationship or transaction came from, such as salary or the proceeds of a sale, and how it was moved. The guide says establishing both helps a firm judge whether your transactions fit what it knows about you. For politically exposed persons it’s a requirement.

Here’s what the exchanges’ pages ask for at this tier:

• A declaration. One enhanced due diligence page has you state whether you are, or are connected to, a politically exposed person. You then tick every source of funds and wealth that applies to you.
• Documents for each source. Payslips, bank statements, sale contracts, inheritance papers and similar, depending on the source you ticked. Most of the documents these pages list have to be recent, often from the last three months.
• A wait. Reviews take up to 5 business days, or 3 to 10, depending on the exchange.

The pages give only general reasons for picking one account and not another: certain risk indicators or regulatory thresholds being met, or keeping accounts in line with current regulatory and security standards. Some reviews simply run on a schedule and aren’t prompted by anything you’ve done. Three of the exchanges say plainly that a request isn’t a sign of wrongdoing.

What happens if you don’t answer matters more than the reason. The pages describe features being restricted until the check is done, from “some features or services” to trading. Kraken may pause trading and deposits, and says withdrawals are not affected. It shows these requests only in a web browser, not in its app, so if an email mentions one and the app shows nothing, log in on a browser.

The documents for each kind of income, and what gets sent back, are in source of funds for crypto: what exchanges accept as proof.

Withdrawal limits by level, and where to see yours

The figures in the table are what the help pages print. Two of the six print none and send you elsewhere instead: a page in your account, or the fee tiers in a fees table. Your current level shows in your account too, under a menu that differs by exchange.

Two other things move the number. On two exchanges, VIP status raises the limit as well as verification does; on one of them, VIP accounts start at the usual limit for their level and you raise it yourself in the account’s security settings. And the page with VIP-level limits was published in April 2024 with no later date and sends you to the fees page for the latest limits, so treat its figures as the oldest of these.

Kraken’s own pages don’t agree on its cash limits. Its verification page (updated 6 October 2026) puts the first level under $100,000 a month and the higher level above it, while its page on deposit and withdrawal limits (updated 3 September 2026) lists $100,000 a day and $500,000 a month for a standard verified individual account and points to the Limits tab in your account settings. Go by that tab.

Level names can drift between pages. One exchange’s pages updated in October 2026 call its levels Verification and Verification with higher limits, while one of its help pages from February 2026 still refers to Intermediate and Pro levels. If your screen uses a name that isn’t in the table, go by what the account shows.

These limits are quoted from the help pages as checked in October 2026, and they’re the part of the table we’d expect to move first. The limit that applies to you is whatever your own account shows on the day.

Moving up a level, or being asked to

What to do next depends on what’s on your screen.

You want a higher limit

Start from the same page where you see your level. On Binance the button for the next level is [Get Verified Plus], which asks for your address and then the document; in the app the path is [Account Center], then [Profile], then [Verifications]. One exchange says you can move to higher limits at any time. If you made a mistake at Primary, MEXC’s KYC FAQ says to go straight to Advanced, whose details become the final record.

Then wait out the stated time, from up to 1–2 working days for an address level to a few days for a review done by hand. One exchange says most applications are done within five days once it has every document, and that uploading the same documents again won’t speed up verification, so one submission is enough.

An email or pop-up asks for proof of address or source of funds

Before you send anything, open your account without using the message, and look for the request there. One exchange says a genuine request will always be there once you log in, and that a message about a request you can’t find in your account should be treated as suspicious. If it isn’t there, read how to spot fake KYC texts and “exchange support” calls before you reply to anything. If it is there, note the deadline and send the documents before it.

A level was refused

Change only the thing that was refused, then try again. Retry caps run from three applications a day at each level to five attempts in 24 hours, and two of the exchanges then make you wait 24 hours.

Stop resubmitting while the status still says the review is under way, such as Submitted or Under review. Contact support once the exchange’s own time has passed, which ranges from 60 minutes to 48 hours depending on the exchange and the page, and have your user ID ready. For Binance’s refusal messages one by one, see the fix for each message you might see.

You were verified, and now you’re asked again

The exchanges that cover this treat it as routine: KYC as a continuous process, with details rechecked when an ID expires, when rules change, or when account activity grows, and reviews on a schedule as part of regulatory obligations. Why it happens, and what each kind of request needs, is in already verified but asked to verify again.

Why exchanges verify you in stages

Levels come from an idea that runs through anti-money-laundering rules, which is to check people in proportion to the risk. The UK Financial Conduct Authority’s Financial Crime Guide (section FCG 3.2, last updated 29 November 2024) tells the firms it supervises that their checks have to be sensitive to risk, and that higher-risk situations call for enhanced due diligence and closer ongoing monitoring. It names applying the same checks to every customer and product, whatever the risk, as poor practice. And it says the depth of any extra checks should match the risk they’re meant to deal with.

The US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network sets out the same thinking in its Customer Due Diligence Rule, written for banks, brokers and similar institutions. Two of the rule’s four core requirements are to “understand the nature and purpose of customer relationships to develop customer risk profiles” and to “conduct ongoing monitoring to identify and report suspicious transactions and, on a risk basis, to maintain and update customer information”. Exchanges describe the same pattern on their own pages, as a way to know who their customers are and how risky each one is, or as layers of checks that depend on your activity, your region and your risk profile.

In practice, three things decide how much an exchange asks of you:

• How much money moves. On the three exchanges that publish figures level by level, the second level always carries a bigger withdrawal limit than the first.
• What you use. Your region or the payment channel you pick may mean a higher level, and some regions, products or services need more than the basic level.
• Where you live. Requirements change from country to country, and a higher level doesn’t override that. One exchange’s processing-time page points out that, depending on your country of residence, you may not be able to deposit or withdraw crypto or cash, whatever your verification level.

Stacked identity checks aren’t unique to crypto. NIST’s digital identity guideline SP 800-63A, written for US federal agencies and the identity services they and other organisations use, defines three identity assurance levels. In its words, “Each successive IAL builds on the requirements of lower IALs in order to achieve increased assurance.” Exchanges don’t use those labels, but the idea is the same: each level keeps everything from the one below and adds something.