Cheapest Network for Crypto Payments: 5 Chains Compared

If you accept stablecoins, you have to pick networks. Polygon, Optimism, Base, Arbitrum and Solana all carry native USDC, and all five now charge less than a cent to move it. So which is the cheapest network for payments, and does the difference matter?

Quick verdict

• Cheapest per transaction: Optimism and Solana had the lowest median fees in early 2026, but in a live October snapshot Solana, Polygon and Base were all within a few hundredths of a cent of each other.

• The fee gap is too small to decide on. On every network, 1,000 payments cost a few dollars at most in network fees.

• What decides your real cost: where your customers already hold stablecoins, what their exchange charges to withdraw there, and who pays the gas in your checkout.

• Best default for most merchants: accept USDC on Solana and Base, then add Polygon and Arbitrum for reach. Optimism costs nothing extra to enable.

The rest of this guide shows the numbers behind each point.

Full disclosure: TidePay publishes this guide and supports all five networks, so we have no stake in which one you pick. Last checked: October 2026.

How each network charges for a stablecoin payment

A USDC payment is a token transfer, and every network bills it differently. Knowing how helps you predict when fees will move.

• Optimism, Base and Arbitrum are Ethereum rollups. You pay for the work done on the rollup, plus a small share of the cost of posting its data to Ethereum. Since Ethereum added cheap "blob" space for rollups in 2024 and expanded it through 2025 and 2026, that data cost has nearly disappeared. Fees are paid in ETH.

• Polygon PoS is a chain with its own validators that checkpoints to Ethereum. You pay gas in POL, so the dollar cost moves with network demand and with the POL price.

• Solana charges a fixed base fee of 5,000 lamports (0.000005 SOL) per signature, plus an optional priority fee when the network is busy. Fees are paid in SOL.

Solana adds one cost the others don't: the first transfer of a token to a wallet that has never held it creates a token account, with a one-time, recoverable deposit of about 0.002 SOL, according to Cryptsy's October 2026 measurement. That deposit outweighs hundreds of ordinary Solana fees.

Fee comparison: the cheapest network for payments

Two caveats. These are medians of all transactions on each network, from a Rutgers study of fees between 2024 and 2026, not stablecoin transfers alone. And fees move: Polygon was the most expensive in early 2026 after a fee surge the authors link to prediction-market activity, yet in Cryptsy's live snapshot on 19 October 2026 a stablecoin transfer cost about $0.0005 on Solana, $0.0006 on Polygon, $0.0007 on Base and $0.0022 on Arbitrum. Optimism was not measured there.

Either way, the gap between the cheapest and the most expensive network is a fraction of a cent. A 1% processor fee on a $20 subscription is $0.20, hundreds of times any of these network fees.

Beyond fees: where your customers' money already is

A customer who holds USDC on one network and has to pay on another must bridge it or withdraw it from an exchange. That step costs far more than any network fee above, so the network your customers already use is usually the cheapest one for them.

Exchange withdrawal fees widen the gap. According to Eco's September 2026 comparison, Coinbase lets retail users withdraw USDC for free on Base and Solana, while Binance charges $1 on Polygon and Arbitrum and $0.80 on Solana. A customer topping up from Coinbase will find Base or Solana cheapest by far.

The five networks also differ in speed, gas token and which stablecoins they carry. All five have native USDC issued by Circle.

On TidePay, USDC and USDT are accepted on all five networks, and EURC on Base and Solana.

Network by network

Polygon PoS

One of the oldest low-fee EVM chains, with wide wallet and exchange support. Because gas is paid in POL, fees swing with demand: they jumped in early 2026 and were back near the bottom by October. RWA.xyz counted 20.88 million stablecoin holders on Polygon in October 2026.

Best for: broad consumer reach and apps already built on Polygon.

Optimism (OP Mainnet)

The original OP Stack rollup and the cheapest network in the Rutgers fee data. The catch is reach: it holds the smallest stablecoin pool of the five, so fewer customers will arrive with funds already there.

Best for: customers whose wallets and apps already live on Optimism. Worth enabling, since accepting it costs nothing extra.

Base

Coinbase's rollup, where USDC makes up the large majority of stablecoins. Coinbase users can withdraw USDC to Base for free, and Circle issues EURC there too, which helps if you price in euros. USDT exists on Base only in bridged form.

Best for: customers who buy crypto on Coinbase, and USDC or EURC pricing.

Arbitrum One

The rollup with the deepest DeFi ecosystem and the fastest blocks of the three. Fees were a little higher than Base in both datasets above, but still a fraction of a cent, and both USDC and USDT circulate widely.

Best for: crypto-native customers, DeFi users and B2B payments.

Solana

The largest stablecoin balance of the five, with fixed fees and, since the Alpenglow upgrade went live on 21 October 2026, a target of about 150 ms to finality. It is not EVM-compatible, so customers use Solana wallets and addresses, and a first payment into a new token account carries the small rent deposit described above.

Best for: high-volume, mobile-first and global consumer payments.

Who pays the gas in a crypto payment

Every payment pays a network fee, but who pays it depends on how the payment is made.

• Plain transfer. The customer sends USDC from a wallet or an exchange and pays the network fee, plus any exchange withdrawal fee. You receive the full amount.

• Approve once, pull on schedule. For subscriptions, the customer approves an allowance once. That approval is the customer's own on-chain action, so unless the checkout sponsors it they need a little of the network's gas token: ETH on Optimism, Base and Arbitrum, POL on Polygon, SOL on Solana. After that, each renewal is a pull made by the payment processor, which pays the gas.

• Your own transfers. Refunds, payouts outside a split and moving funds to an exchange come from your wallet, so keep a small gas balance on each network you accept.

On TidePay, gas for automatic renewal charges is covered on all five networks, so the network a subscriber picks doesn't change what you pay per renewal. On one-time payments through a paylink or checkout, the customer pays the network gas. On Solana, subscribers also pay a small, recoverable rent of about 0.0036 SOL for the accounts that hold their authorization, as described in the TidePay docs.

The fee is rarely the problem; the gas token is. Plenty of customers hold USDC but no ETH or SOL. Offering the networks they already use makes it more likely they have both.

Which networks should you accept?

Start from where your customers are, not from the fee table. A good starting set by audience:

You don't have to choose one. On TidePay, a single pricing option can accept several network and token pairs, and the customer picks at checkout. For example, with the API:

{
  "name": "Pro",
  "pricing": [
    {
      "amount": "30",
      "currency": "USDC",
      "acceptedTokens": ["usdc-solana", "usdc-base", "usdc-polygon", "usdc-arbitrum"],
      "billing": { "type": "recurring", "interval": "month" }
    }
  ]
}

The same choice is available without code when you create a Paylink in the dashboard. Once your networks are set, see how split payments pay partners in the same transaction and how refunds work without chargebacks.

Frequently asked questions

What is the cheapest network for stablecoin payments?

In early 2026, Optimism and Solana had the lowest median transaction fees, and in a live October 2026 snapshot Solana, Polygon and Base were all well under a tenth of a cent per transfer. The differences are fractions of a cent, so where your customers hold stablecoins matters more.

Is Solana cheaper than Base?

Usually by a small margin. Solana's fee is fixed at 5,000 lamports per signature, while Base's moves with demand. A first payment into a new Solana token account also carries a one-time rent deposit, which can make that single payment cost more than on Base.

Is Polygon cheaper than Arbitrum?

It depends on the month. Polygon was the most expensive of the five in early 2026, then cheaper than Arbitrum in October. Both stay under a cent for a normal transfer.

Do my customers need ETH or SOL to pay in USDC?

For a one-time payment, yes: the customer pays the network fee in the network's gas token, including on TidePay paylinks and checkout. For a subscription, they need it once, to approve the allowance, unless the checkout sponsors that step [VERIFY]. On TidePay, the gas for every renewal after that is covered.

Which network is fastest for payments?

All five confirm a payment in about two seconds or less. Solana's Alpenglow upgrade targets about 150 ms to finality, and Arbitrum produces blocks about every quarter of a second.

Should I accept USDT or USDC?

Offer USDC on every network you accept, since Circle issues it natively on all five. Add USDT where your customers hold it, such as Solana, Arbitrum and Polygon.

Accept all five networks with one link

TidePay bills stablecoin subscriptions and one-time payments on Polygon, Optimism, Base, Arbitrum and Solana, wallet to wallet. Customers pick the network they already use, funds reach your wallet in seconds, and gas on scheduled charges is on us.

Start free with no monthly fee, or create a Paylink in a few minutes.

Know merchants choosing a crypto payment network? The TidePay affiliate program pays 30% of TidePay's fee on every charge they make, for life, on-chain.

Sources checked (October 2026)

• Ambrosia & Mizrach, Rutgers: Transaction Costs and Speed in the Ethereum Ecosystem (June 2026)

• Cryptsy Transfer Cost Index, October 2026

• Eco: Cheapest Way to Send USDC (September 2026)

• DefiLlama: stablecoins by chain

• DefiLlama: OP Mainnet stablecoins

• DefiLlama: Tether (USDT) by chain

• Hinkal: multichain statistics, citing RWA.xyz (October 2026)

• Everstake: Arbitrum vs Optimism vs Base (block times)

• Cointelegraph: Polygon cuts block time to 1.75 seconds (May 2026)

• Altcoin Buzz: Solana slot times and Alpenglow

• CoinTurk: Alpenglow live on Solana mainnet

• TidePay docs: Core concepts