• Updated November 2026
Koinly vs TokenTax, compared honestly.
A self-serve platform with the category’s most generous free tier, versus a tax firm that also sells software. The products are less alike than the category suggests.
Koinly is software you drive yourself: import free, preview everything, pay $49 and up per tax year for the reports. TokenTax is an accounting firm with a software front end: no free tier, $49 entry, and professional tiers that climb to $3,499 because human experts are the product. Which one is “better” depends entirely on whether you want a tool or a firm. Pricing checked in November 2026.
Affiliate disclosure: Some links on this page are affiliate links — if you buy through them, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Right now that applies to CoinLedger and Koinly; the other vendors’ links on this page are still plain links. Rankings are not for sale.
The verdict
Verdict: Do-it-yourself filers: Koinly, and it is not close — the free preview alone settles most questions before money changes hands. TokenTax makes sense only when you specifically want accountants attached to your crypto return (complex entities, margin, a full-filing engagement) and accept pro-tier pricing. Everyone else overpays for the firm and underuses it.
Side-by-side comparison
Pricing checked against the vendors’ public pricing pages in November 2026. Prices change often — treat this as a starting point, not a quote.
| Koinly | TokenTax | CryptoTaxAI (us) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free tier | Import up to 10,000 txns, full on-screen gains preview; no report downloads | None — no free plan or free trial | 100% free tools, no account, runs in your browser |
| Entry price | $49 / tax year, up to 100 txns | $49 / tax year, up to 100 txns | Free |
| Mid tier | $99 / tax year, up to 1,000 txns | $199 / tax year, up to 5,000 txns | — |
| High volume | $279 / tax year, up to 10,000 txns | $1,999 / 20,000 txns; $3,499 VIP / 30,000 txns | — |
| Billing model | Per tax year, self-serve | Per tax year; full filing is a separate add-on | — |
| Integrations | 800+ exchanges & wallets (vendor-reported) | 100+ integrations (vendor-reported) | Manual entry — no imports needed |
| Country reports | 20+ countries | US-focused, with an international report option | US-focused guides |
| Human help | Support + paid expert review add-ons | Accounting firm — CPA-prepared filing available as an add-on; VIP is the expert tier | Guides and the Ledger Clinic |
| Standout | Most generous free preview in the category | Software and accountants under one roof | Zero signup, zero uploads, instant answers |
| Visit | koinly.io → | tokentax.co → | Our free tools → |
Prices checked against the vendors’ public pricing pages in November 2026. TokenTax full filing is priced as an add-on to its software plans; multi-year purchases receive a discount per the vendor. Vendors change pricing without notice — confirm before buying.
Who each one is for
Pick Koinly if…
Koinly
You are comfortable driving software yourself, want to see your full gains picture free before paying, or file outside the US. The default choice for most DIY filers.
Visit Koinly →Pick TokenTax if…
TokenTax
Your situation genuinely needs professionals: entity returns, heavy margin or derivatives, an IRS notice, or a full-filing engagement where the same firm computes and files. That is what the upper tiers are buying.
Visit TokenTax →Pick neither if…
CryptoTaxAI free tools
Your history is simple: a few buys and sells, some staking income, or a quick what-if estimate. No account, no uploads — just answers in your browser.
Open free calculator →Pricing, as checked
Prices checked in November 2026. Both bill per tax year; the resemblance ends there.
- Koinly: free import and gains preview for up to 10,000 transactions. Paid: $49 (up to 100 transactions), $99 (up to 1,000), $179 (up to 3,000), $279 (up to 10,000) per tax year. The tiers buy capacity, not features.
- TokenTax: no free plan and no free trial — the first look at your numbers costs money. Basic $49 (up to 100 transactions), Premium $199 (up to 5,000), Pro $1,999 (up to 20,000), VIP $3,499 (up to 30,000) per tax year. Full filing by its accountants is an additional add-on, and the steep Pro/VIP steps are priced like services, not software.
- Read Premium carefully: TokenTax Premium ($199 for 5,000 transactions) is genuinely competitive on raw capacity — cheaper per transaction than Koinly’s mid tiers. The catch is everything around it: no free preview to verify your import first, a smaller integration list, and a cliff from $199 to $1,999 if you outgrow it.
Where each one breaks
- Koinly breaks when you want a human. Support and paid expert reviews exist, but nobody at Koinly files your return or represents you. If your facts are genuinely messy — an entity, a notice, years of unreported activity — software polish is not the missing ingredient.
- TokenTax breaks on try-before-you-buy and on DeFi depth. With no free tier, you pay to discover whether your exchanges import cleanly. And 2026 roundups consistently rate its DeFi and chain coverage behind the newer platforms; heavy on-chain users should look at our DeFi software comparison before paying pro prices.
- TokenTax also breaks on the upgrade cliff. Outgrow Premium’s 5,000 transactions and the next step is $1,999 — a 10× jump for capacity that costs $279 at most at Koinly.
- Both break on records that no longer exist. A closed exchange’s exports, a lost wallet file, a dead email account — neither software nor accountants can subpoena your own history. The firm’s edge is knowing what substitute evidence the IRS accepts; it is not magic, and it does not extend to records nobody kept.
The workflow we’d run
- Start with the free preview — Koinly’s. Import everything and look at the totals. Most filers discover here that their situation is ordinary, and ordinary situations do not need a firm.
- Reconcile the 1099-DA gap. Use our free 1099-DA reconciler to check what your broker reported against your own basis, whatever platform you end up paying.
- Escalate only on evidence. If the preview surfaces entity income, margin liquidations, or years of missing filings, that — not anxiety — is the case for TokenTax’s accountants or a local CPA.
- Consider the middle path. Many US filers land between these two: CoinLedger previews the full report free like Koinly, exports straight into TurboTax, and our readers get 10% off with code CRYPTOTAX10 — DIY pricing without giving up the filing-oriented polish.
How each handles your 1099-DA
Form 1099-DA is where the DIY-versus-firm question gets concrete. The form will frequently be incomplete — proceeds without basis for anything transferred in or bought before 2026 — and somebody has to reconstruct the missing half. The only question is who.
- With Koinly, it is you. The platform imports your exchange data, flags every noncovered gap, and gives you the lot-matching tools to close them. For organized records this is an afternoon of work; for a shoebox of CSVs, it is the same afternoon plus archaeology.
- With TokenTax, it can be them. Reconciliation help is the firm’s trade: at the service tiers, professionals chase the records and make the treatment calls. That is a real service for genuinely tangled histories — and the reason the top tiers cost what they do.
- Neither can amend the broker’s form. Issuer errors get issuer corrections, whoever you hire. What a firm adds is judgment about the gray areas, not a hotline to the IRS.
Before paying firm prices for a reconciliation, size the problem free: our 1099-DA reconciler shows the dollar gap between the form and your basis in about a minute. Small gap, organized records — DIY wins. Chaos — now you have a measured case for the firm.
How we compare
- We take pricing, free tiers, and billing models from the vendors’ own public pages, cross-checked against independent roundups — and we date every check, because these numbers move.
- We do not accept payment for placement or ranking. Where a link on this page can earn us a commission, the disclosure at the top and bottom says so, and says which vendor it applies to.
- We do not publish user counts, star ratings, or testimonials we cannot verify, and we label integration counts as vendor-reported because every vendor counts differently.
- When sources disagree, the vendor’s current pricing page is the final authority — confirm there before buying.
Not tax advice. This page is educational content only and does not constitute tax, legal, or financial advice. Crypto tax rules are complex and change over time — consult a qualified tax professional about your situation.
Keep comparing
- Koinly vs CoinLedger — the other per-tax-year head-to-head.
- Koinly vs CoinTracker — free tiers and billing models.
- The full software hub — all four platforms side by side.
- Software that works with TurboTax — if filing inside TurboTax is the plan.
Koinly vs TokenTax FAQ
Because the top tiers are services wearing a software price tag. Pro ($1,999) and VIP ($3,499) bundle high transaction capacity with professional involvement from TokenTax’s accounting team; full filing is still an add-on. If you do not need the humans, the same capacity costs a few hundred dollars at self-serve platforms.
No free plan and no free trial, as of our November 2026 check. That is the sharpest contrast with Koinly, whose free tier imports up to 10,000 transactions with a full gains preview.
For a regular exchange-based investor, no: Koinly or CoinLedger produce the same forms for $49–$99. TokenTax earns its price when the return itself is complicated — entities, margin, notices, or a full-filing engagement.
Koinly, by a wide reported margin: 800+ integrations versus TokenTax’s 100+. If your history lives on smaller exchanges or on-chain, verify TokenTax imports yours before paying, since there is no free tier to test with.
If you made a handful of buys and sells, free browser tools like our capital gains calculator plus a plain-English Form 8949 guide are usually enough. Take the two-minute quiz if you are unsure.
No. Only the broker that issued the form can correct it, and the IRS directs taxpayers to the issuer for errors in proceeds, dates, or identity. What Koinly and TokenTax both do is organize your side of the story: your documented basis reported on Form 8949 alongside the broker’s proceeds. A blank basis box, specifically, is not an error at all — it is how noncovered assets are reported.
Affiliate disclosure: Some links on this page are affiliate links — if you buy through them, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Right now that applies to CoinLedger and Koinly; the other vendors’ links on this page are still plain links, and we earn nothing from them. Pricing was checked against the vendors’ public pricing pages in November 2026 and can change. Our comparisons are never for sale.
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