How Forex Comparison Sites Make Money, and How to Read a "Best Brokers" List

Short answer: most forex comparison and rating sites, this one included, are paid by the brokers they list, usually through commission when a reader opens or funds an account via their links and sometimes through paid advertising or "featured" spots. That does not make a ranking worthless, but it means you should read three things before the list itself: who pays the site, how it chose and scored the brokers, and whether every figure is dated and sourced. Australia's advertising guide for financial products, ASIC RG 234 (June 2026), spells out what a comparison site should disclose, and it is a useful checklist wherever you live.

We earn a commission from some links on this site; it can influence which providers we feature. We do not publish star ratings or scores of our own.

How comparison and rating sites are paid

The common models, in plain terms:

Two disclosures from real sites, read on 12 November 2026, show what this looks like in practice. ForexBrokers.com's advertiser disclosure states: "Our partners compensate us through paid advertising", and that partners "may pay to provide offers or be featured" but "cannot pay to alter our recommendations, advice, ratings, or any other content". And FOREX.com's global trading accounts page notes that "Typical Spreads may not be available for Managed Accounts and accounts referred by an Introducing Broker". In other words, the route by which you arrive can, at some brokers, change what you pay. Check the pricing in your own client agreement against the broker's public page.

What the rules say a comparison site should disclose

The most detailed public rulebook is Australian. ASIC's RG 234, reissued in June 2026, has a section on comparison sites:

• The basis of ratings and awards. If a site includes awards or ratings, "the basis for such should be clearly disclosed" (RG 234.190).
• Money from providers. Sites "should disclose any links to the providers of the products that are being compared, including commissions, referral fees, payments for inclusion in comparisons and/or payments for 'featured' products" (RG 234.191).
• Completeness. "A warning should be included if not all providers are included in the comparison" (RG 234.192).
• Adverts must look like adverts (RG 234.193), and a site should warn, unless it is not the case, that it does not compare every feature that may matter to you (RG 234.194).

The same guide treats content that carries "click through" links in exchange for advertising revenue as sponsored content within its scope (RG 234.189), and says a rating used in an advert should be explained, should be current, and should come with a statement that ratings are "only one factor to be taken into account" (RG 234.76 to 234.79).

Elsewhere the principles are similar, if less specific:

• United States. The FTC's guidance on its Endorsement Guides tells affiliates: "You should disclose your relationship to the retailer clearly and conspicuously on your site", and "The closer the disclosure is to your recommendation, the better."
• United Kingdom. The CAP Code, rule 2.1, says "Marketing communications must be obviously identifiable as such", and rule 2.3 that they "must make clear their commercial intent, if that is not apparent from the context". The ASA has also ruled against award and survey claims that implied testing that never happened, which our guide to broker awards covers.
• European Union. A broker's own marketing must be "fair, clear and not misleading" under Article 24(3) of MiFID II, whoever carries it.

How to read a "best forex brokers" list

Red flags on a comparison or rating site

Some signs say a "best brokers" page is an advert dressed as research. Any one of these is a reason to leave and check the brokers elsewhere:

• No disclosure at all, or one hidden in a footer far from the recommendations, against the FTC's advice that "the closer the disclosure is to your recommendation, the better".
• Deposit bonuses offered to EU or UK readers. Retail CFD bonuses are banned in the EEA and the UK, so a site that pushes them to you is pointing you at an offshore entity; our explainer on the deposit bonus ban covers why.
• Leverage as the headline feature. A list led by 1:500 or 1:1000 leverage is ranking the very thing retail rules cap for your protection.
• Scores with decimals and no formula. "9.7 out of 10" means nothing without the criteria and weights behind it. RG 234 says a rating should be "properly explained", with details of where to learn "the meaning of the rating and the rating scale".
• Undated fees and minimums. Broker pricing changes. A figure without a date, or without a link to the broker's own page, cannot be checked.
• No regulator or entity named. "Regulated" without saying by whom, and for which company, is the gap that clone firms exploit. Our list of broker red flags goes through the rest.
• Urgency. "Offer ends today" on a brokerage account is a sales technique, not information.

None of these proves a site is dishonest, and a site can avoid all of them and still rank brokers by who pays most. The red flags simply tell you how much checking is left for you to do.

Using a ranking well

A ranking is most useful as a shortlist of names you then verify one by one. Take three brokers from any list, find each one's legal entity for your country, and write down five facts per broker from the broker's own pages: regulator and licence number, retail loss percentage, cost per round-trip lot on your account type, minimum deposit and withdrawal terms, and whether negative balance protection applies. If the facts on the comparison site match the broker's own pages, the site has earned some trust; if they do not, you have learned something about the site.

Then do the parts no list can do for you. Confirm the entity on the regulator's register with our regulator check tutorial, compare the retail loss percentage within one jurisdiction, and price your own account with the all-in cost method. For reading client reviews and testing customer service, see how to compare forex broker reviews.

How this site works

We are a comparison site, so the checklist applies to us. We earn commission from some of the brokers we write about, and that can influence which providers we feature; the details are on our disclosure page. We compile facts from the brokers' and regulators' own pages and date them; we do not open accounts to test execution and we do not publish scores, star ratings or awards. We do not cover every broker: we write about brokers whose pages we have read, and the brokers we hold are marked where we link to them. The method is in our editorial policy, and the broker spec pages are on the broker reviews hub.

Brokers we hold, with their own risk figures

For transparency, here are three brokers we earn a commission from, with the retail loss figure each publishes, read on its own site on 12 November 2026:

Our best forex brokers for 2026 compares them on regulation, costs and platforms, and how to choose a forex broker gives the full checklist.

Risk warning

CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. Between 73.6% and 80% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with the providers named above, per their own published figures read on 12 November 2026. A ranking or rating does not change that risk. This article is general information, not financial or investment advice.