Our method
Everything on BrokerVersus is a function of the same recorded data. This page sets out the rules in full, so you can decide whether you agree with them before you trust an output.
The rules
Six rules that produce everything on this site
Nine fields per broker, recorded identically
Founding year, headquarters, every regulator and its tier, minimum deposit, maximum leverage, typical EUR/USD spread, trading platforms and account types. All of it comes from public regulatory registers and each broker's own published account terms. If a figure cannot be checked from a source you can open yourself, it does not go in the table.
The matrix is ordered by a rule, not an opinion
Tier-1 licence count descending, tightest EUR/USD spread as the tiebreak. That is the whole ordering function. It is applied to every broker equally and there is no manual override — a broker's position moves only when its licences or its pricing move.
Head-to-head rounds are computed, not written
Every matchup scores five rounds — cost, trust, access, platforms and operating record — and each is decided by comparing a single number. Where the numbers are equal the round is drawn; we do not invent a winner to make a page more decisive. The verdict text explains the scoreline, it never overrides it.
Quiz weights are fixed in code and published
Every answer in the matcher carries a fixed weight towards specific brokers, and the whole weighting table is printed on the quiz page itself. Ties break the same way the matrix does. Nobody gets a personalised result that a different reader with the same answers would not get.
What Tier-1 actually means here
We treat the FCA, ASIC, CFTC/NFA, BaFin, MAS, IIROC/CIRO and the Central Bank of Ireland as Tier-1: jurisdictions with segregated client money, compensation schemes and enforceable leverage caps. CySEC, FSCA, DFSA and similar sit at Tier-2. Offshore registrations — Seychelles FSA, Belize IFSC, SCB, CIMA — are Tier-3 and carry little practical protection despite often being the licence behind the headline leverage.
Where the money comes from, and where it stops
We earn a commission when a reader opens an account through an outbound link. Those links carry rel="nofollow" and route through a first-party /go/ redirect that stamps an attribution ID. No broker can pay to move up the matrix, win a round, join a shortlist or gain weight in the matcher, because none of those outputs are hand-set — they are all functions of the recorded data.
Evidence
The primary sources we check against
Leverage caps, licence status and compensation cover are read off the regulators themselves, not off broker marketing. These are the pages we work from — each screenshot links to the live original.
Limits
What this method does not tell you
Spread is a snapshot, not a guarantee
Every spread figure here is a typical quote on the broker's tightest account in normal conditions. Around a rate decision or a payrolls print, all of them widen — sometimes by multiples. A broker with a 0.60 pip headline can be more expensive than a 1.00 pip rival at the moment you actually trade.
Commission accounts are not in the spread column
Raw and zero accounts quote close to nothing and charge per lot instead. Our cost figures price the spread only, which flatters those tiers. The fee calculator says so explicitly, and the guide on spread versus commission works through where the crossover sits.
Licences describe protection, not service
Tier-1 cover tells you your money is segregated and there is a compensation scheme behind it. It says nothing about slippage, requote behaviour, withdrawal speed or how a support desk handles a dispute at two in the morning.
Headline leverage is usually not yours
Ratios like 1:1000 or 1:2000 apply to offshore entities. If you are a retail client in the EU or UK, your account is capped at 1:30 on major pairs whatever the marketing says, and the entity holding your money may not be the one with the Tier-1 licence.