How FX Skipper works: methodology

1. The mid-market rate

The reference rate on every page is the mid-market (interbank) rate from open.er-api.com, the open endpoint of ExchangeRate-API. That source refreshes once a day, so the rate shown can be up to about 24 hours old and does not move intraday. It is a reference for measuring what providers charge, not a rate you can trade at.

2. Live quotes

Real provider prices are collected once a day, for each corridor, at a reference amount of roughly USD 1,000 expressed in the sending currency (for example about 3,700 AED or 160,000 JPY), so every route is judged on a comparable, realistic transfer. Two sources are used:

• Wise's quote API — Wise's own rate and fee for the corridor.
• Wise's public price-comparison data — timestamped quotes for other providers and banks (for example Remitly, Western Union, OFX, InstaReM, Xoom, and high-street banks).

Disclosure: both sources come from Wise, which competes with several of the providers listed. The data reflects standard delivery and excludes first-transfer promotions, so your own quote may differ. A quote is only shown as live while it is fresh — under 36 hours old for Wise's own quote, under 96 hours for the other providers — and every row shows the date it was collected.

3. How the amount received is calculated

Every row — live or estimated — is described by the same four numbers and follows the same formula:

rate after margin = mid-market rate × (1 − FX margin)
recipient gets = (amount − flat fee) × (1 − transfer fee) × rate after margin
total cost = value at the mid-market rate − recipient gets

For a live quote the provider's own rate and fees are used; the FX margin is derived as how far that rate sits below our mid-market reference, so it can be slightly negative when a provider's rate is marginally better than the reference. The tables show each of these columns, and they add up to the total.

Worked example (illustrative numbers, not a real quote): sending 1,000.00 EUR to INR when the mid-market rate is 1 EUR = 90.0000 INR, with a 5.00 EUR flat fee, a 0.5% transfer fee and a 1% FX margin.

4. How often it updates

• Mid-market rates: once a day, from the source above.
• Live quotes: collected once each time our daily update runs. Each corridor page states when its quotes were collected.
• If an update does not run, quotes older than the limits in section 2 stop being shown as live and the affected rows fall back to estimates — they are never left looking current.

5. Live quote, published fee, estimate

• Live quote — a real price returned for that corridor and amount, with the date it was collected.
• Published fee (checked date) — a fee read from the provider's own published price list, with the date someone checked it. No row uses this label yet; it is reserved for fees verified by hand.
• Typical fee (estimate) — typical published fees and margins used where no live quote exists. It is not a quote for your transfer, is listed separately, and is never ranked against live quotes or called "best". Where it comes from for each provider:

6. Which providers are listed in which country

A provider is listed for senders in a country only if we have evidence it serves them there: an official provider page, a live response from its API, or a fresh live quote. If a source says it does not serve a country it is excluded; if we simply cannot confirm it, it is hidden too and named, with the reason, under the table. Review of this matrix: 2026-10-17. Availability can differ by country inside the euro area and changes over time.

7. Ranking, affiliate links and commission

• Live quotes are ranked by the amount the recipient gets, best first. Estimates follow, listed separately and unranked.
• Some links are affiliate links and are marked rel="sponsored nofollow". Active affiliate relationship today: Wise.
• Featured placements (exchange houses on the country pages, see Advertise) are paid and are labelled "Featured · paid placement". They add a label and a branch info card only: the exchange-house tables are not ranked, rows keep their order, and corridor pages, rankings and every "best live quote" line ignore them. A featured provider is always labelled next to its name, and the label says it is paid.
• Commission is never an input to the ranking, the highlighting or the "best live quote" line. This is enforced by automated tests that check the order is identical whether or not any provider has an affiliate link.
• Outbound clicks pass through a small redirect that records the provider, currency pair and page — never an IP address, cookie or user ID.

8. Why there are no star ratings

A star score without a published method would just be an opinion presented as data, so FX Skipper shows none. If ratings are added they will come with their criteria on the page.

9. Limits

• FX Skipper compares prices; it does not process payments and is not financial advice.
• Figures are indicative: amounts far from about USD 1,000, other delivery methods, promotions and the exact time of day can change what a provider charges.
• Rate alerts on corridor pages compare your target with the mid-market rate (section 1), which updates once a day — not with what a provider pays out. Each alert email also shows the best live quote when a fresh one exists, and says so when none does. Emails carry no affiliate links.
• The large-transfer calculator shows what a margin would cost; the bank figure is the median of fresh bank quotes in our live data (measured on about USD 1,000 transfers) and the broker figure is a what-if you set — it is not a quote. The business page ticks a feature only when the provider's own page says so (dated, with a short note) and otherwise says "Not verified"; it shows no fees.
• Translated corridor pages are published only after a native speaker has reviewed them; the share cards and the embeddable widget use the same ranked live quotes as the corridor pages and are skipped or say "no live quote" when there is nothing real to show.
• Delivery times and per-corridor delivery options are not verified, so they are not stated on corridor pages.
• The site covers 14 money transfer providers, 172 local exchange houses and 173 corridors; a provider that is not listed for your country is not necessarily unavailable there — we may just not have confirmed it.

10. Corrections

If a figure or a coverage entry is wrong, tell us at contact@fxskipper.com. Every coverage entry records its source and the date it was checked.

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