Kaiko announced its acquisition of Amberdata on June 2, 2026 (Kaiko, Cointelegraph, checked September 25, 2026). If you are comparing against Amberdata specifically, see Aperiodic vs. Amberdata.
Where Kaiko wins
- History. Kaiko's Level 1 and Level 2 data page dates its trade data from 2010, and its order book snapshots, market depth and slippage “since 2015 (varies per exchange)” (Kaiko L1/L2 data, checked September 25, 2026). Our Pro plan carries 5 years; Prime and Institutional carry full history.
- Venues. Kaiko states coverage of “over 100 exchanges” for L1/L2 data (same page), and its Amberdata announcement puts its infrastructure at 200+ exchanges (Kaiko, checked September 25, 2026). We cover three.
- Reference rates and compliance. Kaiko sells reference rates and indices and describes itself as “SOC-2 Type II certified and EU BMR-compliant” (kaiko.com, checked September 25, 2026). We sell no benchmarks and make no regulatory claim. If a valuation or fund-admin process needs a regulated rate, buy Kaiko.
- DeFi. Kaiko covers “CeFi and DeFi ecosystems”, including lending protocols (Kaiko L1/L2 data, checked September 25, 2026). We cover centralized perps only.
- Brand and procurement. Kaiko states 200+ enterprise clients (kaiko.com, checked September 25, 2026). A bank's vendor-risk team will know the name. It will not know ours.
If one of these is why you are shopping, stop here. The rest of the page will not change the answer.
Where Aperiodic is the better alternative
You can buy it today, without a quote. Kaiko's pricing page describes custom, quote-based plans. Its L1/L2 data page does list starting prices, from $1,000 a month for L1 aggregations to $2,500 a month for L2 tick-level data (Kaiko pricing, Kaiko L1/L2 data, checked September 25, 2026). Aperiodic is free for every metric over 2025 on BTC, ETH, SOL and 10 RWA perps, on all three venues. Paid self-serve starts at $199 a month billed yearly ($249 month to month), listed on the pricing page, with no sales call. Pro and Prime carry a personal licence; Prime Commercial carries a commercial licence for internal business use (licensing). Negotiated terms and an SLA are on our Institutional plan, which is priced by conversation, like Kaiko.
You can test it before you talk to anyone. This command pulls a real preview file with no API key and no account:
# Install the Aperiodic CLI into ~/.local/bin
mkdir -p "$HOME/.local/bin"
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aperiodic-io/cli/main/install.sh | INSTALL_DIR="$HOME/.local/bin" bash
export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"
aperiodic slippage --preview --exchange binance-futures --symbol perpetual-BTC-USDT:USDT \
--interval 5m --timestamp exchange --start-date 2025-05-01 --end-date 2025-05-31 \
--output-dir ./data && echo "Saved to $PWD/data"It returns 8,928 rows, one per 5-minute bar in May 2025, with 10 slippage metrics per bar. The median bar had a mean slippage of 0.142 bps against the prevailing quote. The worst bar averaged 3.54 bps. You can check the median yourself on the file the command writes:
# pip install pandas pyarrow
import pandas as pd
df = pd.read_parquet("data/2025-05.parquet")
print(df["slippage_bps_mean"].median()) # 0.142Or have your agent run it and read the file for you:
Read https://aperiodic.io/start.md and follow it. Then pull the free `slippage` preview and tell me the median `slippage_bps_mean`.The preview is free. Beyond it, slippage is included from the Pro plan up.
The slippage comes from executed trades. Kaiko's price slippage is “calculated from at least one order book snapshot per minute” (Kaiko L1/L2 data, checked September 25, 2026): the cost a hypothetical order would pay walking the book. Ours is what each executed trade paid above the best ask or below the best bid, aggregated per bar. Both are useful, and they answer different questions: Kaiko's says what an order of a given size would have cost, ours says what the orders that actually traded paid.
The metrics are point-in-time features, not raw feeds. Aperiodic ships 220 metrics across 19 datasets (catalog): order flow, slippage, L1 and L2 imbalance and liquidity, funding, basis and open interest, from 1 minute to 1 day self-serve (15s and 30s on Institutional).
Two clocks on every bar. Kaiko stamps its own snapshot request time, and its docs do not say which timestamp its bars are built on (Kaiko docs, checked October 1, 2026). Aperiodic records the exchange time and the time each message reached our collectors closest to the exchange, and builds every metric on either. On local time, a bar holds only what you could have seen by its close.
What every plan gives a backtest
- Every perpetual on Binance, OKX and Hyperliquid stays in the data after it is delisted, so a backtest sees the coins that were listed at the time, including the ones that later died.
- Published bars are never recalculated. A backtest you run next year reads the same history as one you run today.
- Every metric comes on exchange time or on local time (when the data reached us). On local time, a bar only holds what you could have seen by its close.
- Prime and above have no API rate limits, and Pro has high ones. The Python SDK downloads 10 files at a time by default.
Side by side
| Kaiko | Aperiodic | |
|---|---|---|
| What you buy | Market data, analytics, reference rates, indices | 220 computed microstructure metrics as parquet |
| Venues | Over 100 exchanges (L1/L2); 200+ across its infrastructure | Binance futures, OKX perps, Hyperliquid perps |
| History | Trades since 2010; order book snapshots since 2015 (varies by exchange) | 5 years on Pro; full history on Prime and Institutional |
| DeFi | Yes, including lending protocols | No |
| Regulated benchmarks | Reference rates; EU BMR-compliant | None |
| Slippage | From order book snapshots, at least one per minute | From every trade versus the prevailing quote, per bar |
| Timestamps | Own snapshot request time; bar clock not documented | Exchange and local timestamps; every metric built on either clock |
| Delisted instruments | Inactive instruments stay in reference data | Kept, on every covered venue |
| Revisions | Corrections ship as a new dataset version | None: published bars are never recalculated |
| Rate limits | Per contract | None on Prime and above, high on Pro; parallel downloads |
| Public pricing | Custom quotes; L1/L2 tiers listed from $1,000/month | Free for 2025 on BTC, ETH, SOL and 10 RWA perps; paid from $199 a month billed yearly, self-serve |
| Try with no account | Trial by request | Preview slice with no key; a free account gets every metric for 2025 on BTC, ETH, SOL and 10 RWA perps |
Kaiko facts checked September 25, 2026 against kaiko.com, the L1/L2 data page, the pricing page and the acquisition announcement. Vendors change their terms. Check their site before you buy.
Which one to buy
Buy Kaiko if you need a regulated reference rate, DeFi coverage, a venue outside Binance, OKX and Hyperliquid, or history before our window.
Buy Aperiodic if you are testing a microstructure or cost hypothesis on perps and want the data today, self-serve, without a procurement cycle.
Some teams will use both: Kaiko for valuation and breadth, Aperiodic for the research features on the venues they actually trade.