Why the Same Asset Shows Different Prices Across Sites

It's a common moment of doubt: one site shows a price a fraction different from another, and you wonder which one is 'right'. Usually both are — they're just measuring slightly different things.

Different sources, different snapshots

Prices come from exchanges, and no two exchanges are perfectly in step. A tracker that averages across many venues will land somewhere between the highest and lowest, while one pulling from a single large exchange reports that venue's last trade. Add a few seconds of caching to respect rate limits, and small gaps appear that mean nothing for anyone who isn't trading tick by tick.

When the gap actually matters

For a quick read on where an asset stands, a fraction of a percent is irrelevant. The differences start to matter only in two cases: very thin assets where venues genuinely disagree, and the exact moment of placing a trade, where you care about the price on the specific exchange you're using — not an aggregate.

What we do here

We're transparent about this on our methodology page: which sources feed each asset class, how often figures refresh, and why. If a number ever looks stuck or wrong, that page is the first place to check what you're actually looking at.