Why does the exchange-rate markup matter more than the fee?

Because it scales with the amount and the fee usually does not. On a $5,000 payment, PayPal's international fee is capped at $4.99, but the 4% conversion spread takes about $199.80 on top, so the visible fee is 2% of what the transfer actually costs. Any provider that advertises zero fees without stating a markup is telling you about the small half.

Why are Wise, Remitly and Western Union not all in the table?

Because several of them publish no number to quote. Wise is listed with an explicit note that its fee comes from a live quote we pulled; Xe, Remitly, WorldRemit, Western Union, OFX and Chase price only inside their own calculator, and we would rather show a gap than a figure we cannot source. Run their quote and put it in the calculator above; that is what the top half of this page is for.

Who should pay the transfer cost, me or the client?

Whoever agreed to it in writing before the work started. Our take: put the receiving cost on the client in the contract (an invoice line for bank charges, or a clause that the invoice total must arrive net of fees), because you cannot control which correspondent bank shaves $15 off the way through. If that negotiation fails, price it into the rate instead of absorbing it silently.

Invoicing & cash flow

International transfer fee calculator

The advertised fee is rarely the cost. Most of what a cross-border payment loses is hidden in the exchange rate, where a 4% markup on $5,000 quietly costs forty times the $4.99 fee printed next to it. Enter the amount and your provider's numbers to see what actually lands, and compare against the published pricing we could verify.

The transfer

Amount sent

The invoice total your client pays, before anyone takes a cut.

Your provider's pricing

Percentage fee

The percentage the provider charges on the amount; check the quote, not the homepage.

Flat fee

Any fixed charge per transfer, such as a wire fee.

Exchange-rate markup

How far their rate sits from the mid-market rate. Zero only if they say so in writing.

Receiving fee

What your own bank deducts when the money arrives; banks often charge 10 to 20 dollars.

What lands in your account

You receive$4,972.5

Total cost: $27.5
Visible fees: $27.5
Hidden in the exchange rate: $0
Taken on arrival: $0
Cost as a share of the invoice: 0.6%

Published pricing we could verify

Provider	Total cost	You receive
HSBC USA	$0 + undisclosed markup	·
Wise	$27.35	$4,972.65
Bank of America	$60 + undisclosed markup	·
PayPal	$204.79	$4,795.21
Payoneer	$223.25	$4,776.75

HSBC USA: no fee to send an outgoing wire, and no published exchange-rate markup, which means the cost sits somewhere inside the rate you are quoted.
Wise: quotes the fee live and states a 0% markup on the mid-market rate; the figure here is a real quote we pulled, not a fixed price.
Bank of America: $45 to send an international wire in dollars, $0 when sent in the destination currency, and $15 to receive one. The markup on foreign-currency wires is not published, so the real cost is higher than the row shows.
PayPal: 5% international fee capped at $4.99, then a 4% currency conversion spread on the rest. The cap is why the fee looks small and the total does not.
Payoneer: 1% to receive a bank transfer into a different currency, minimum $1, plus conversion of up to 3.5% above the wholesale rate. The 3.5% is the published ceiling, so treat this row as the bad case.

On this amount, Wise costs $195.9 less than Payoneer among the providers that publish every component.

Rates checked 2026-09-01 against each provider's own pricing page. Xe, Remitly, WorldRemit, Western Union, OFX and Chase are missing on purpose: they price only inside a live quote, so there is no published number to list.

Estimate

workingfigures.com/calculators/international-transfer-fee-calculator

Formula

Visible fee = amount × percentage (floored at any minimum, capped at any maximum) + flat fee. Exchange-rate cost = (amount − visible fee) × markup. Total cost = visible fee + exchange-rate cost + receiving fee. You receive = amount − total cost. Cost share = total cost ÷ amount.

Assumptions

Everything is expressed in the currency you send, so no rate forecast is involved: the markup is what you lose against the mid-market rate on the day. Provider rows were checked 2026-09-01 against the provider's own pricing page and nothing else; comparison sites were used only to find those pages. Payoneer's conversion is published as a ceiling and modelled at that ceiling. Banks that do not publish a markup are shown with their fee and an explicit gap, never with an invented number, and they are excluded from any cheapest or priciest claim. Platform pricing rots fast: re-check before relying on a row.

FAQ

Why does the exchange-rate markup matter more than the fee?: Because it scales with the amount and the fee usually does not. On a $5,000 payment, PayPal's international fee is capped at $4.99, but the 4% conversion spread takes about $199.80 on top, so the visible fee is 2% of what the transfer actually costs. Any provider that advertises zero fees without stating a markup is telling you about the small half.
Why are Wise, Remitly and Western Union not all in the table?: Because several of them publish no number to quote. Wise is listed with an explicit note that its fee comes from a live quote we pulled; Xe, Remitly, WorldRemit, Western Union, OFX and Chase price only inside their own calculator, and we would rather show a gap than a figure we cannot source. Run their quote and put it in the calculator above; that is what the top half of this page is for.
Who should pay the transfer cost, me or the client?: Whoever agreed to it in writing before the work started. Our take: put the receiving cost on the client in the contract (an invoice line for bank charges, or a clause that the invoice total must arrive net of fees), because you cannot control which correspondent bank shaves $15 off the way through. If that negotiation fails, price it into the rate instead of absorbing it silently.