How to Find a Bitcoin ATM Near Me
Bitcoin ATMs first appeared in 2013 and since then grew into a large and one of the most developed cryptocurrency related industries. It is considered that ATMs are one of the easiest on-ramp and off-ramp ways today. Many bitcoin ATMs also support buying and selling of other cryptocurrencies, like LTC, ETH, BCH, Dash etc. For simplicity reasons, we still call such machines “bitcoin ATMs”.
Bitcoin ATMs advantage
Bitcoin ATMs became popular for several reasons:
- They can serve unbanked or underbanked users as they use cash on one side of the transaction, for example, you buy bitcoins by depositing cash into a machine, or sell cryptocurrency and receive cash from the ATM. You don’t need have a bank account or credit/debit card to use bitcoin ATM. All you need is cash and an installed wallet on your mobile phone to buy cryptocurrency. Even in developed countries like USA there are plenty people who are cut off from traditional financial services. Also even those who have access to financial services prefer to use ATMs in some cases, as many banks have reportedly closed accounts of the users who transferred funds to and from bitcoin exchanges. Some users reported the cases when they were a client of the bank for tens of years and account was closed on a short notice. Not to risk losing a bank account, many users use ATMs, which is a way around the banks.
- Transactions / registration happens much faster compared to online exchanges, especially in case of high load periods. Online exchanges reportedly take anywhere from 1 day to more than a week to get the account approved before users can start using an exchange. Then user needs to make a funds wire and wait for a bank payment to be accepted by the exchange before the user can make a trade. Bitcoin ATM accepts cash and sends bitcoins to your wallet immediately after the cash is deposited. If the first registration required, this is usually faster and simpler, as the user is in front of the machine, and operator can easily check that the scanned ID belongs to the person who registers.
- Bitcoin ATMs in many cases are valued for higher privacy. It is important to differentiate privacy of financial operations and hiding criminal activity. Some might think that they have nothing to hide, hence they don’t care about privacy. Blockchains contain public information about transactions (pseudonymous transactions), but in case your identity can be connected to one transaction, your further history of using the funds can be obtained through tracker services. ATMs transact by using cash and cash doesn’t leave a financial trace compared to bank transfers or card payments. It is true, that nowadays many ATM operators made the registration mandatory even for small amounts (being pressed by the stricter regulation or forced by banking partners in order to continue having access to traditional financial system). Usually the registration is made in tiers, e.g. for smaller amounts you just register your phone and confirm through SMS (sometimes the burner phone might work), for larger transactions ID scan is required. But it is still possible to find ATMs that allow to transact up to some threshold without registration, means the only trace the user leaves is camera footage (usually the ATMs themselves have cameras, but also operators or local business owner install 1 or several cameras around ATM to monitor). With Covid-19 measures and requirement to wear a mask in public places it becomes easier and less suspect to cover face and hence to increase the privacy of transacting at ATMs.
- Bitcoin ATMs are relatively easy to use. In many cases users report that using an ATM to acquire cryptocurrency was their first experience. Once the users get more familiar with the process, they can later switch to other ways of getting coins, e.g. online exchange, which will definitely be a cheaper option.
The factors mentioned above and others made operating bitcoin ATMs a successful business opportunity and many companies pursuit this activity.
Bitcoin ATMs Disadvantage
- The main disadvantage of buying or selling bitcoins using ATMs are the high fees. Operators of ATM deal with handling the cash, which is by default considered a high-risk business. There are plenty costs for operators, e.g. cash collection services, rent payments, keeping bank relationships in place, regulatory compliance procedures etc. This all increases the costs of running bitcoin ATMs. Operators forward the costs to the user-base and usually exchange fees at ATMs are in 5–20% range. Some operators go extreme route and charge up to 30–40% (known cases reported by users). Some operators, on opposite, use pricing at their ATMs as a marketing, e.g. Coinflip, the largest bitcoin ATM operator that runs more than 1000 ATMs in the USA, target 7% fee at all their ATMs. As a customer, it is important to know the fees in advance. You can do this by using our map (website or mobile apps — see links below) or checking the price on the screen of the ATM before starting the transaction — usually the ATM has the price of the transaction displayed, which users need to compare to market price themselves and figure out the fee size.
- Although in some areas there are plenty of ATMs, some areas are still not very well covered by ATMs and it is hard to find a bitcoin ATM close to your location. This is where our services come in play and we help to find nearest bitcoin ATM easier.
Find Bitcoin ATMs
When you are familiar what a bitcoin ATM and how to use it:
you would like to search for the closest one or several ATMs in order to check how they work in practice. You can utilize our services below to search for bitcoin ATM near you.
CoinATMRadar Website
All locations added on our map can be found on the website: https://coinatmradar.com/
There are several ways you can search for ATM location and further details:
Bitcoin ATM Map (available on the main page)
Each marker on the map is clickable and links to the detailed page for each ATM, where users can check online prices / fees / limits and many more details.
Alternative way to search a bitcoin ATM near you is by using a dedicated search page: https://coinatmradar.com/bitcoin-atm-near-me/
All you need is to enter the address and the transaction details, which coin and whether you want to buy or sell, and the search will show the list of closest locations (you can also click “Use my current location” and the search will use your current position):
Another option to search for bitcoin ATM location is by navigating through country / state / city pages. You can start with a list of countries where ATMs are installed: https://coinatmradar.com/countries/ And then navigate to the area of your interest, e.g. USA-> Georgia -> Atlanta.
USA: https://coinatmradar.com/country/226/bitcoin-atm-united-states/
Georgia: https://coinatmradar.com/state/11/bitcoin-atm-georgia/
Atlanta: https://coinatmradar.com/city/7/bitcoin-atm-atlanta/
Each of the pages contains information about locations in that area. The more narrowed down territory the less ATMs are listed.
State and city pages have some additional functionality to search:
There is an option to sort search results, by default it is “best fees”, so the cheapest options will be displayed on the top of the list. It is important to provide an amount of your intended transaction, because many operators charge fixed fee and percentage fees. Our website will calculate the best option for the particular use cases. For example, Operator 1 sets fixed fee per transaction $10 and percentage 8%. Operator 2 charges $5 + 9%.
In case you exchange $100 it is cheaper to use the ATM of the Operator 2, because the user will pay $14 and get an equivalent of $86 to the wallet, in case the ATM of the Operator 1 used, it will cost $18, and $82 will be delivered.
In case the amount of the transaction is $1000, it is cheaper to use Operator 1 on opposite, while the costs will be $90 instead of $95.
There are two more features that might be useful:
- Ignore fixed fees and online priority checkbox. There is an option for most of the operators to enable online reporting of information (prices, limits etc). In case this information is reported, the fees are displayed on our website. By default the top list priority is given to ATMs that have fixed fees and online information reported. By unticking this checkbox you can have a full list and if operator defines the fees manually that will be compared to online reported information (keep in mind that manually defined information is less reliable and usually less accurate, while online information shows exactly the information as on the screen of the ATM).
- Show current city on top checkbox. Usually a city listing covers some larger geographical territory (smaller cities belong to the larger cities territory). This checkbox make the listing that are located in this particular city to be displayed on top.
CoinATMRadar Mobile Apps (Android, iOS)
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.coinatmradar.android
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/coinatmradar/id944855781
In our previous post we covered a description of our mobile applications (Android and iOS). They allow to easily find bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies ATMs, where users can buy bitcoins with cash and also sell cryptocurrency for cash.
The recent update to the v.3.3.0 included some new features, which we cover below.
- Custom markers and icons defined by operators can be seen on the map and Nearme pages, which makes the search for ATMs of the particular operator easier:
- Now it is possible to check online status of the ATM and prices within the app (previously available on the website only), the button “Show fees and limits”:
- You can also check feedback and operator responses:
- We added dark mode, which makes the use of the apps more convenient (can be changed in the settings):
Bitcoin ATMs are one the easiest ways to buy or sell cryptocurrency, however, definitely not the cheapest options. If you want to find bitcoin ATM near you — please check our website: https://coinatmradar.com/ or any of the mobile apps: Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.coinatmradar.android or iOS: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/coinatmradar/id944855781
We are always glad to hear feedback of our users, so please don’t hesitate to contact us in case you have any ideas to improve the service.
