Build copy-trading infrastructure, or buy it.

Three ways to ship it

What “build it” means

A copy-trading stack is eight distinct systems, and once shipped it stays an expense as venue APIs change and credentials expire mid-session. This is the work you take on in-house, and the work you skip by integrating.

• Venue credential handshakes across four venues
• A leader grading engine and copyability gates
• An execution engine with per-user risk caps
• Slippage and edge protection, with logged skips
• A credential-expiry lifecycle and renewal
• Gateway auth, metering and rate limits
• A sandbox with paper-mode execution
• Ongoing monitoring as venue APIs change

A year of senior engineering to ship. Headcount to keep it running.

What you keep, either way

Building on Hyperliquid’s builder codes keeps 100% of the fee, but only after you have built and now maintain every system above. A per-account vendor takes a monthly fee from you and shares none of the trading revenue. Integrating Unhosted keeps 70% of the venue fees your flow generates, costs nothing to integrate, and ships in days. The trade is the last slice of the fee against a year of engineering and a permanent line on your headcount.

Common questions

Should I build or buy copy-trading infrastructure?

Build if copy-trading execution is your core product and you want to own every venue integration, the custody model and the grading engine — expect roughly a year of senior engineering to ship and permanent headcount to maintain it as venue APIs change. Buy if it is a feature that should earn revenue without a dedicated team: an API and SDK give you the same rails in five calls, free to integrate, and you keep a share of the fees.

What does it actually cost to build copy trading in-house?

The build is not one feature. It is four venue integrations with their own credential handshakes and expiry rules, a custody model your security review has to sign off on, a grading engine that can tell a real trader from a market maker, and execution monitoring. Then it stays an expense: venue APIs change without notice and credentials expire mid-session, so it needs engineers paid to catch failures before your users do.

If I build it myself, do I keep all the fees?

On Hyperliquid, builder codes let you keep 100% of the builder fee — but you build and run everything above yourself. With Unhosted you keep 70% of the venue fees and skip the build entirely. The question is whether the last 30% of the fee is worth a year of engineering and permanent headcount.

How is this different from per-account copy-trading vendors?

Copy-trading-as-a-service billed per account (such as CopyFactory on MetaApi) charges you a monthly fee per copied account — published pricing runs from $10 to $144 per account per month — and shares none of the trading fees, and it is oriented at MetaTrader brokers rather than on-chain venues. Unhosted charges nothing to integrate and shares the venue fees with you.