Futures commission per contract: on a micro S&P at NinjaTrader's free plan, the commission is 41% of what you pay

Per-contract futures pricing from Interactive Brokers and NinjaTrader, read from each firm's own pages. The headline commission is the smaller part of a micro trade: exchange, NFA and clearing fees make up the rest, and they do not fall when you buy a cheaper plan.

Last verified 16 September 2026 · how we check

A futures commission is quoted per contract and per side, and it is the number every broker puts in large type. It is also, on the contracts most retail traders start with, less than half of what one side of the trade costs.

What two brokers quote

Read from each firm’s own pricing pages on 16 September 2026, US futures, per contract, per side:

IBKR’s rate falls with monthly volume: on standard US futures, $0.65 between 1,001 and 10,000 contracts, $0.45 up to 20,000 and $0.25 above that. On micros the same bands run $0.20, $0.15 and $0.10. Its Fixed and Tiered plans both start at the same rate; only Tiered steps down.

On commission alone, IBKR undercuts NinjaTrader’s free and monthly plans on both contract sizes. Only the Lifetime plan is cheaper. The same schedules apply at Tradovate, which sits in the same group and publishes identical rates.

What NinjaTrader itemizes

NinjaTrader publishes a second page that the headline table does not show: every contract it offers, with the fees broken out. The schedule is dated 14 August 2026 and, by the page’s own note, is updated quarterly.

All figures per contract, per side.

On a micro S&P on the free plan, the commission is $0.39 of $0.94: 41%. The other 59% is the exchange, the regulator and the clearing firm. On the Lifetime plan the commission shrinks to 14% of the cost, and the part it leaves behind does not move.

A round turn, in full

Doubling for entry and exit:

On ES the exchange and NFA fee alone is $2.78 a round turn, more than the Lifetime commission on both sides combined.

When a plan pays for itself

The saving a plan buys is the commission difference and nothing else, because the fees under it are fixed.

Monthly against Free. The $99 plan saves $0.30 a side on ES, $0.60 a round turn, so it pays for itself at 165 round turns a month, which we worked through in NinjaTrader fees. On micros it saves $0.10 a side, $0.20 a round turn, and needs 495 round turns a month.

Lifetime against Free. $1,499 at $1.40 saved per ES round turn is about 1,071 round turns. At $0.60 per micro round turn it is about 2,498.

Lifetime against IBKR’s commission. On ES the Lifetime plan saves $0.26 a side against IBKR’s first band, $0.52 a round turn, and needs about 2,883 round turns to recover $1,499. On micros the saving is $0.16 a side, and recovery takes about 4,684.

Those last two figures compare commissions only, and the next section is why that is as far as the comparison can honestly go.

Why the all-in comparison stops at one broker

NinjaTrader lists a clearing fee of $0.19 per contract. IBKR’s US futures table names exchange fees, regulatory fees and, on the Tiered plan only, overnight position fees on top of its commission; it does not list a separate clearing line. We have not reproduced the dollar amounts behind those fee headings, so we do not put an IBKR all-in figure next to NinjaTrader’s.

The exchange fee itself is set by the exchange, not the broker. IBKR’s own disclosure adds a caveat to that: on the Tiered schedule, fees passed on to clients “may be greater than the costs paid by IBKR” to the exchange or regulator, because volume discounts it receives are not necessarily passed on.

What to take from this

Compare all-in, not commission. On a micro contract, the commission is under half the cost on the free plan and a seventh of it on the Lifetime plan. A broker quoting a lower commission can still be dearer per side if its other fees are higher.

Find the itemized schedule. NinjaTrader publishes one, per contract. Where a broker only names fee categories, ask for the dollar figure on the specific contract you trade.

Size the plan to your volume. Under 165 ES round turns a month the free plan wins. At a few hundred micro round turns a month, the monthly plan barely moves the total, because the commission it reduces is the smallest line on the bill.

Watch the date on the schedule. NinjaTrader’s itemized table is updated quarterly, and exchanges change their own fees on their own calendar.

Commissions on options follow a different logic, where the premium rather than the fees decides whether the cost matters; we set that out in how much it costs to trade options.

What we checked, and what we didn’t

IBKR’s US futures commission bands were read from its futures commissions page, and NinjaTrader’s plan rates and itemized per-contract fees from its pricing and commissions pages, on 16 September 2026. NinjaTrader’s itemized schedule is dated 14 August 2026. The round turns, shares and break-even counts are our arithmetic on those figures.

We have not reproduced IBKR’s exchange, regulatory or overnight position fee amounts, and we have not compared margin, market data or platform costs, which are separate charges at both firms. We hold no account at either and report no fills of our own.

Sources

• Interactive Brokers: futures commissions
• NinjaTrader: pricing plans
• NinjaTrader: commissions by contract, itemized