CoinTracking Review And Tutorial: Best Tax Calculator?

To start with this CoinTracking review, you must know there are two main ways to use CoinTracking: 

1. As a cryptocurrency tax calculator. 
2. As a cryptocurrency portfolio tracker.
    

CoinTracking as a crypto tax calculator

CoinTracking lets you import your trading data from all your wallets and exchanges like Coinbase and Binance, so that you can crunch all the numbers all at once and find out how much you made or lost in any given tax year. Before software solutions like CoinTracking, cryptocurrency traders had to use spreadsheets to keep track of their purchases and sales.

CoinTracking as a crypto portfolio tracker

If you have accounts with several different cryptocurrency exchanges, you can link them all together with CoinTracking. Once connected, you can view the value of all your cryptocurrency assets in a single interface. In addition to exchanges, you can also connect many different cryptocurrency wallets.

I’ll continue my review of CoinTracking with a background check of the company to determine whether or not CoinTracking is safe to use.

In a recent interview with Wealthica, CoinTracking founder Dario Kachel elaborated on the software firm’s origin story.

“I started trading with my own first bitcoins in 2013 at Mt. Gox along others. After several trades I realized quickly that properly tracking all my trades was almost impossible. So I started off with an Excel spreadsheet like many others but I quickly grew tired of manually updating it. I met several traders at that time who had similar problems. So I realized that the need for a professional cryptocurrency portfolio tracking tool is huge and started developing CoinTracking, which initially launched in April of 2013.”

CoinTracking filled an important niche because it could import trading data from exchanges automatically. This eliminated the need to use spreadsheets to determine annual gains and losses. Early cryptocurrency traders took notice and started joining the service, which CoinTracking says now has over 400,000 daily active users.

Over the past several years, CoinTracking’s developers have added several new capabilities. Features like permissioned accounts allow accounting firms to share CoinTracking’s features among their employees. A new database lets CoinTracking users look up cryptocurrency tax laws and find CPAs that have cryptocurrency expertise. 

Lastly, CoinTracking displays an impressive list of team members on their website. 

Considering its maturity and user base, I believe CoinTracking is safe to use for any cryptocurrency investor, beginners and advanced alike.

Let’s continue this CoinTracking review by covering its main features and competitive advantages.
 

Best-in-class API support

One of the best things about CoinTracking is that it has better API support than any other cryptocurrency tax calculator. Most cryptocurrency exchanges like Binance and Coinbase with publicly accessible APIs can be easily linked into CoinTracking. Once you link your exchange account to CoinTracking, it can import your trading data and update it in real-time.

Tax form generator 

United States-based cryptocurrency traders can use CoinTracking to automatically populate IRS form 8949. This is the main tax form that you need to submit when you do your taxes. The form generator gives you several options for listing out your cryptocurrency transactions on the form. You can either list your transactions individually or combine them using a shortened format that has been approved by the IRS.   
 

Tax software integration

Once you generate a tax report with CoinTracking, you can export your trading data to a variety of different tax software programs. CoinTracking is compatible with TaxAct, TurboTax, Microsoft Excel and Drake Software. You can also download your report as a CSV or PDF file if

The main feature that sets CoinTracking apart is the fact that it has much better API support compared to competing crypto tax calculators. The majority of other crypto tax calculators require you to download a CSV file of your trading data, then upload it to your account manually. Crypto tax calculators that do offer API integration typically only support a handful of the most popular exchanges. 

Another nice thing about CoinTracking is that many tax professionals use it. If you work with a CPA firm that uses CoinTracking, you can share your cryptocurrency trading data with them in just a few clicks. 

Other cryptocurrency tax calculators offer cheaper paid plans for intermediate-level traders. On the other hand, CoinTracking’s unlimited transaction plan is actually inexpensive compared to other crypto tax calculators’ unlimited plans, some of which charge $1000/year. 

Also, most crypto tax calculators lack a free plan. The fact that you don’t have to pay anything if you have 200 transactions or less to process makes CoinTracking a logical choice for beginner traders. 

Most beginner cryptocurrency traders will be able to use CoinTracking for free. However, if you end up placing more than 200 trades before tax season arrives, you’ll need to upgrade to a paid account. 

There are two options to consider: CoinTracking Pro and CoinTracking Unlimited. CoinTracking Pro will process up to 3,500 transactions, which is more than enough capacity for most intermediate level traders. 

CoinTracking Unlimited is designed for professional crypto traders that use trading bots to place trades automatically. 

Here’s what Cointracking’s fees look like: 

• Free. Free users can generate tax reports, but they have to upload their trading data manually using CSV files. 
• Pro. CoinTracking Pro costs $166/year or 0.014 BTC/year. If you pay for two years of service upfront, you can get a $76 discount (or a 0.01 BTC discount if you pay in Bitcoin). Alternatively, you can purchase a lifetime CoinTracking Pro subscription for $434, or 0.043 BTC. 
• Unlimited. CoinTracking Unlimited costs $302/year or 0.03 BTC/year. You can save $162 (or 0.016 BTC) by paying for two years of service in advance. A lifetime subscription will cost you $3459, or 0.343 BTC.

This time, I will not review CoinTracking and its features, but instead, I’ll show you how to use CoinTracking to get your crypto tax report ready in no time.
 

Step 1: Create your account

To start this CoinTracking tutorial, you must create an account. Go to CoinTracking.info, then fill in the signup form. You can use the free version of CoinTracking to generate a tax report, but only if you have 200 transactions or less to process. This makes CoinTracking a logical choice for anyone who is just getting started with cryptocurrency.

Step 2: Transfer your data

The first step of using CoinTracking involves copying all your trading data to your CoinTracking account. There are two main ways to do this: with CSV files or by syncing CoinTracking to all your cryptocurrency exchanges and wallets. 

• CSV files. Almost all cryptocurrency wallets and exchanges provide the ability to export your trading data to a CSV file. CSV stands for Comma Separated Values. It’s a type of spreadsheet format that can be read by Excel, Google Docs and many other similar programs. 
• API sync. The easiest way to use CoinTracking is to sync all your wallets and exchanges to it. To do this, you must log in to each exchange or wallet that you want to connect and create an API key. Once you do this, you can copy and paste your API information into CoinTracking. This will let CoinTracking fetch your trading information and update it automatically. To use this feature, you need a paid CoinTracking subscription.

You can begin importing your data via the Enter Coins drop-down menu. Select either Exchange Imports (CSV) or Exchange Imports (API). Then, follow the instructions to complete the process.

Step 3: Generate your tax report

After you’ve imported all the trading data that you want to analyze, you can generate a tax report. 

To begin, select Tax Report from the main menu, then click the red Open settings and create a new Tax Report button. 

You will see this screen:

For the most part, the fields you need to fill out here are self-explanatory. However, there are a few that require a brief explanation. 

If you’re a beginner trader and you only have accounts with one or two crypto exchanges (generally Coinbase and Binance), you may want to flip the Group by day toggle switch to the off position. This will let you create a more detailed tax report that includes all the trades that you placed in any given day. If you used exchanges that are located in different time zones, you’ll probably want to leave this feature enabled.

The Method drop-down menu lets you choose the way you want CoinTracking to price the value of the assets at the time you purchased them. There are several different ways of doing this, and they all have their own advantages and disadvantages. Most tax authorities let traders choose from several different accounting methods. However, once you pick an accounting method, you should stick with it. 

CryptoManiaks Tips: If you’re having trouble deciding which accounting method to use, you can use CoinTracking’s free tax professional database to contact a crypto tax expert near you. 

The Tax short-term and Tax long-term fields let you learn how much you’ll need to pay at tax time. To fill those in, you’ll need to find out which tax bracket you’re in. If you’re not sure or if you just want to see how much you earned from trading crypto, you can change the Tax calculation mode from Calculate tax and gain to Calculate gain only.

Lastly, this CoinTracking review wouldn’t be exhaustive if I didn’t mention that additional features that it offers.
 

Export IRS form 8949

If you live in the US, you can use CoinTracking to generate IRS form 8949. This is the form you need to submit to report your crypto gains or losses. CoinTracking will populate the form with data from your CoinTracking tax report.

Export your trading data to other tax programs

If you use TaxACT, TurboTax or Drake, you can export your trading to those programs after you create your CoinTracking tax report. Just click the appropriate button and you’ll be able to download the file you need to perform the import. 
 

Track your crypto portfolio on the go with CoinTracking’s mobile apps

If you’ve synced all your wallets and exchanges, CoinTracking’s Android and iOS apps let you check your crypto accounts from anywhere. 
 

Forecast Bitcoin price fluctuations

The experimental Bitcoin Analysis feature uses technical analysis to predict if Bitcoin prices will rise or fall three hours from the time of calculation. Scroll down to see more useful Bitcoin charts.

You probably understand it by now: my review of CoinTracking is extremely positive.  In fact, we even mentioned CoinTracking in our article “The best crypto tools for cryptocurrency.”

I love CoinTracking mostly because:

• Thanks to its features, it will allow you to calculate your tax reports in a user-friendly and time-saving way. 
• The company’s history and user base make CoinTracking safe to use for anyone. CoinTracking won’t run away with your money and will deliver on its promises.
• You can try it for free, and even use it for free if you do not trade a lot. 

I hope you enjoyed my review of CoinTracking! Feel free to check this page for more awesome tools cryptocurrency investors must use.