Buy XRP (XRP)

Where can I buy XRP?

You can buy XRP at various European exchanges from as little as € 5, and technical knowledge is no longer required. We only show XRP exchanges that hold a MiCA authorisation and have a good reputation, so you can make your own choice. You pay by credit card, SEPA bank transfer or Wero, the European payment system.

XRP, Ripple and Ripples: what is the difference?

In everyday use XRP, Ripple and Ripples are used interchangeably, but strictly speaking they do not mean the same thing. Ripple is the name of the company, in full Ripple Labs, which builds payment solutions for banks and payment providers. XRP is the coin that lives on the underlying network. Ripples is an older, informal name for that same coin that you still come across now and then.

The network itself is called the XRP Ledger and has existed since 2012. The coin was created in one go at launch and cannot be mined. When someone talks about “buying Ripple” or “buying Ripples”, they almost always mean buying the coin XRP. In this text we use the terms interchangeably, as they are in practice.

Only providers with a MiCA authorisation

Since 30 December 2024, the Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation, better known as MiCA, applies across the entire European Union. National transition arrangements that let previously registered firms carry on ended in the course of 2025, so a provider offering crypto services in the EU now needs a MiCA authorisation. An authorisation granted in one member state passports across all 27, so a provider licensed in the Netherlands (Bitvavo), Austria (Bybit EU) or Malta (OKX) may operate throughout the EU.

What a MiCA authorisation means for you as a buyer:

• The exchange stays under continuous supervision by a European regulator
• Your euros and crypto are kept separate from the exchange’s own assets
• You must be told the costs and risks clearly in advance
• There are rules against market abuse and a mandatory complaints procedure
• Every user must go through a KYC identity check

An authorisation says something about supervision, not about the price risk of XRP. That risk always stays with you.

The XRP price and volatility

The XRP price is volatile and can rise or fall sharply, sometimes within a single day. The chart below gives an impression of how the price has moved over time. How the price behaved in the past says nothing about the future, so only invest money you can afford to lose.

What is XRP used for?

XRP is built for fast and cheap international payments. A transaction on the XRP Ledger is usually settled within seconds and the cost per transaction is very low, regardless of the amount. That is how Ripple positions XRP as an alternative to traditional systems for cross-border payments, such as SWIFT. Unlike Bitcoin or Ethereum, the XRP Ledger is not mined or staked, but runs on a consensus mechanism in which a group of trusted validators confirms the transactions together.

At launch in 2012, 100 billion XRP were created in one go. No new coins are added. A tiny amount of XRP is destroyed with every transaction, so the total supply slowly falls. A large part of the supply is held by Ripple in escrow. In 2017 the company locked 55 billion XRP in such an escrow, from which a portion can be released each month. The fact that the company controls a sizeable share of the coins is one of the points critics raise.

The lawsuit between Ripple and the SEC

XRP was tied up for years in a lawsuit in the United States. In December 2020 the US regulator SEC sued Ripple, arguing that XRP had been sold as an unregistered security. Because of that case, several US exchanges temporarily removed XRP from their offering.

In July 2023 the court ruled that XRP is not a security when it is sold to the public through an exchange, while direct sales to institutional parties did fall under securities rules. In 2024 Ripple was fined 125 million dollars for this. In 2025 both Ripple and the SEC dropped their appeals, ending the long-running case, after which several exchanges listed XRP again.

There were more developments in this period. In December 2024 Ripple launched its own stablecoin, RLUSD, which runs on both the XRP Ledger and Ethereum. And in November 2025 the first spot ETF on XRP went live in the United States, letting investors gain exposure to XRP through the stock market.

The hack of January 2024

In early 2024 it emerged that around 112 million dollars worth of XRP had been stolen from personal wallets belonging to co-founder Chris Larsen. Important to know: this concerned his personal wallets, not the XRP Ledger or the systems of the company Ripple itself. The network and users’ balances were untouched. The incident mainly shows how important it is to secure your own keys well.

Storing XRP in a wallet

After your purchase, your XRP sits in the exchange wallet. That is handy to start with, but the exchange controls the keys. For larger amounts or longer-term storage, a wallet of your own is safer. Your options:

• Exchange wallet: on the exchange itself, easy, yet the keys remain with the provider
• Software wallet: an app such as Xaman (formerly Xumm), where you control the keys yourself
• Hardware wallet: a device such as a Ledger or Trezor that keeps your keys off the internet, safest for larger amounts

Two things matter especially with XRP. First, the destination tag: many exchanges use a single receiving address for all their customers and recognise your deposit by that tag. If you enter no destination tag or the wrong one when transferring, your XRP can go missing or arrive late. Second, a self-custody XRP Ledger wallet needs a small amount of XRP as a reserve to activate the address.

With a wallet of your own you get a recovery phrase of usually twelve or twenty-four words. Whoever has those words has access to your XRP. So keep the recovery phrase offline in a place only you know, never share it, and never store it as a photo or text file on an internet-connected device. If you lose the recovery phrase, your XRP cannot be recovered.

What to look for when choosing an exchange

The XRP coin is the same at every exchange, so there is no quality difference. Exchanges mainly differ on other points:

• Where the trading fees and spread land
• Under which regulator the MiCA authorisation was issued
• How quickly your XRP arrives after payment
• Whether an app plus help in your language is available
• How large the offering of other coins is
• What payment methods the exchange accepts (credit card, SEPA bank transfer or Wero)

Keep in mind that the XRP price can move sharply up and down, and that supervision does not remove that price risk. Decide for yourself how much you can afford to lose and always do your own research before buying XRP.