Educational only, not financial advice. Broker features, options-approval requirements, 0DTE availability, and fees change and vary by account — verify current details on the broker’s own site. NoVo is independent and not affiliated with the brokers named.
When people ask for the cheapest broker for 0DTE scalping, they usually mean commissions. But for a scalper making many trades, commissions are often the smallest cost — the spread, slippage, and fees matter more. Here’s the real cost picture.
The full cost of a scalp
Commissions/fees — per-contract charges (many brokers are low or commission-free, though regulatory fees may still apply; verify current schedules). The bid-ask spread — you buy at the ask and sell at the bid, paying the spread every round trip; over many trades this dwarfs commissions. Slippage — fills worse than expected in fast or thin markets. For a high-frequency scalper, spread + slippage are the dominant costs — and they’re about which strikes you trade and how you fill, not which broker’s commission is lowest.
How to actually minimize cost
Beyond picking a low-fee broker: trade liquid, tight-spread strikes (the spread is your biggest lever), work orders toward the mid instead of always crossing the spread, avoid the widening spreads into the close, and don’t oversize a thin strike. These execution habits save far more than shaving a few cents of commission — and they compound over hundreds of trades.
Chasing the lowest commission while ignoring the spread is like haggling over the tip and overpaying for the meal. The spread is the bill that actually adds up.
Where execution quality comes in
Because spread and slippage are the real costs, execution quality is where the savings live. That’s a reason a tool with adaptive routing aimed at good fills — like NoVo (via Tradier/Alpaca) — can matter more than a commission difference for an active scalper. Pick a low-cost broker, then focus on trading liquid strikes and filling well; that’s the cheapest way to scalp, in the way that actually counts.