Koinly Review for Canadians

Let's face it, crypto taxes can be a nightmare because you have to search through a maze of transactions. That's why many tax calculators have popped up to automate this process and make filing your taxes easier.

Koinly is one of the most popular crypto tax calculators thats makes it easier to calculate your capital gains. In this post, I go over my Koinly review after using it for my crypto taxes since 2020. I share everything I wish I knew so hopefully I can save you a few hours of time.

The bottom line: Koinly integrates with 350 exchanges, including most Canadian ones, and is compliant with the CRA's guidelines. It's Canadian-friendly and helps you calculate your capital gains faster than you could by yourself.

Just don't set your expectations too high. They market it as "taxes in 20 minutes" but it's not as easy as it seems. There will still be a lot of work collecting your transactions, reviewing the numbers, and troubleshooting. The more transactions you have, the longer it will take. However, Koinly does make it easier overall versus doing it yourself.

What Is Koinly?

Koinly is a beginner friendly crypto tax calculator that makes it easier to file your crypto taxes. Just import your trading history and Koinly does the rest. It will calculate your capital gains, profit/loss, and much more so you can download the papers you need to file your taxes or send to your accountant.

Why Use A Tax Calculator? 

If you have multiple wallets, exchanges, and altcoin purchases, things start to get complicated fast because you have to track every wallet transfer, purchase, sale, etc. This is how even casual crypto investors can end up with 100+ transactions to sort through. Instead of searching through a maze of transactions or paying an expensive accountant, Koinly does everything using software.

Koinly Features

1. 500+ Integrations

Koinly supports most of the popular crypto exchanges and platforms. If something is not supported, you can import your own CSV spreadsheet and do manual entry.

• 350+ exchanges
• 50+ wallets
• 50+ blockchains

2. Detailed Reports

Export various files and reports to get the data you need:

• Complete report
• Schedule 3
• Income report
• Capital gains report
• Transaction history
• End of year holdings
• And much more

3. Portfolio Tracking

• Track your portfolio in the dashboard
• See profit/loss, capital gains, and unrealized gains
• Income overview for mining, staking, airdrops, and more

4. Expert Review

For $499, an expert can manually review your data to highlight issues and ways to save.

5. Mobile and Web App

6. Resources

• Helpful blog posts, tax guides, and information
• If you get stuck, Koinly shows you the relevant info you need which helped me a few times

How To Use Koinly

Here is the most simple way to calculate your capital gains:

1. Download Your Transaction History

Start by listing every exchange, wallet, blockchain, and platform that you've used. Then, export your transactions.

On exchanges, there will be a button somewhere to export your transaction history in a CSV file (usually in settings). The other way is to create a new API key which will automatically sync everything with Koinly (make sure to do read-only access).

For your cryptos, all you need is a list of your public wallet addresses since Koinly can pull info directly from the blockchain.

2. Upload Your Transactions Into Koinly

Once you have your transactions, import it into Koinly. Upload your CSV files, paste your public wallet addresses, or enter your API data to automatically sync everything.

Koinly supports hundreds of exchanges and wallets. This includes the popular ones in Canada like Shakepay, Newton, NDAX, Ledger, Trezor, and much more.

If your blockchain or exchange is not supported, you will have to manually create a spreadsheet that is formatted for Koinly. Here is Koinly's template.

Quick Tip

To get accurate reports, you need to import every wallet and exchange that you've used. If you're missing one, the numbers will be wrong.

3. Check For Accuracy

As you upload your transactions, it will start looking something like the image above. Koinly will tell you if its found errors, duplicates, and so on. Double check it for accuracy and fix any warnings. Your Koinly dashboard will also start displaying your profit/loss and your total crypto holdings. Make sure your crypto holdings in Koinly matches your real portfolio. If it doesn't, there might be a wallet or exchange you forgot to import.

4. Download Your Tax Report(s)

Once the numbers look correct, you can finally download your final reports. Koinly gives you various reports which are helpful for taxes as well as seeing how your investments performed. There's also many advanced features in settings if you need more customization.

The Bottom Line

Koinly is not the cheapest crypto tax calculator, but it's compliant with the CRA's guidelines and saves you time. It has a beginner-friendly user interface and over 500+ integrations. It saved me many hours versus doing everything myself or getting an expensive bill from an accountant. 

Who Should Use Koinly?

• If you have over 20 transactions to track (especially 100's or 1000's of transactions)
• If you want to save yourself or your accountant some time
• If you want a tool that's made for Canada and compliant with local laws

Who Should Not Use Koinly?

• If Koinly does not support your exchanges, blockchains, wallets, etc
• If you want to hire an accountant or professional to do it for you
• If you want to try one of the Koinly alternatives

Koinly FAQ