Definition
A trading pair is a market quote that links two assets and expresses the price of one asset in terms of the other. In crypto markets, common trading pairs combine a cryptocurrency with another cryptocurrency or with a stable asset, such as BTC/USDT or ETH/BTC. The first asset in the pair is the base asset, and the second is the quote asset that measures the value of the base. Trading pairs are the basic structure used by exchanges to organize how assets are priced and exchanged.
On both a CEX and a DEX, each trading pair represents a specific market where participants can exchange one asset for the other. The price shown for a trading pair indicates how much of the quote asset is required to obtain one unit of the base asset. Market Order and Limit Order instructions are applied within a chosen trading pair to determine how and at what price trades are executed. Without trading pairs, it would be difficult to express consistent prices or match buyers and sellers across different assets.
In Simple Terms
A trading pair is like a price label that always involves two assets. It tells how much of one asset must be given up to get a certain amount of the other. The pair’s format, such as BTC/USDT, makes clear which asset is being valued and which asset is used to measure that value. This simple structure allows many different assets to be traded in an organized way on both centralized and decentralized platforms.