Which countries can't use Bybit? The official list, plus the UK, Japan and EU changes

01Bybit's official restricted countries list

Bybit publishes a single help-center page called Service Restricted Countries. It is the only Bybit page that sets out a general list of restricted places — other country names turn up in separate announcements and campaign terms, which is why the picture is scattered. As of its 16 October 2026 update the page lists the United States, the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Singapore, Canada, North Korea, Cuba, Iran, Uzbekistan, Sudan and Syria, plus Crimea and Sevastopol and the non-government-controlled areas of the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions of Ukraine.

Dubai is on the list, but only for one Bybit company — the one licensed in Dubai. For anyone living there it is not a clear yes or no, so start the sign-up and let verification tell you which Bybit entity serves you and what it offers.

Two more things on that page are easy to skip. The list ends with "or any other jurisdictions in which we may determine from time to time", so being absent from it is not a promise of access. Bybit also turns away anyone on the US, EU or UK sanctions lists. The table below repeats the list in a form you can scan, with the document date next to it.

02Countries that are not on the list but still cannot trade

Japan is not on that page at all, and yet Bybit has already finished closing its service to people living in Japan. From 22 July 2026 a Japanese resident can only turn their balance into BTC, ETH or USDC and withdraw it — no trading. So if you live in Japan, the answer is clear even though Japan is not printed on the list: trading is over, and withdrawing is all that is left. Japan's own rules also cap leverage on crypto futures at 2x, whichever venue you look at; the country pages cover that local-law side.

The United Kingdom went the same way. Bybit stopped new UK registrations, and from 21 October 2026 UK access is restricted to crypto and fiat withdrawals plus Convert Small Balances, with bybit.com/en-GB closing on 19 November 2026. If you hold a UK account, the clock is running on getting funds out; our UK page covers what the FCA allows and which venues still work there.

In the European Economic Area, Bybit said on 29 June 2026 that access to certain Bybit Global services for EEA residents would be progressively limited. EU residents are sent to bybit.eu, run by Bybit EU GmbH — a separate company with an Austrian licence, and a separate account you open yourself, not your old balance appearing somewhere new. Futures are not among the services listed for it on the regulators' registers, so an EEA account can work for buying coins while the futures tab simply is not there — check in the app what your account shows. What is allowed in the EU is a longer story than one exchange.

Bybit has also named, in its own campaign terms, jurisdictions where derivatives trading is restricted — that is the exchange's word for futures and perpetuals, the leveraged products, as opposed to simply buying coins on spot. The places named are Brazil, Hong Kong, the Chinese mainland, Kazakhstan, the Netherlands, Spain and Türkiye. That wording is indicative rather than a formal list, but it tells you where to expect the futures section to be missing even if you can register and buy coins. For Türkiye in particular, the local rule is separate: leverage on crypto is not permitted on licensed Turkish platforms, which the Turkey page explains.

03What "restricted" means for an account you already have

The word covers three different situations, and they feel nothing alike. The hardest one is a full block: you cannot register, and an account opened before is closed down. The middle one is a wind-down, which is what the UK and Japan got — you keep logging in, trading stops, and you are left with conversion and withdrawal so you can take your money out by a stated date. The softest one is being pointed to a local company, like EEA users opening an account on bybit.eu, where things work but the product list is shorter.

There is also the quieter version: everything works except the futures tab. That is the Brazil, Netherlands, Spain and Türkiye pattern, and it catches people who funded an account specifically to trade perpetuals. If that is your situation, the money is not stuck — it is on spot, and you can withdraw it or use it there. What does not change in any of these cases is your own country's law, which is a separate layer from the exchange's list.

04Why the lists you find on blogs contradict each other

Most of the "Bybit banned countries" pages in search results are copies of a copy, and nobody dated the original. Lists move in both directions: Binance, for example, no longer names Syria on its current prohibited countries document, while plenty of old articles still show it there. Bybit's page itself does not mention the UK or Japan, because those closures arrived through announcements instead.

So treat any list — including the one on this page — as a snapshot with a date attached. The one source that is always right about you is the sign-up form plus identity verification, because that is where the exchange applies its own current rules to your actual documents and location.

05The same countries on other exchanges

A country being closed on Bybit says nothing about the next exchange. Canada bars leverage for everyone through a regulator rule, so it is closed almost everywhere. Singapore is on Bybit's restricted list, and separately Singapore's regulator does not allow licensed providers to offer leveraged crypto or crypto derivatives to retail clients — so even where an exchange is open, the product may not be. The matrix below puts the five venues we cover side by side for the countries people ask about most — read down your own row, not across one exchange.

Each venue has its own document and its own quirks: Binance's prohibited countries list, where OKX restricts derivatives only and what Hyperliquid's terms actually say. For the general picture of who serves whom, which futures exchanges are available in my country covers the broader comparison in one place.

06How to check your own country in ten minutes

1. Open Bybit's own page and look at the date

   The Service Restricted Countries article shows when it was last updated. If your country is there, stop — there is no legitimate route in.

2. Read your own country page

   Exchange lists and national law are two different things. Start from the country index and find yours: in some places futures are legal but one venue left, in others no venue may offer leverage at all.

3. Start the sign-up and let verification decide

   Register with your real country and real documents. The app applies the current rules during identity verification, and that result is more reliable than any list. If your country is not restricted, you can open a Bybit account and see which products appear in your region — the futures tab either shows up or it does not.

4. Test a small amount before you commit

   Deposit something small, send part of it back out, and confirm withdrawals work from your account. Doing that before you fund a real trading balance costs you a few minutes and tells you more than any review.

If verification goes through and futures are available to you, the next question is whether this exchange suits you at all — contracts, fees and how the terminal is laid out. That is covered in our Bybit overview rather than here.