# What is a DEX and why is it secure?
DEX stands for “Decentralized Exchange.” On DEXs, every order is settled on blockchain with the help of smart contract technology.
What’s great about DEX is that it’s more secure than centralized exchanges. If your order is written on smart contracts, no one can manipulate it or revert it. It eliminates security concerns that centralized exchanges have. DEX is transparent and immutable. So it’s free from frauds.
# What’s the downside of DEXs?
ERC-20 was a great success and most tokens were issued on Ethereum blockchain. Therefore most DEXs are based on Ethereum which is a second ranked blockchain in terms of its market cap. But it’s not easy to trade in a DEX without deep knowledge on how Ethereum works. You’ll get frustrated even before using DEX due to three reasons below.
First, MetaMask plugin isn’t an easy-to-use tool for normal users. Obviously it is a great tool to read data from or send transactions to the blockchain but it requires basic knowledge on how blockchain works including seed words, gas fee, block confirmations, etc.
Second, users need to pay for gas for every transaction. Gas is paid in ETH so you need to have a small amount of ETH when trading. It’s not reasonable to force you to have ETH if you just want to trade ERC-20 tokens.
Lastly, it takes at least 15 seconds for any transaction to be confirmed. When you want to add an order to the order book, you need to wait for 15s. Cancelling them also requires another 15s and filling orders too. What’s worse is that 15s are the minimum amount of time. When the network is busy, you would have to wait for 3-4 minutes just for cancelling an order.
# How is LevX different?
[**LevX**](https://levx.app) is the first exchange on [LoomNetwork](https://loomx.io)’s BaseChain and it offers fastness and convenience. You don’t need a knowledge of blockchain and you don’t have to pay any fee any more. More importantly, you don’t need to wait for minutes! LoomNetwork’s DPoS consensus guarantees 1-3 seconds confirmation for any transaction.
What LevX is focusing on is user experience. If there’s any friction for users, that’s our high priority to remove it. Because LevX is a DEX fueled by smart contracts, you can benefit from both safety and fast, convenient trading experience.
One more thing, LevX is the first DEX that supports leverage trading with cross-chain assets including ETH, ERC-20, BNB, TRON, ATOM and BTC. This feature will be covered in the following posts.
# How can I get early access?
You can request for an early access now.
* Visit [LevX website](https://levx.app) and click 'GET EARLY ACCESS'
* You’ll see your position. You can BOOST your position.
* Invite friends with your referral URL. The more your invite, the higher your position is in the waiting list.
* Users with higher position are getting to the access sooner.
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