What is Polymarket and how does it work?
Polymarket is the largest crypto-based prediction market — a platform where you trade shares in the outcome of real-world events, like elections, sports, or economic reports. Each market offers YES and NO shares that pay $1.00 if they turn out correct and expire worthless if not, and the share price (between 0 and 100 cents) works out to the market’s live, crowd-sourced probability estimate for that event.
Shares and payout
Every market has two sides: YES and NO. If you buy a YES share at 63¢ and the event happens, that share pays out $1.00 — a profit of 37¢ per share. If the event doesn’t happen, the YES share expires worthless. NO shares work the same way in reverse. You can buy either side at any time before the market resolves, and you can also sell out of a position early instead of holding to resolution.
Price is the market’s probability estimate
Prices move continuously as traders buy and sell on news, so a share trading at 63¢ means the market — collectively, across every trader with money on the line — currently prices the event at roughly a 63% chance of happening. This is the core idea behind prediction markets: the price itself is the probability estimate, updated in real time as new information arrives.
How markets resolve
After the underlying event occurs, each market resolves YES or NO against a resolution source and criteria defined when the market was created, with settlement enforced on-chain through UMA’s optimistic-oracle dispute process.
Key terms
- Market
- A single yes/no question about a real-world event, with its own YES/NO shares, price history, and resolution date.
- Share
- A YES or NO position in a market. Pays $1.00 if that side is correct at resolution, or $0 if not.
- Resolution
- The point at which a market is settled YES or NO based on its defined criteria, triggering payouts to holders of the correct side.
- Liquidity
- How much capital sits in the order book at each price level. Deeper liquidity means larger trades move the price less.
Polymarket historically restricted access for US persons following a 2022 CFTC settlement, and the rules around US access have been changing since, including through a licensed-exchange acquisition. Availability varies by jurisdiction and can change — check current terms for your location before trading. This page is educational and is not legal or financial advice.
Explore further: the live market screener, the signal feed, the whale feed, or a deeper look at how prediction-market odds work.
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