By PredictQ Team // Updated: July 2026
Polymarket did roughly $10.8 billion in trading volume in June 2026, and its regulated U.S. platform went from about $50 million a day in mid-May to over $200 million a day by late June. Annualized revenue crossed the $1 billion run rate the same month. Seven months after the December 2, 2025 U.S. relaunch, this is a very different platform than the one the CFTC kicked out of the country in 2022.
One honest caveat up front: you’ll still see Polymarket called “the largest prediction market in the world,” and that claim needs an asterisk now. Kalshi posted a record month in June 2026 on the back of the World Cup, roughly tripling Polymarket’s volume. What Polymarket still owns is the deepest global, crypto-native prediction market and some of the best order books anywhere on politics, crypto, and macro. Here’s the full review: history, mechanics, fees, funding, availability, and where it fits against Kalshi.
What Polymarket Is
Polymarket is a peer-to-peer event contract exchange built on the Polygon blockchain, founded in 2020 by Shayne Coplan, who started building it at 22. Trades settle in USDC, the dollar-pegged stablecoin, and every order, fill, and settlement is verifiable on-chain.
There are two front doors. U.S. users trade through a CFTC-regulated, intermediated platform running on QCEX, the licensed derivatives exchange and clearinghouse Polymarket bought in July 2025. International users connect their own Polygon wallets and trade against the same on-chain order book directly. Same market mechanics underneath, different onboarding, funding, and compliance on top.
The Comeback
Polymarket’s history is half the story. The company launched in 2020, built a rabid user base on fee-free politics and crypto markets, and grew fast enough to get noticed. In January 2022 the CFTC fined it $1.4 million for operating as an unregistered Designated Contract Market and forced it to geo-block American users. Polymarket complied and spent the next three and a half years building globally while locked out of its biggest natural market.
The 2024 U.S. election was the breakout. Election markets on Polymarket pulled in more than $3.3 billion in volume and got cited constantly as a sharper forecasting tool than the polls. In July 2025, the CFTC and DOJ closed their investigations without new charges, and Polymarket bought QCEX, a CFTC-licensed exchange and clearinghouse, for $112 million. Instead of spending years applying for its own designation, it bought one. The CFTC issued an Amended Order of Designation on November 25, 2025, clearing intermediated U.S. access, and the relaunch went live December 2. Intercontinental Exchange, the parent of the NYSE, completed a $2 billion investment in the company by March 2026.
Why this matters to you as a trader: the federal cleanup is real and finished, and the platform’s scale means liquidity on major markets is deep enough to give you tight spreads and clean fills. That’s the whole game.
How Trading Works
Every market is a Yes or No question with a written resolution rule. Contracts trade between $0.01 and $0.99, and the price is the implied probability. A Yes contract at $0.72 means the market says 72%. Winners pay $1.00, losers pay zero, and you can sell out at the market price any time before resolution. That exit option is the most underrated feature of trading on an exchange instead of a sportsbook.
Under the hood, Polymarket runs a central limit order book, the same architecture as stock and futures exchanges. Orders match on price-time priority. Market orders fill instantly at the best price; limit orders sit on the book at your price until someone takes the other side.
Markets and Liquidity
This is where Polymarket earns its keep. The platform runs more than 1,000 active markets at a time across politics, sports, crypto, economics, culture, AI, weather, and geopolitics.
Politics is the franchise. Polymarket built its name on election markets and still runs some of the deepest political order books in the business: presidential races, congressional control, primaries, policy decisions.
Sports has been the big 2025-2026 investment. Polymarket signed on as the Official and Exclusive Prediction Market Partner of UFC and Zuffa Boxing in November 2025, added an MLB partnership with a sports integrity agreement in March 2026, and has deals with the NHL, DraftKings, and PrizePicks. Coverage spans the major U.S. leagues, international soccer, golf, college sports, and MMA.
Crypto and macro markets (Bitcoin prices, Fed decisions, inflation prints) attract heavy institutional and algorithmic flow. Culture and tech markets cover AI milestones, IPOs, awards, and whatever is trending. Geopolitics draws serious money and, occasionally, serious controversy around who knew what before the market moved.
Top political and crypto markets can run cumulative volume in the hundreds of millions with depth at every price level. Polymarket probabilities also feed into Google Finance and Yahoo Finance, which puts its odds in front of millions of people who never open the app.
Fees
Polymarket moved to a category-based fee model in 2026 built on a price-uncertainty curve: fees = shares x category rate x price x (1 - price). Fees peak at 50/50 and fall to near zero at the extremes.
The current schedule, per 100 shares at the 50-cent peak:
Geopolitics and world events: 0% fees, maker and taker
Sports: 0.03 rate, $0.75 max (25% maker rebate)
Finance, Politics, Mentions, Tech: 0.04 rate, $1.00 max
Economics, Culture, Weather, Other: 0.05 rate, $1.25 max
Crypto: 0.07 rate, $1.75 max
Note the distinction people keep getting wrong: only geopolitics is free. Regular politics markets sit in the 0.04 tier. Still cheap, but they’re separate categories now.
Makers never pay fees, full stop. Polymarket recycles 20% of taker fees in crypto and 25% in other categories back to liquidity providers as daily rebates, and a tiered taker rebate program exists on top of that. Fees round to five decimals, so the smallest possible fee is 0.00001 USDC, which means tiny trades in lopsided markets often pay nothing at all.
Polymarket charges nothing on deposits or withdrawals. Your only costs moving money are Polygon gas (under a cent) and whatever your on-ramp or exchange takes.
Deposits and Withdrawals
Funding is the biggest practical difference from Kalshi. U.S. users can fund via ACH bank transfer, debit card, or MoonPay’s fiat on-ramp. ACH is free; card deposits carry a processing fee from the payment provider, not Polymarket. Recent bank deposits can carry a short hold before they’re withdrawable, which is standard on regulated platforms.
International users fund with USDC on Polygon. Buy USDC on Coinbase or Kraken, withdraw to Polygon, send to your Polymarket address. A few minutes end to end once you know the drill, with a learning curve the first time. Withdrawals mirror the deposits: ACH or card for U.S. users, USDC on Polygon for everyone else. Daily withdrawal limits apply to standard accounts, with higher tiers for institutional users.
The App
The U.S. mobile app launched with the December 2025 relaunch and is the main onboarding path. The web interface is clean and built for traders, with real charting, order book visualization, and good market discovery. It assumes a slightly sharper user than Kalshi does, which fits the crypto-native DNA. One quirk: desktop signups still land on a waitlist as of July 2026, while mobile signups with a promo code skip it. Support runs through email, in-app messaging, and a genuinely active Discord.
Where You Can Use It
Polymarket is live in roughly 38-40 U.S. states as of July 2026. It is not accepting users in New York, Arizona, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, New Jersey, Nevada, or Ohio, with Nevada’s status hanging on a preliminary injunction. Minnesota’s ban takes effect August 1, 2026 and is being challenged by the CFTC, which has now sued nine states over prediction market enforcement. The map moves monthly. The in-app eligibility check is the only answer that matters for your address.
Internationally, the global platform reaches most countries. Brazil and several European countries, including France, blocked access in 2026, and Polymarket geo-blocks restricted jurisdictions.
Pros
Largest global, crypto-native prediction market, with a $1B revenue run rate as of June 2026
Deep order books and tight spreads on major political, crypto, and macro markets
Geopolitics markets carry zero fees; every other category scales to near zero at price extremes
Makers pay nothing and earn daily rebates
1,000+ active markets across politics, sports, crypto, economics, and culture
CFTC-regulated U.S. access through the acquired QCEX exchange
ICE completed a $2 billion investment in March 2026
Sports deals with UFC, Zuffa Boxing, MLB, and the NHL
Odds integrated into Google Finance and Yahoo Finance
Non-custodial on-chain settlement for global users
Cons
Desktop signups still hit a waitlist; mobile with a promo code is the fast path
No 1099-B tax reporting (you self-report on Schedule D and Form 8949)
Crypto rails on the global platform take some learning
Unavailable in 10+ states while litigation plays out
More complexity than Kalshi for a first-time prediction market user
Who Should Trade Here
Two types of traders belong on Polymarket. The first wants the broadest, deepest global market catalog and doesn’t mind either the regulated U.S. onramp or crypto rails. The second is the active or quantitative trader who cares about spreads, liquidity, and execution quality above all else.
If you want the simplest onboarding, zero crypto exposure, and a 1099 in January, Kalshi is the cleaner fit. If you want depth, breadth, and a fee schedule that rewards patient limit orders, Polymarket wins.
Bottom Line
Polymarket came back from a federal ban to a CFTC-regulated U.S. relaunch, a $2 billion ICE investment, and a $1 billion revenue run rate inside seven months. The fee structure is among the cheapest in the regulated space and literally free on geopolitics. Kalshi may be printing bigger monthly volume numbers right now, but on the markets Polymarket does best, nobody offers a better book.
The state map is messy and the crypto architecture scares off beginners. Traders who push past both get the best execution in the category. You can sign up HERE.
Disclosures: PredictQ may receive compensation when readers sign up for platforms through links on this page. We only partner with platforms we evaluate as legitimate, but compensation does not influence our editorial analysis. Information was accurate as of July 2026. Prediction market rules and state availability are changing rapidly, so always confirm current terms and eligibility on the platform itself before depositing or trading. Event contract trading involves substantial risk and is not appropriate for all participants. This content is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, legal, or investment advice. Must be 18 or older. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER.