How to Read Volume on Polymarket (US 2026)

Official Browse Markets: find markets on the home screen; each tile shows the question, the current Yes and No prices, and a resolution date. Official Place a Trade: tap any market to open it. That opened ticket is where you look for a volume or activity figure if the live screen prints one. Official Browse Markets does not list Volume on the tile. We will not invent a home-screen “Volume” chip those pages do not print. If the sports desk is hidden where you live, stop.

Official Place a Trade, Official Browse Markets, and Official Glossary do not reprint a retail column or tab labelled “Volume,” “Vol.,” or “Liquidity $” on the swipe we checked. We will not invent one. The action is: on that opened ticket, look at the volume / activity figure that sits with the market if the live app prints it. If the live control is labelled differently — or is missing — use the live screen, then read posted size on the book. Official Website vs App: US residents do that in the Polymarket US app.

Official Markets API names volume as total trading volume, plus windowed fields volume24hr, volume1wk, and volume1mo, and names liquidity as current market liquidity (also liquidityNum). Official Data Guide lists volume under market statistics. Those are published field names. Official Place a Trade does not reprint them as 24H / 1W / 1M chips. We will not paste an API window onto the US swipe as if the retail page printed that menu.

Public international market pages print a “Vol.” stamp next to a dollar figure. Official Website vs App: US residents browse and trade in the Polymarket US app, not on polymarket.com. We could not confirm that “Vol.” abbreviation, or a retail “All time” chip, on the US help we checked. We will not mash the international stamp onto the US app as a rule. If the US ticket and the international page disagree, trust the book in front of you.

Official Markets API: volume is total trading volume — matches that already happened. Windowed fields (volume24hr, volume1wk, volume1mo) are the same idea over a published window, not a promise size is still sitting. Official How are Polymarket odds determined? is not this page; the point here is simpler: a volume stamp is a tape of fills. It is not the clip you can lift now.

Official Glossary: size is the number of contracts available to buy or sell at a given price; liquidity is how much of that size is there to trade at listed prices. Official Liquidity: that posted clip is what can trade at a level before the next price is touched. Official Prices & Market Data: a market order fills at the best available price on the other side right now — the BBO — if size is there. How to read the Polymarket order book is that ladder. This page does not reprint those teaching fills.

Official Spreads: you buy at the ask. Official Prices & Market Data: a tight spread means the market is liquid; a wide spread means fewer people are trading. A large lifetime volume number can sit next to a thin best ask. Official Liquidity: treat the displayed price as dynamic, especially in live sports. Read posted size at the BBO first. Then glance at volume as history.

Official How are Polymarket odds determined?: Polymarket US does not set prices; odds move when the next orders match. Official Liquidity: size can vanish late in a quarter, in overtime, after a score or injury, or when the result looks decided. A busy tape earlier today does not lock the ask you will pay, and it does not lock settlement. We do not reprint a live volume figure.

Official Glossary: slippage is the gap between the price you expected and the price you received; price impact is how much limited liquidity moved that fill. Official Liquidity: when posted size is low, even a smaller clip can walk through several prices. Official Price Impact: quiet periods, pre-announcement windows, and near-deadline cancels thin depth. High lifetime volume does not refill those levels. The walk lives on the order-book how-to — this page only names why the thin book is the risk, not the volume stamp.

Official Market Settlement and Official Prices & Market Data: a winning contract settles at $1.00 and a losing contract at $0.00. Official Price Slippage: markets stay open until the outcome is confirmed, even if the result looks certain; liquidity can thin on the side already priced as likely. A fat volume number on a “decided” ticket is not a sportsbook hold and not a reason to skip the book.

Official Markets API can name volume and liquidity. Those are field names, not tonight’s NFL tape we quote. Confirm whatever figure is on the ticket after KYC. We will not reprint a dollar Vol., a share count, or a “this market has traded $X.”

Official Glossary defines liquidity as posted size at listed prices. Official Markets API names liquidity as current market liquidity and lets filters speak in USD. Official Liquidity’s teaching ladders are docs books, not a formula we turn into “liquidity = volume × spread.” We will not invent that equation, a shares-versus-dollars conversion, or a “safe size” threshold.

Official Volume Incentive Program is a published rewards pool on eligible contracts — taker-side notional in a stated price band, not a retail Volume chip and not a liquidity equation. We will not paste that program onto the market-page stamp as if Place a Trade printed it. If you wanted the cost stack, that is How Polymarket fees work.