Ever wondered, ‘How does Polymarket work?’ Then you are in the right place as we’ve got this quick and simple guide to using this prediction markets site.
We’ll give you the lowdown on how you can sign up to Polymarkets, make a deposit and then buy and sell event contracts for anything from sports and politics to entertainment and even the weather. You’ll also get a guide as to contract pricing so that you can make your trades without making too many rookie errors.
While we’ve got this in-depth Polymarket review, it’s probably best that we give you this speedy introduction right here. So Polymarkets is a prediction markets site. This lets you trade shares or event contracts on outcomes of various events such as the following:
Polymarket will typically ask a question that could give you binary answers such as, ‘Will a Republican or Democrat candidate win the next US election?’ or multiple answers such as, ‘Which team will win the next Super Bowl?’ Your job is to select one of the answers and back up your prediction by buying the relevant event contact.
The shares that you trade are priced between $0.01 and $1 and their prices are based on probabilities that are initially set by Polymarket, but are then adjusted by the trading activities of customers on the site. So a contract valued at $0.17 would have a 17% perceived chance of happening, whereas a contact valued at $0.77 would have a 77% perceived chance of happening.
Every contact won will then be valued at $1. So if you bought a cheaper and riskier contract that succeeded, you would make a larger profit than a more expensive contract that had a better chance of winning.
As such, trading at Polymarket is simply a matter of making a prediction, backing up that prediction by purchasing the relevant event contract and then hopefully selling that contract at a profit.
It’s probably best to give you an example of sports prediction markets rather than something like politics so that you can see what Polymarkets is all about. So let’s take an example of an NBA game between the 76ers and the Celtics.
Here the Celtics were the outright favorites, and previous public trades had given them an aggregated predicted 83% chance of winning. This is reflected in the fact that the event contract for a Celtics moneyline win is $0.83. So if you bought this contract and the Celtics won, your contract would then be worth one dollar representing a profit of $0.17.
On the other hand, the 76ers were rank outsiders to win, and this was reflected in the event contract price of $0.18 representing an 18% chance of winning. If you purchased one of the contracts and the 76ers won, your contract would be worth $1 and you’d have made a profit of $0.82.
The fact that you are trading against other customers means that Polymarket has to make its money somewhere, and this is done by adding in fees for certain trades.
Such fees will typically be applied as ‘taker’ fees when you take liquidity away from the market. These could range from as little as 0.75% of your trade for sports prediction markets to as much as 1.8% for cryptocurrency markets. Note that some markets for geopolitical events might not have any fees imposed on them.
Conversely, those ‘makers’ who add liquidity to the market won’t be hit with any fees and may even get a rebate of the collected fees. Just so you know, this arrangement is typical of many prediction markets sites and the fees are on par with the competition.
Prediction markets sites are still a relatively new phenomenon and there is still plenty of debate in the US as to how they should be regulated. The key thing to understand here is that Polymarket is a legit site that is regulated as a Designated Contract Market by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). This basically means that, as of late 2025, Polymarket is available in all 50 states and you should be fine to sign up here.
No how-does-polymarket-work explanation would be complete without a look at how you’ll be funding your trading activity. Perhaps the most important thing to understand is that it’s primarily a crypto site where you’ll be expected to make your deposits via coins such as USDC, Polygon and Ethereum with no minimum threshold on your payments.
If that doesn’t work for you, then there is the option to make a fiat purchase of cryptocurrencies via MoonPay from a minimum of around $20 at a time. From here you can make your trades and then submit a withdrawal request at any time with no fees and the funds will instantly be sent back to your crypto wallet.
So now you know about all aspects of how Polymarket works, it’s time to give it a try yourself. Simply follow these steps to get straight into the trading action:
Hit any of the links for Polymarket in the banners of this page to launch the site from your web browser (you can also download the brand’s app)
Register your account by hitting the Sign Up button and selecting whether to sign up via your email, Google or crypto wallet
Create your username, check the box to show that you agree to the Terms of Use and then submit your application
Log into your account and verify your identity by submitting the required documentation
Navigate to the cashier section and make a deposit with one of the accepted payment methods
Browse the available prediction markets and click on the event contract you wish to trade
Enter how many of the contracts you wish to buy and confirm your purchase
Now you can sit back and see what happens regarding that particular event. Trade in your contract early for a profit or wait until the event has settled and hope your prediction is correct, it’s your call.
By now you will have everything you need to figure out whether you should download that Polymarket app and start trading. This is because we’ve shown you that Polymarket actually offers you a fairly simple way to get involved in prediction markets and it’s a whole lot of fun too.
Just remember that things are moving fast in the prediction markets realm and we’ll make sure to update this guide to reflect any of the latest changes. But for now, simply click on any of the links for Polymarket in the banners of this page to sign up and make your trades.
Any income made on Polymarket would be classed as capital gains or income and this means that you will have to keep a log of your transaction history and submit this as part of your regular tax return. Just note that Polymarket won’t issue its own tax forms.
Well, there is an excellent Polymarket app that you can download for free to your iOS or Android device. Plus the brand has made sure that its website is fully mobile-optimized, meaning that you can load it up from the browser of your smartphone or tablet and trade from the small screen.
You will have to be at least 18 years old to register an account at Polymarket which is about standard for most prediction markets sites. So expect to have to complete the Know Your Customer (KYC) procedure before making your trades.
Yes, you will find Polymarket on all of the usual social media channels like X, Instagram and TikTok. Plus the brand even has its own Discord channel that’s well worth a closer look.
Well we’ve got this constantly updated guide to the best prediction markets right here. Expect to find Polymarket among the highest-ranked sites alongside fierce rivals such as Kalshi, RobinHood, PrizePicks and Underdog.✅ Sports prediction markets and more✅ A different way to participate in sports❌ Fees can be up to 3.5%
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