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Tiếng ViệtWhat Is Slippage in Crypto? How It Works and How to Limit It
by PrivaccUpdated September 25, 20268 min read
Slippage is the difference between the price you are quoted for a swap and the price you actually get. It is not a fee and nobody charges it — it is what happens when the market moves in the second or two between signing and settling. Slippage tolerance is the limit on how much of that movement you will accept. This guide covers why slippage happens, how the tolerance protects you, what sensible settings look like, how it differs from price impact, and how it works on each of the swap panels on this site.
On this page
- What is slippage?
- Why the price moves between quote and fill
- Positive and negative slippage
- What slippage tolerance does
- Slippage vs price impact
- The trade-off
- Sandwich attacks: why a wide tolerance is risky
- Sensible starting points
- How slippage works on this site
- How to reduce slippage
- A worked example
- Common mistakes
- Slippage on different networks
What is slippage?
When you request a swap, you are shown a quote: how much of one token you will receive for a given amount of another. The quote is a snapshot of the market at that moment. By the time your transaction is confirmed, the market may have moved, and you receive slightly more or slightly less than quoted. That difference is slippage.
It happens on every exchange, centralised or decentralised. On a decentralised exchange it is more visible, because you sign the transaction yourself and see both the quote and the result.
Why the price moves between quote and fill
Several things can move the price in that short gap.
Other trades in the same pool
Other people are trading the same pair at the same time. If their trades land just before yours and move the price in the same direction as your swap, you get a slightly worse rate.
Time to confirm
A transaction takes time to be included and confirmed. Solana settles in about a second; some other networks take longer, which leaves more room for movement.
Volatility
In a fast market — after news, at the launch of a token, during a sharp sell-off — prices can move a long way in seconds.
Thin liquidity
In a small pool, even modest trades by others move the price noticeably, so the rate you are quoted is more fragile.
Positive and negative slippage
Slippage can go either way. Negative slippage — receiving less than quoted — is what people usually mean. But if the market moves in your favour in that gap, you can receive more than quoted. Slippage tolerance only limits the downside; it does not stop you benefiting from a favourable move.
What slippage tolerance does
Slippage tolerance is a limit written into your transaction: the worst rate you are willing to accept, expressed as a percentage below the quote. It is enforced on-chain, by the swap itself, not by the website.
If the price moves beyond it
The swap is rejected rather than filled. Your tokens stay in your wallet; at most you pay the network fee for the attempt.
If the price stays within it
The swap fills at whatever the actual rate is — which may be anywhere up to your limit, not necessarily at the limit.
Slippage vs price impact
The two are often confused, and they have different causes and different fixes. Price impact is the cost of your own order moving the pool's price; it is predictable from your order size and the pool's depth, and it is already built into the quote. Slippage is the unpredictable part — what other traders do in the seconds around your transaction. Lowering your slippage tolerance does nothing about price impact.
| Price impact | Slippage | |
|---|---|---|
| Caused by | Your own order moving the pool | The market moving before your order settles |
| Known in advance? | Yes — shown in the quote | No — it depends on others |
| Grows with | Order size relative to liquidity | Volatility, time to confirm, activity in the pool |
| Reduced by | Trading smaller, or deeper pools | A tighter tolerance, calmer markets, faster settlement |
The trade-off
Choosing a tolerance is a balance between failed swaps and bad fills.
Too low
Ordinary market movement trips the limit, and swaps fail repeatedly. Each failed attempt can cost a network fee and some time.
Too high
You authorise the swap to fill at a much worse rate than you were shown. On a volatile or thin token, a wide tolerance can quietly cost a lot.
Sandwich attacks: why a wide tolerance is risky
A wide tolerance is not only exposed to ordinary market movement. It is the condition a sandwich attack needs. An automated trader sees your pending swap, buys just ahead of you to push the price up, lets your swap fill at close to your worst acceptable rate, then sells straight after at a profit.
The attacker's profit comes directly out of the room your tolerance allowed. A tighter tolerance leaves less to take — which is why the right tolerance is the lowest one that still lets your swap go through.
Sensible starting points
Where you can set it yourself, these are reasonable starting points. They are rules of thumb, not guarantees, and a token that needs a very high tolerance to trade at all is telling you something about its liquidity.
| Market | Typical starting tolerance | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Large, liquid pairs (e.g. SOL to USDC) | 0.1% – 0.5% | Rarely needs more |
| Mid-size tokens | 0.5% – 2% | Raise gradually if swaps fail |
| New or thinly traded tokens | 2% – 5%+ | Understand you may receive that much less than quoted |
| Anything needing 10%+ | — | Liquidity is probably too thin to trade safely |
How slippage works on this site
The two swap panels here handle slippage differently, because they are built on different routers.
On Solana
The Solana panel uses Jupiter's routing, which sets the tolerance automatically for each swap based on the pair and current conditions. There is no manual slippage setting in that panel. The quote you see before signing is what the tolerance protects.
On BNB Chain, Ethereum, Base, Arbitrum and Polygon
The panel for the other networks uses LI.FI's routing, and does let you adjust the tolerance in its settings. The starting points above are a reasonable guide there.
How to reduce slippage
You cannot remove slippage, but you can make it smaller and less costly.
Trade liquid pairs
Deep pools move less when others trade, so quotes hold better.
Trade smaller amounts
Smaller orders leave less exposed to movement, and also reduce price impact.
Avoid the most frantic moments
The first minutes after a launch or a major announcement are when prices move fastest and slippage is worst.
Read the quote before signing
Check the amount you will receive and the minimum you are guaranteed. If the minimum is far below the quote, the tolerance is wide.
A worked example
Suppose you are quoted 1,000 USDC for a swap, with a slippage tolerance of 0.5%. The transaction is written so that it only fills if you receive at least 995 USDC — 0.5% less than quoted.
If another trade lands first and the rate slips so that you would receive 997, the swap fills at 997. If it slips to 992, below your minimum, the swap is rejected and your original tokens stay in your wallet. If the rate moves in your favour, to 1,003, you receive 1,003.
Raise the tolerance to 5% and the minimum falls to 950. The swap is far more likely to go through — and far more exposed to a bad fill or a sandwich attack, which is exactly the trade-off described above.
Common mistakes
A few habits cost people more than slippage itself.
Raising the tolerance to force a swap through
If a swap keeps failing, the market is telling you something — usually that the pair is thin or moving fast. Doubling the tolerance fixes the failure by accepting a worse price.
Confusing slippage with price impact
A large price impact in the quote comes from the size of your own order. No tolerance setting changes it; only a smaller order or a deeper pool does.
Leaving a high tolerance set
On interfaces that remember your settings, a tolerance raised once for a thin token can quietly apply to every later swap.
Swapping thin tokens at the busiest moments
Launches and major announcements combine thin liquidity with fast movement — the worst conditions for slippage.
Slippage on different networks
How fast a network confirms transactions changes how much room there is for the price to move. Solana settles in about a second, which leaves a short window. Networks that take longer leave a longer one, and fees for a failed attempt are higher on some of them — both reasons to keep tolerance deliberate rather than generous.
Frequently asked questions
Does slippage cost me money directly?
Not as a charge. Slippage tolerance is a limit on how much worse a rate you will accept, not an amount taken. If the price does not move, you pay nothing for having set it.
Why does my swap keep failing?
Often because the price is moving more than your tolerance allows in the time it takes to confirm. Trading a more liquid pair, trading less, or waiting for calmer conditions usually helps more than simply raising the tolerance.
What slippage should I set?
The lowest tolerance that still lets the swap go through. For large, liquid pairs that is usually well under 1%; for thin tokens it can be several percent.
Can slippage be positive?
Yes. If the market moves in your favour between quote and fill, you can receive more than you were quoted.
Is slippage the same as price impact?
No. Price impact is the cost of your own order moving the pool and is shown in the quote. Slippage is movement caused by others before your order settles.
What is a sandwich attack?
An automated trader buys just before your swap and sells just after it, profiting from the room your slippage tolerance allowed. A tighter tolerance leaves less to take.
Can I set slippage on the Solana panel?
No. The Solana panel uses Jupiter's routing, which sets the tolerance automatically for each swap. The panel for the other networks does let you set it.
Does a failed swap cost anything?
Your tokens stay in your wallet. At most you pay the network fee for the attempt, which on Solana is a tiny amount and on some other networks can be more.