Moon.com vs Polymarket: what's actually different
Polymarket is a prediction market: you buy Yes or No shares on a real-world event, priced between $0 and $1, from other traders. Moon.com is leveraged price betting: you bet Up or Down on Bitcoin, Tesla or another listed asset at up to 1000x, against the house, 24/7. Here is the side-by-side, and which one suits which kind of bet.
Updated 10 September 2026. Facts sourced from moon.com and its help centre. Affiliate disclosure.
Moon.com vs Polymarket comes down to one question: do you want to bet on whether something happens, or on how far a price moves? Polymarket sells outcome shares priced between $0 and $1 that pay $1 if you’re right, traded peer-to-peer with other users. Moon.com lets you bet Up or Down on Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, Apple, Tesla and other listed markets with leverage from 1x to 1000x, around the clock, against the house, and $100 at 100x behaves like a $10,000 position. If it’s the price move you want, sign up on Moon through our referral link, learn the mechanic on the free play-money mode, and you’re on the VIP track with rakeback on fees from day one.
- 1000x Moon max leverage
- $0 to $1 Polymarket share price
- 1% Moon opening fee
- 0% Polymarket maker fee
What each one is, in one paragraph
Polymarket is a prediction market. Its documentation describes a platform where “users trade on the outcomes of real-world events”. Each market is a single binary question with Yes and No outcomes, and each share is priced between $0.00 and $1.00, where the price “directly represents the market’s belief in the probability of that outcome”. A Yes share at $0.65 implies roughly a 65% chance. When the market resolves, winning shares redeem for $1.00 and losing shares are worth $0.00. You trade with other users through a central limit order book, “not against the house”. Orders are matched off-chain and settled on-chain on Polygon, and all trading uses pUSD, an ERC-20 token that the docs describe as backed by USDC.
Moon.com is leveraged price betting. You pick an asset, bet Up or Down, choose a stake and a leverage multiplier from 1x to 1000x, and your profit or loss is the percentage move in your direction multiplied by your exposure. There are no strike prices, no expiry dates and no order book. You bet against Moon, which sets the price and reserves a spread in its favor. Markets run 24/7, there is a free play-money mode, and the full mechanic is walked through in the how it works guide.
Moon.com vs Polymarket: comparison table
| Moon.com | Polymarket | |
|---|---|---|
| What you bet on | The price direction of an asset: crypto, stocks, futures, commodities (BTC, ETH, SOL, AAPL, TSLA visible at launch) | The outcome of a real-world event, framed as a Yes/No question |
| How you win | Price moves in your direction; profit = exposure × move %, minus fees | Hold the winning side at resolution; each winning share redeems for $1.00 |
| Leverage | 1x to 1000x | Not described in Polymarket’s docs; shares are bought at their $0 to $1 price |
| Who you trade against | Moon (house-banked, with a pricing edge in Moon’s favor) | Other users, peer-to-peer, through an order book |
| Fees | 1% of wager to open; holding fee every 8 hours (dynamic rate); performance fee of at least 10% of realized profit; undisclosed spread at close | Makers pay nothing; takers pay a fee that scales with price and peaks at 50% probability; geopolitical and world-events markets are fee-free; no Polymarket fee to deposit or withdraw USDC |
| Deposits | Crypto only, after KYC (government ID front and back, proof of address) | Crypto from a list of supported chains, automatically converted to pUSD on Polygon |
| Time horizon | Open-ended: the bet runs until you close it, it’s liquidated, or a Moon limit is hit | Fixed: each market has an end date, then a resolution process through the UMA Optimistic Oracle with a 2-hour challenge period |
| Maximum loss | Your stake on that bet, plus the opening fee | What you paid for the shares |
Polymarket lines come from Polymarket’s own documentation, linked at the end of this page; Moon lines come from Moon’s terms and help center.
How the two payouts actually work
On Polymarket. You buy 100 Yes shares at $0.65, paying $65 (plus a taker fee if you cross the spread, unless the market is in a fee-free category). Two things can happen. The market resolves Yes and your 100 shares redeem for $100, a $35 gain on $65. Or it resolves No and the shares are worth $0, a $65 loss. You can also sell to another user before resolution. The most you can make is $1 per share, so the upside shrinks as the crowd agrees with you.
On Moon. You bet $100 Up on BTC at 100x. Exposure is $100 × 100 = $10,000. Bitcoin rises 1%, so the gross result is 1% × $10,000 = $100. Moon takes the 1% opening fee on the stake ($1) and a performance fee of at least 10% of the $100 profit ($10), leaving $89 net before the undisclosed spread and any holding fees. Had Bitcoin fallen 1% instead, the bet would be liquidated for the full $100 stake, plus the $1 fee. There is no probability baked into the price: you’re paid on distance, scaled by leverage.
That is the whole structural difference. Polymarket pays you for being right about an outcome. Moon pays you for being right about direction, and the leverage guide covers how the multiplier turns a 1% move into 10%, 100% or 1,000% of your stake. Polymarket shows you the odds, while Moon’s crowd shows up as positioning, which our sentiment page puts into one number per asset.
Which one for what?
A view on an event. An election, a central bank decision, a product launch. That’s a Yes/No question with a resolution date, which is what a prediction market is built for. Moon lists asset prices, not events.
A view on a price over the next minutes or hours. Bitcoin after a data release, Tesla into the close. Polymarket lists crypto and finance categories, but they’re still Yes/No questions with an end date and a $1 cap per share. Moon is built for this: pick Up or Down, choose leverage, and the result tracks the move itself.
Wanting leverage. Polymarket’s docs don’t describe leverage on outcome shares. Moon is leverage from the first tap, up to 1000x.
Wanting to trade against other people. Polymarket’s order book puts you across from other users, and its docs say makers pay no fee. On Moon you’re always against the house, at a price with a spread built in.
Wanting to learn before risking anything. Moon’s play-money mode lets you place Up/Down bets at any leverage with a demo balance, so you can feel how fast 1000x resolves before you fund the account.
The same logic runs through our Moon vs Stake comparison: Stake is casino and sportsbook, Polymarket is event outcomes, Moon is leveraged price direction. For the regulated US version of event contracts, the Moon vs Kalshi comparison covers that.
Leverage in one sentence
At 1000x a 0.1% move against you ends the bet before spread and fees, and every asset on Moon moves 0.1% constantly, so size a high-leverage bet as money you’ve already decided to lose.
Getting started on Moon
The Moon account flow is register, verify, deposit, bet. KYC comes before the first deposit: a government ID (front and back) plus proof of address. Deposits are crypto only, and withdrawals are subject to AML checks, limits and network fees.
There’s no welcome bonus at the time of writing. What our link gives you is Moon’s VIP track and rakeback of 3.5% of fees, which activates through approved affiliates or at Bronze VIP; check your rewards tab after signing up to confirm what’s active. The promo code page covers the details. Moon runs in the browser with add-to-home-screen on mobile, and it restricts a list of jurisdictions at sign-up; the FAQ has the current list.
Nothing here is advice to use one over the other. If your bet is “this happens or it doesn’t”, it belongs on a prediction market. If your bet is “this price goes up, and I want the move multiplied”, that’s what Moon was built for.
Frequently asked
Is Moon.com a prediction market like Polymarket?
No. Polymarket matches you with other traders through an order book and shares pay $1 or $0 at resolution. On Moon you bet Up or Down on an asset's price against Moon itself, with leverage from 1x to 1000x, and your result scales with how far the price moves.
Does Polymarket offer leverage?
Polymarket's documentation describes shares priced between $0.00 and $1.00; it does not describe leverage on those shares. Moon offers leverage from 1x to 1000x on every Up/Down bet.
Who do I trade against on each platform?
On Polymarket you trade peer-to-peer with other users through a central limit order book, not against the house. On Moon there is no other user on the other side: Moon prices the bet and pays out when you win.
How do fees compare between Moon.com and Polymarket?
Moon charges 1% of the wager to open, a holding fee every 8 hours at a dynamic rate, at least 10% of realized profit, and an undisclosed spread. Polymarket's docs say makers pay nothing and takers pay a fee that scales with the share price, with some categories fee-free.
Can I use the same deposit on both?
No. They are separate platforms with separate accounts. Polymarket's docs say deposits are converted to pUSD on Polygon; Moon accepts crypto deposits into its own account after KYC.
Which is riskier, Moon.com or Polymarket?
Both can lose your whole stake. A Polymarket share can only fall to $0 when the event resolves against you; a Moon bet at 1000x can be liquidated by a 0.1% price move within seconds of opening, so Moon's losses arrive much faster.