Up or Down windows

The windows

Windows run for 5 minutes, 15 minutes, 1 hour, 4 hours or a day. The terminal opens for windows on BTC, ETH, SOL, XRP, DOGE, BNB, ADA, AVAX, LINK, DOT, HYPE and ZEC; which lengths run for which asset is Polymarket’s choice, and changes from time to time.

Like any market, each window has two sides. On the 5-minute to 4-hour windows an Up share pays $1 if the closing price is greater than or equal to the price to beat, and a Down share pays $1 if it is lower, so a tie resolves Up. On the daily windows an exact tie resolves 50-50: each share pays 50¢. Each window’s own rules say which applies.

The window open now and how the last ones settled, per asset: Bitcoin Up or Down, Ethereum Up or Down, Solana Up or Down, XRP Up or Down.

What settles a window

Every window names its own settlement source, and the terminal reads it from the market rather than assuming it from the window’s length. When last checked against Polymarket, they were:

On a window’s page, the source is printed with its pair — for example Chainlink BTC/USD · 60-s average or Binance BTC/USDT. The 60-second average means the settling price is Chainlink’s average over the last minute of the window, not a single tick.

The price to beat

The price to beat is the window’s opening price, as Polymarket sets it: the same figure polymarket.com shows, read the way polymarket.com reads it. Polymarket’s posted figure is used only when that one is missing. It usually appears shortly after the window opens.

Until it is known, the terminal shows — and says why. It never fills the gap with a live tick or a guess. You can already place orders on a window before its price to beat is set.

The terminal

The price strip

Always on screen: the live settling price, named by its source; the price to beat, with the distance from it in dollars and percent; and the Up and Down share prices from the live book, the ask large and the bid beside it. A missing or stale value is shown as — with its reason, never as 0¢ or 50¢.

The chart

The line is the settling source’s price. If you open a Chainlink window part-way through, the minutes before Chainlink’s first tick are drawn faintly from Hyperliquid’s price and labelled Hyperliquid shape · not the settling price: a shape, never the price to beat or the result. A Binance window fills the same gap from Binance’s own 1-minute closes, and if those do not load, the chart says so and draws nothing in their place.

The Tuner

A gauge of how far the settling price is from the price to beat, measured in typical moves for the time left, beside the market’s own Up price. “Arithmetic, not a forecast.”

The Sequencer

Past windows with their results (▲, ▼, or ? while unknown — never guessed), the current one, and the ones coming up; every step opens its window. Arm next marks the next window for a sample rule. It is paper only: arming places nothing, and arms are kept on this device.

On 5- and 15-minute windows, the Up and Down buttons pause if the settlement feed goes quiet for more than a few seconds, and unlock on the next tick.

Two ways to buy

Polydict’s fee applies to both. The terminal never places an order itself: you confirm and sign every Up or Down order in the regular order ticket, with its fees shown first. On the ticket, each side’s button leads with its price, as in ▲ Up 53¢ (EXAMPLE).

At the close

The page does not jump to the next window by itself. At the close the window stays, with its result, and a Next window control takes you on when you choose.

The receipt reads settling until Polymarket posts the result — usually about a minute — and then shows the result, the settlement numbers with their sources, and your fills and fees. If no result comes, it says so: the page does not guess one. Winnings are collected from Portfolio, like any market: Collecting winnings.