In early 2024, the prediction market was still on the fringe. At that time, the combined monthly transaction volume of all major platforms was less than $100 million, and there were only a few thousand active monthly users. However, in less than two years, this market has made a huge leap—by the end of 2025, the annual transaction volume of the prediction market had exceeded $44 billion, with the highest monthly transaction volume exceeding $13 billion. Entering 2026, the daily transaction record was further refreshed to over $700 million.
📈 Growth Path of Prediction Market Size
The first large-scale release in the prediction market occurred in October 2024. The U.S. presidential election became a real catalyst for the market. That month, the total transaction volume of the prediction market broke through $4.5 billion for the first time, setting a historical record.
It is noteworthy that after the election, the prediction market did not cool down. In previous cycles, the prediction market showed a clear event dependency: 🔴 major events arrive, transaction volume soars; after the event, liquidity quickly shrinks.
But this time was different. After entering 2025, even without major elections, the market's monthly transaction volume still maintained steadily between $1.5 billion and $2 billion, far higher than any level before 2024.
By the second half of 2025, as the economic, technological, and policy markets' trading activity increased, the monthly transaction scale quickly climbed and broke through $13 billion in November.
The beginning of 2026 continued to be explosive, with weekly transaction volumes frequently breaking $5 billion, and daily transaction records being continuously refreshed. The market no longer needed an event "catalyst" to maintain high growth momentum.
📈 Increase in Transaction Frequency and Changes in User Scale
The growth in the prediction market's transaction volume came from several dimensions, such as the number of transactions and changes in user scale and structure.
From early 2024 to the end of 2025, the number of transactions in the prediction market grew from about 240,000 to over 43 million, an increase of nearly 180 times. At the same time, the number of active monthly trading users grew from about 4,000 to over 600,000.
More and more users began to engage in high-frequency, small-amount, multiple transactions, constantly adjusting their positions based on new information. In the past, users were more likely to place a one-time bet and then wait for the outcome. This change in behavior not only increased the frequency of transactions but also made the operation logic of the prediction market more akin to financial trading rather than traditional gambling.
As a result, the market's trading categories began to significantly diversify. Markets revolving around politics and economics, such as inflation data, interest rate policies, and regulatory decisions, saw about a 10-fold increase in transaction volume; technology-related markets (such as technological milestones, product launches, policy approvals) saw their transaction scale expand by more than 17 times.
📈 Two Giants: #Polymarket & #Kalshi
Despite the rapid expansion of the overall market size, the concentration of the prediction market was actually very high.
In 2025, Polymarket and Kalshi together contributed 85%–90% of the annual total transaction volume. Out of the more than $44 billion in annual transaction volume, these two platforms accounted for about $38 billion to $39 billion.
Polymarket's transaction volume from January to November 2025 was about $21.5 billion, with a total of about 95 million transactions, accounting for about 54% of the entire market's transaction volume. Its monthly transaction count grew from less than 50,000 to nearly 19 million, an increase of over 420 times.
Kalshi's transaction volume during the same period was about $17.1 billion, with a total of about 74 million transactions, and its monthly transaction count grew from about 196,000 to 21 million, an increase of over 100 times.
The event structure differences between the two platforms were also very clear. Kalshi's transactions were highly concentrated in the sports market, with sports contracts contributing about 85% of its transaction volume; whereas Polymarket's structure was more diversified, with sports, politics, and cryptocurrencies together accounting for over 90% of its betting transactions.
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