How to Deposit on Polymarket and Kalshi (2026)

By Marcus Yeo · Published 2026-10-08 · Independent review — not affiliated with any exchange

How to deposit on Polymarket and Kalshi comes down to two different funding rails. Kalshi, a CFTC-regulated US exchange, takes bank transfer, wire and debit card deposits after identity verification, while Polymarket runs on USDC that you send in from a crypto wallet or a crypto exchange. Both platforms list event contracts that settle to one dollar for a Yes outcome or zero for No, and the price between one cent and ninety-nine cents reads as the market’s implied probability for that outcome.

I’ve opened accounts on both platforms to see how the onboarding and funding actually compares, and the two could not be more different in approach. One wants your passport. The other wants your wallet address. Neither wants your guesswork on which blockchain network you’re sending on.

How does Kalshi funding actually work?

Kalshi is a Designated Contract Market registered with the CFTC, which means it operates as a regulated US exchange rather than an offshore or crypto-native platform. Per Kalshi’s help center, that regulatory status requires it to confirm the identity of every person who trades, through document verification using a photo of a government-issued ID, an unexpired, legible driver’s license or passport showing a photo. During signup you also confirm your country of residence. So despite trading in dollar-denominated contracts that can feel crypto-adjacent, Kalshi is not a no-KYC platform in any sense.

Once verified, per third-party guides, Kalshi’s deposit options are:

• ACH bank transfer: one to three business days, no Kalshi fee
• Wire transfer: same day, no Kalshi fee (your bank may still charge one)
• Debit card: instant, with a two percent payment fee
• Crypto deposit: some guides mention this option, worth confirming directly in the app since availability can change

Per a third-party fee explainer, Kalshi also charges a trading fee calculated as 0.07 times the price times one minus the price, per contract. That fee peaks near the fifty-cent mark (around 1.75 cents per contract at that price) and shrinks as a contract’s price moves toward either extreme.

Per Kalshi’s country page, the exchange is available in 143 countries and restricted in 52, with restricted jurisdictions including Australia, Belarus, Belgium, Canada, France, Italy, Poland, Singapore, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, mainland China, Russia, Iran, Cuba and North Korea, among others. That list changes, and some third-party summaries add countries like Ireland that Kalshi’s own page doesn’t list, so treat any list (including this one) as a snapshot, not gospel. Confirm your own country’s status on Kalshi’s official site before assuming you’re cleared to deposit.

How does Polymarket funding work for international users?

Polymarket is built around USDC rather than fiat. Per third-party guides, standard use on the international exchange doesn’t require identity verification at all. You sign up with a wallet or an email (which generates a wallet for you), deposit USDC, and trade, with Polymarket enforcing compliance mainly through geoblocking rather than onboarding checks.

That geoblocking is extensive. Per Polymarket’s own geographic-restrictions documentation, a long list of jurisdictions are close-only on both the frontend and the API, meaning existing positions can be closed but no new trades opened. That list includes Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada (several provinces), France, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, Poland, Russia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, the United Kingdom, and the United States, among many others. A shorter list, including Ireland, Japan, the Netherlands and South Korea, is close-only on the frontend only. Third-party summaries note that OFAC-sanctioned territories such as Iran, Cuba, Syria, and the Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk regions are blocked outright, which is standard practice across most regulated and semi-regulated platforms, not unique to Polymarket.

The US situation has two layers. The international Polymarket exchange has been close-only for US IPs since a 2022 CFTC settlement, per third-party guides, and Polymarket’s own documentation confirms the United States sits in the close-only category. Separately, a fully verified Polymarket US exchange launched on iOS, Android and web, with its waitlist removed in May 2026 per a third-party guide. On that US exchange, every account must clear full verification before trading, and you can deposit USD by bank transfer (ACH) or by sending in stablecoins.

Worth noting: at TOKEN2049 on October 7, 2026, Polymarket’s CEO Shayne Coplan discussed a possible on-chain asset tied to the platform’s economy, per CryptoTimes reporting. No token, ticker, contract address or launch date has actually been announced, so anything claiming to be a live “Polymarket token” right now should be treated as unverified at best.

How do I actually get USDC into a prediction market wallet?

If you’re funding Polymarket’s international exchange, you need USDC in a wallet before you can deposit. The general process:

1. Buy USDC on a centralized crypto exchange. This is where something like BYDFi or a larger exchange such as Binance comes in, you convert fiat or another crypto asset into USDC on the exchange first.
2. Copy the deposit address Polymarket’s wallet gives you.
3. Send the USDC, matching the network exactly. USDC exists on multiple chains (Ethereum, Polygon, and others), and sending on the wrong one is the single most common way people lose a deposit permanently.
4. Send a small test amount first, confirm it lands, then move the rest.
5. Never enter a seed phrase anywhere outside your own wallet software, no legitimate exchange or platform support will ever ask for it.

If you want the fuller mechanics of moving funds exchange-to-wallet versus staying fully on an exchange, our guide to P2P versus on-chain deposits breaks down the trade-offs. For picking where to source your USDC in the first place, our exchange rankings and the BYDFi exchange review are reasonable starting points for comparing fees and withdrawal limits.

Fees and timing side by side

Treat the exact numbers in this table as a 2026 snapshot. Both platforms change fee schedules and availability without much warning, so check the live figures inside each app before you move money.

Which one fits your situation?

If you’re in an eligible US state and comfortable with full ID verification, Kalshi’s regulated structure and standard bank-transfer options are the more conventional path. If you’re outside restricted jurisdictions and already hold or can acquire USDC, Polymarket’s international exchange keeps onboarding light but puts more responsibility on you to get the wallet address and network right. Neither path is faster or cheaper across the board, it depends which friction you’d rather deal with: paperwork or blockchain mechanics.

If you’re newer to crypto exchanges generally and want the basics on how KYC, wallets and withdrawals work before touching either platform, our beginner learning path and the no-KYC exchange comparison are useful background reading before you fund anything.

A note on legality and restricted regions

If your country or US state is listed as restricted or close-only on either platform, that restriction exists for legal and regulatory reasons specific to that jurisdiction, not as an arbitrary inconvenience. Attempting to get around geographic restrictions, through a VPN or any other method, violates both platforms’ terms of service and can put your funds and account at risk with no recourse. Rules here shift often enough that the only reliable move is checking kalshi.com or polymarket.com directly before you deposit anything.

Marcus Yeo — Trades perpetual futures full-time and has opened, funded and stress-tested accounts on more than 20 exchanges since 2019. Runs every withdrawal test himself.