What slippage really costs
Slippage tolerance is not a fee. It is the worst price you are agreeing to accept, and on a thin pool the difference between the price you saw and the price you get can be most of your position.
Two different things called slippage
Price impact is what your own order does to the pool: buying moves the price up against you, and the thinner the pool the more it moves. Slippage tolerance is the setting you choose, the maximum worse-than-quoted price you will still accept rather than have the trade revert.
Why thin liquidity is expensive
In a shallow pool a modest order is a large share of available depth, so it moves price a long way. This is why the same trade size can cost a fraction of a percent on a deep pair and a double-digit percentage on a new token. The quoted price impact tells you this before you sign, read it.
Setting it too low, and too high
- Too low: the price moves between quoting and execution, the minimum-output check fails, and the transaction reverts. You still pay gas.
- Too high: you have pre-agreed to a bad fill. On a volatile launch, a very high tolerance means accepting whatever the pool offers at the moment your transaction lands.
High tolerance is sometimes a deliberate choice. At a launch, a reverted trade may be worse than a poor fill. But it is a choice with a cost, not a convenience setting.
How to choose
Start from the quoted price impact rather than a habit. If a trade shows 12% impact, a 1% tolerance will simply fail. If it shows 0.3% impact, a 25% tolerance is handing away protection you did not need to give up. Size matters too: splitting a large order into smaller ones reduces impact on a thin pool, at the cost of more gas.
What MemeSwap shows you
Every quote displays the expected output, the minimum output after your tolerance, and the price impact, before you sign. Your wallet signs the transaction, so the decision, and the responsibility, stays with you.
Common questions
- What slippage should I set?
- Base it on the quoted price impact rather than a fixed habit. If impact is high, a low tolerance will only cause reverts; if impact is low, a high tolerance gives away protection for nothing.
- Why did my swap fail with slippage too low?
- The price moved between the quote and execution by more than your tolerance, so the minimum-output check failed and the transaction reverted. Gas is still spent.
- Is slippage a fee?
- No. It is the difference between the quoted and executed price, caused mostly by your own order moving a thin pool. Fees are charged separately by the pool and any router.
Keep reading
Nothing here is financial advice. Meme coins are high risk and most lose value. Read the full risk disclosure before trading.