Understanding Slippage

Learn about slippage, price impact, and how to protect your trades.

Slippage is the difference between the price you expect and the price you actually get. Understanding it helps you trade smarter and avoid costly mistakes.

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Slippage vs Price Impact

These terms are often confused but mean different things:

Slippage

Price movement that happens between when you submit a trade and when it executes—caused by other traders and market activity.

Price Impact

Price movement caused by your trade itself—larger trades in smaller pools have higher price impact.

Factor	Slippage	Price Impact
Cause	Other market activity	Your trade size
Control	Set tolerance limit	Choose better pools/split trades
Visibility	Unknown until execution	Shown in quote

Orca displays price impact in the swap interface before you trade. Always check this before large swaps.

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Slippage Tolerance Settings

Slippage tolerance is the maximum price difference you’re willing to accept. If the price moves more than your tolerance, the transaction fails instead of executing at a bad price.

Recommended Settings

Scenario	Tolerance	Notes
Stablecoin pairs	0.1%	Very stable prices
Major pairs (SOL/USDC)	0.5%	Normal market conditions
Volatile tokens	1-3%	Higher volatility expected
High volatility periods	2-5%	Use with caution

How to Adjust Slippage

1. Open settings

   Click the gear icon (⚙️) in the swap interface

2. Set your tolerance

   Enter your desired slippage percentage or select a preset

3. Save and trade

   Your setting applies to your current and future trades

Orca has separate slippage settings for trades and liquidity operations. Liquidity operations can safely use higher slippage since they’re not vulnerable to front-running.

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Risks of High Slippage

Setting slippage too high exposes you to:

Front-running attacks

What it is: A bot sees your pending transaction and places trades before and after yours, profiting from the price movement.

Sandwich attack: Your trade gets “sandwiched” between two attacker transactions:

1. Attacker buys → price goes up
2. Your trade executes at higher price
3. Attacker sells → profits from your trade

Protection: Lower slippage tolerance limits how much value can be extracted.

Poor value trades

Even without attacks, high slippage means you might accept a significantly worse price if the market moves against you between quote and execution.

Example: You quote a trade at $100. With 5% slippage, you could receive as little as $95 if the market moves.

Never set slippage higher than necessary. Start low and only increase if transactions fail.

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When to Increase Slippage

Sometimes higher slippage is necessary:

Situation	Why	Recommendation
High volatility	Prices moving rapidly	Increase gradually until trade succeeds
Low liquidity pools	Price swings more easily	Consider if the trade is worth the risk
Network congestion	Transactions take longer to confirm	Small increases may help
Urgent trades	Can’t afford failed transactions	Accept the trade-off knowingly

If you don’t need to trade immediately, waiting for volatility to settle is often better than increasing slippage.

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Avoiding Poor Value Trades

Even with proper slippage settings, you can get bad prices if you’re not careful:

Always Check Before Trading

1. Verify the quoted price

   Does the rate match what you expect? Compare with price aggregators like CoinGecko.

2. Check price impact

   High price impact (>1%) means you’re significantly moving the market. Consider splitting the trade.

3. Look at pool liquidity

   Low liquidity pools have worse prices and higher volatility.

4. Verify the token

   Confirm you’re trading the correct token by checking the mint address.

Red Flags to Watch For

• Price significantly different from other markets — The pool may be stale or manipulated
• Very high price impact — Your trade is too large for the available liquidity
• New or unfamiliar tokens — Higher risk of scams or extreme volatility
• Pools with very low TVL — Prices can swing wildly

Pool prices are determined by trading activity, not external oracles. A pool’s price can differ significantly from other markets, especially in low-liquidity or inactive pools. Always verify the quoted price meets your expectations.

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Summary

Set Appropriate Slippage

Start with 0.5% for most trades, adjust only if needed

Check Price Impact

Always review before large trades

Verify Prices

Compare with external price sources

Be Cautious

When in doubt, start with a small test trade

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Next Steps

How to Swap

Step-by-step swap guide

Range Orders

Advanced order types