An order that remains in the book until either filled or explicitly cancelled. Unlike day orders that expire at market close, GTC orders persist indefinitely across sessions.
An order that remains in the book until either filled or explicitly cancelled. Unlike day orders that expire at market close, GTC orders persist indefinitely across sessions.
A Good-til-Cancelled order, or GTC, is a standing instruction you place with a trading platform to buy or sell a particular asset at a specified price. Once placed, the order remains active and waiting to be filled for as long as you keep it open—which could be hours, days, weeks, or even months. The key feature of a GTC order is its persistence: it doesn't expire at the end of the trading day or week, and it won't vanish because of market hours or platform restarts. You are in control of when the order exits the market, either by the order being fully matched or by you actively choosing to cancel it.
The term "Good-til-Cancelled" originates from traditional stock and futures markets, where order management is a core function. In those markets, traders rely heavily on standing orders to capture price moves they anticipate but cannot watch for in real time. Prediction markets like Polymarket have adapted this concept because traders often make forecasts that play out over days or weeks, not intraday. A binary prediction market question might not resolve for months, so a trader might place a GTC buy order at 0.35 (35 cents) for YES, willing to wait patiently for the price to dip to that level. This gives prediction market traders a way to set a price target without babysitting the screen, which aligns well with the longer time horizons typical in prediction markets.
On Polymarket and similar CLOB-based (central limit order book) platforms, GTC orders are the standard order type. When you place a limit order to buy or sell at a specific price, that order sits in the orderbook as a GTC order by default. If you offer to sell 10 shares of YES at 0.65, that offer stays in the book, visible to other traders, until someone accepts it or you cancel it. Many traders use GTC orders strategically: they might place a limit order to sell at a profit target, then walk away knowing it will execute if the market moves in their favor. Conversely, they might place a GTC buy order at a lower price, acting as a standing bid for shares if a seller materializes. The counterparty never knows how long your order has been waiting; they only see the price and size when they're ready to trade.
A frequent misunderstanding is that a GTC order is "set and forget." While technically true, this can lead to problems. First, traders sometimes forget they have open orders and are surprised when an old order executes after days of inactivity—suddenly you own a position you weren't thinking about. Second, many traders underestimate how long a GTC order might sit unfilled. In a low-liquidity market or if your limit price is far from the current midpoint, your GTC order might age silently for weeks without filling. Another misconception is that a GTC order guarantees execution at your specified price; in reality, it only executes if the market reaches that price and a counterparty is willing to trade there. Some traders also conflate GTC with "good til a certain date," which is a different order type (GTD or Good-til-Date) that expires on a specified calendar date.
Understanding GTC is easier when you compare it to other order lifespans. A Day order expires automatically at market close if not filled. A Fill-or-Kill (FOK) order must execute immediately in full or be cancelled entirely, while an Immediate-or-Cancel (IOC) order fills whatever it can immediately and cancels any unfilled remainder. Some platforms also offer Post-Only orders, which are GTC by default but carry a special instruction: they will only add liquidity, never take it. In prediction markets, where trading is continuous and markets don't have traditional closing times, GTC is the dominant mode. The persistence of GTC orders means the orderbook you see on Polymarket might contain orders placed hours or days ago, each waiting silently for the right moment to execute.
Suppose you believe the prediction market question "Will the Federal Reserve cut interest rates by June?" will eventually trade down to 0.30 on YES, but it's currently at 0.55. You place a GTC limit order to buy 100 shares of YES at 0.30, and that order waits in the orderbook. Three weeks later, economic data weakens and the price drops to 0.28. Your GTC order executes automatically, filling your 100 shares at your target price without any additional action needed from you.