What is float?

The portion of a token's supply actually available to trade, as distinct from total supply locked in vesting, treasuries, or staking contracts.

A low float paired with a high fully diluted valuation means a small amount of trading sets the price for a much larger supply that is still to come. Prices in low-float tokens move easily in both directions, and later unlocks meet a market that must absorb far more supply than it has been pricing. Compare float against the unlock schedule.

The term is borrowed from equities, where it means shares available to the public rather than held by insiders. The crypto version is looser, and different data sources compute it differently, which is why two sites can quote different circulating supply figures for the same token on the same day.

How it works

Start from total supply and subtract what cannot reach the market:

• Tokens still under a vesting contract, held for the team, investors, or advisers.
• Treasury and foundation holdings not committed to any near-term use.
• Tokens locked in staking or governance escrow with a withdrawal delay.
• Tokens burned or provably unrecoverable.

What remains is the float, and it is the supply that actually meets bids. circulating supply as published by data providers is an attempt at the same number, computed with different assumptions about which locked categories count.

Two effects follow, and they compound each other.

First, price discovery happens on a small base. A modest amount of buying moves a thin market a long way, which produces a price that gets multiplied by the full supply to give a fdv figure far larger than any capital that has actually entered.

Second, scheduled supply arrives into that same thin market. An unlock releasing 5% of total supply may be releasing 50% of the float, and the market's ability to absorb it is set by real market depth rather than by market capitalization.

Example

Illustrative arithmetic. A token has 1 billion total supply, 80 million circulating, and trades at $5. Market capitalization is $400 million and fully diluted valuation is $5 billion. An unlock releasing 40 million tokens increases the float by 50% at a stroke. If the order book holds $2 million of bids within 10% of the current price and the unlocked tokens are worth $200 million at the current price, even a small fraction of holders selling overwhelms the available depth.

Why it matters when you buy

Low float is measurable in advance and tells you both that the price is fragile and that scheduled supply is coming into a market that may not absorb it. Check the schedule at the unlock calendar, the ranking at the unlock pressure page, and the measured depth behind the price at the liquidity pages.

Related terms

circulating supply — the published approximation, fdv — the number float distorts, unlock — supply arriving into the float, market cap — price times circulating supply, market depth — what must absorb an unlock, lockup vesting — why supply is held back.

Questions

How do I find a token's real float?

Read the project's vesting contracts and its own supply documentation, then compare against what aggregators publish. Where the two disagree, the contracts are the authority.

Is low float always a warning sign?

It is a description of fragility rather than a verdict. It tells you the price rests on a thin base and that more supply is scheduled, both of which are facts worth knowing before you buy.

Does staked supply count as float?

It depends on how quickly it can be withdrawn. Supply locked behind a long unbonding period is not immediately sellable, while supply in a liquid staking arrangement effectively is.