The order book shows live supply and demand for a market by listing buy and sell orders at different price levels. It is the primary mechanism through which price discovery happens on Polyester.
Every trade begins as an order in the order book. As orders are added, matched, or removed, the book updates every ~100 milliseconds to reflect current market conditions: depth, liquidity, and intent.
Polyester exposes multiple views of the order book, each serving a different purpose.
Order Book Levels
L1: Top-of-book
L1 shows the best available bid and ask for a market.
This view answers the question: what is the best price available right now? It is commonly used for quick price checks, spread monitoring, and basic execution decisions.
L2: Order book depth
L2 shows aggregated depth at each price level on both sides of the book.
Orders at the same price are grouped together, displaying total size per level rather than individual orders. This provides visibility into liquidity concentration, support and resistance zones, and how depth changes as price moves.
L2 data is the primary order book view for most traders.
L3: Full order book
L3 shows individual orders resting in the order book, including order size and price for each entry.
This level exposes the most granular view of market structure, allowing analysis of queue positioning, order placement behavior, and fine-grained liquidity dynamics.
Delayed vs Real-Time L3 Data
By default, all users see a 15-minute delayed L3 feed.
This design balances transparency with fairness. Real-time order-level data can be used to infer individual strategies or target resting liquidity, which degrades execution quality for the broader market.
Real-time L3 access is therefore granted only to traders who demonstrably improve market quality.
Access to the Live L3 Order Book
Traders may qualify for real-time L3 access by meeting objective contribution thresholds over a rolling evaluation window.
Eligibility is based on measurable signals such as:
- Minimum maker volume ≥ X units of maker-side notional over X days
- Order book participation Resting orders within X bps of mid-price for at least X% of active time
- Depth contribution Average contributed depth of ≥ X units within the top X price levels
- Order stability Median order lifetime ≥ X seconds (to discourage excessive order flickering)
- Consistency Participation across ≥ X trading sessions within the evaluation window
Access is evaluated continuously and may be granted, maintained, or revoked automatically based on ongoing performance.
Where to View the Order Book
The order book is available directly on the Spot Trading page for each market.
The order book is the source of active market intent. Trades and candles are produced only when orders in the book execute, while depth visualizations show the current state of those active orders.
For more details on market data feeds and availability, see the Market Data Overview.