Is PredictIt still open in 2026?
PredictIt survived. The CFTC ordered it shut in August 2022, the platform sued, and it kept trading through the entire fight. In July 2025 the agency settled the question with an amended no-action letter, and in March 2026 PredictIt shipped a full redesign. Positions, balances, and accounts carried over unchanged.
The operator changed too. Victoria University of Wellington handed the market to the Prediction Market Research Consortium, a US not-for-profit that lists contracts through a board of academics from US universities. Aristotle International still runs day-to-day operations, exactly as it did before the transfer.
The acquisition headlines belong to a different company. Underdog bought Aristotle Exchange in March 2026, a separate exchange that won its own CFTC approval in September 2025. PredictIt was not part of that deal.
So the platform is alive. The real question is whether it is still the right venue for your size, and the answer is written into its own regulatory paperwork.
What changed under the July 2025 CFTC letter
CFTC Letter No. 25-20, dated July 14, 2025, rewrote PredictIt's two most famous constraints. The per-contract investment limit moved from $850 to the federal individual campaign contribution limit, currently $3,500, adjusted for inflation every two years. The 5,000-trader cap per contract is gone entirely.
Two constraints did not move. The market stays restricted to political events: elections, nominations, court decisions, legislation, and regulatory actions, with war and terrorism explicitly excluded. And the published fee schedule still takes 10 percent of profits plus 5 percent of every withdrawal.
That combination tells you who PredictIt is for. The letter describes a small-scale, not-for-profit market operated for academic study, and that is what it is. A $3,500 ceiling is a real upgrade for a hobbyist. For a trader running a book of positions, it is a wall you hit in week one, on every single contract.
Run the arithmetic on one trade. Buy Yes at 40 cents, watch it resolve at $1, and PredictIt keeps 6 cents of your 60-cent profit at resolution, then 5 percent of whatever you move back to your bank. Fee drag like that compounds across an election cycle, and it compounds fastest for the traders who win.
What are the best PredictIt alternatives in 2026?
Kalshi is the direct upgrade for political traders. It is a CFTC Designated Contract Market, the same license class as US futures exchanges, legal in all 50 states. It lists politics alongside economics, sports, and weather, with a central limit order book and a public API. Its fee mechanics differ sharply from PredictIt's 10 percent profit cut. The full schedule is in our Kalshi fees guide, and the regulatory case is in Is Kalshi legit.
Polymarket came back to the United States in December 2025. The CFTC approved an amended order of designation for the exchange Polymarket acquired in its $112 million QCX deal, and the US app is rolling out invite by invite, sports first. Internationally it runs one of the deepest prediction-market books in the world. The switcher's guide is Polymarket alternatives.
Neither venue ties your position size to campaign finance law, and neither takes a tenth of your profits at resolution.
Serious political traders end up on more than one venue, because the same event prices differently on each book. Kairos is the terminal built for exactly that: Kalshi, Polymarket, and Predict.fun in one order book, with sub-second data and advanced order types, free to use. What the Bloomberg Terminal did for Wall Street, Kairos does for prediction market traders.
How traders make the switch
The mental model transfers directly. PredictIt quotes contracts in cents and settles winners at $1. Kalshi and Polymarket price the same way, and implied probability works identically on all three.
The differences are size, scope, and tooling. No campaign-finance cap on positions. Markets beyond politics when you want them. Books deep enough to work orders instead of crossing every spread. And a terminal layer PredictIt never had: the wider field is mapped in Kalshi alternatives and the venue-by-venue roundup in best prediction market apps.
Keep the PredictIt account if the research mission matters to you. Trade your size on venues built for trading. See you in the order books.
Sources
Every regulatory claim on this page comes from the primary document or dated reporting.
- CFTC Letter No. 25-20, July 14, 2025: the $3,500 FECA-linked limit, the removal of the 5,000-trader cap, the politics-only scope, and the transfer to the Prediction Market Research Consortium.
- DeFi Rate, March 2026: the redesign, current operating status, and Underdog's acquisition of Aristotle Exchange.
- PredScope's PredictIt guide: the 10 percent profit and 5 percent withdrawal fee schedule and the August 2022 shutdown-order timeline.
- PR Newswire, December 2025: Polymarket's amended order of designation.
- Sportico, 2026: the invite-only status of Polymarket's US rollout.