CoW Swap exchange profile

CoW Swap is a wallet-connected trading interface for CoW Protocol. Users specify the assets, quantities and conditions they will accept; competing solvers find a way to execute those instructions. Liquidity can come from matching opposite user orders, automated market makers, other aggregators or private market makers. The interface and the underlying settlement system have different roles.[1]

DefiLlama showed approximately US$3.217 billion of rolling 30-day routed swap volume on 20 October 2026. This measures trades routed through the aggregator, rather than turnover in a proprietary CoW liquidity pool. It is not directly comparable with leveraged perpetual notional or an exchange’s registered-user total.[37]

For a separate historical reach measure, CoW DAO reported 47,700 active wallets and 292,947 trades for April 2026. Wallets are not verified individual people, and those April figures should not be presented as current monthly users.[34]

The standard auction compares solutions for directed token pairs. A fast-path order instead gives the winning quote provider a short exclusive opportunity to settle immediately. If that window ends without settlement, the order returns to the normal auction. Fast path requires an unchanged matching quote and opt-in; partially fillable, pre-signed and ERC-1271 smart-contract orders are excluded. The user’s limit still applies.[3]

A 30 September 2026 announcement extended TWAP placement, editing and cancellation to ordinary EVM wallets. The older tutorial still describes Safe setup and fallback-handler changes; those instructions should be read as the Safe-specific route, rather than a universal current wallet requirement.[27][6]

CoW’s charging model combines network costs, protocol volume charges and a share of qualifying price improvement. An application integrating the protocol may add its own partner charge. These components should be read together with the quoted output; gasless order submission does not mean a cost-free trade.[32]

CIP-74’s adopted discussion includes authority to vary the baseline by token pair between 0% and 0.05%, and a 1% total protocol-fee cap excluding partner fees. A 14 October 2026 fee-policy proposal remains labelled draft in the inspected forum. Its proposed wider ranges are not treated here as an implemented tariff.[30][33]

Fee illustration: US$10,000 of unchanged trade value incurs US$2 at 0.02%, or US$0.30 at 0.003%. These are volume-fee components only; they exclude improvement sharing, network costs, partner or bridge charges and market movement.[31]

A solver can improve execution by netting opposite orders, using deeper liquidity or reducing transaction overhead. The resulting improvement depends on the actual auction. It is not a guaranteed rebate, and the protocol’s quoted competitive advantages are not an independent test of every available venue.[8]

Ordinary ERC-20 trading starts from the user’s wallet. An allowance authorises the vault relayer to move a specified token; it is not a bank deposit into a CoW account. The relayer separates that approval from the settlement contract’s execution logic. A remaining token allowance and an unfilled order are different permissions.[14]

The cited funding documentation describes crypto wallets, contract transactions and bridges. It does not establish a CoW-operated bank-transfer deposit, card purchase or fiat withdrawal facility. Token networks and destination addresses therefore define the documented funding route.[24]

Off-chain intents and private settlement routing are designed to reduce front-running and sandwich opportunities. This protection concerns trade execution. It does not protect against a user signing a malicious wallet request on a compromised website or against every external contract used in a transaction.[23]

On 14 April 2026, the cow.fi domain was hijacked and visitors were shown a phishing interface. CIP-86 reports an estimated US$1.2 million of affected user assets. Its relief programme was discretionary and incident-specific, with eligibility verification rather than a standing insured-balance promise.[35]

CoW DAO’s April recap says the domain was recovered. KPK’s August H1 treasury review reports that the defence reserve funded victim reimbursements in June. Those sources document a recovery and payments; they do not establish that every claimed loss was paid or that equivalent relief is guaranteed after a future incident.[34][36]

The public contract repository supplies source code, deployment information and an audit directory. It also retains a warning that zero buy or sell amounts can allow repeated fee collection, and directs integrators to prevent such orders. This is a documented contract-use constraint, not a finding that the current CoW Swap interface creates those orders.[38]

The interface terms require legal capacity and compliance with applicable laws, sanctions and restricted-party rules. They do not provide a comprehensive affirmative list of eligible countries. Public technical access alone cannot settle a particular resident’s eligibility.[28]

The privacy policy excludes under-18 users and identifies CoW Hosting Limited as the BVI data controller. Data-rights requests can be sent to [email protected], with additional identity or wallet verification where required. That procedure concerns personal data; it cannot reverse a settled blockchain trade.[29]

Contractual disputes first go to [email protected]. After 30 days from notification without amicable resolution, the terms specify ICC mediation; after 40 days from the mediation request without settlement, ICC arbitration follows unless another period is agreed. The stated seat is Tortola, BVI, in English. A sole arbitrator applies below US$250,000 of combined claims and counterclaims; otherwise three. The terms retain an individual small-claims carve-out. They also state a US$100 aggregate liability cap, subject to liabilities that applicable law cannot exclude. These are contractual provisions, not free statutory compensation.[28]

The privacy policy gives retention periods of 30 days for server logs unless security work requires longer, one year after execution or expiry for order-intent records, and 18 months after closure for support or research records. The order tools establish transaction visibility, not a complete tax calculation or indefinitely retained brokerage statement service.[29]

The researched documentation describes a software interface, a trading protocol and independent solvers. BVI incorporation identifies the interface company; it does not itself establish a financial-services permission. This review did not establish a current entity-specific exchange authorisation or statutory customer compensation entitlement. No such permission is inferred from protocol governance, open-source code or the availability of the website.[25]

CoW Hosting Limited is the interface counterparty named in the current linked terms, which remain dated July 2025.[28]

The protocol and CoW DAO are described separately from the interface provider.[25]

The contract repository records the former Gnosis Protocol name. CoW DAO marked CoW Swap’s fifth anniversary in April 2026. The current business model centres on trading infrastructure, solver execution and protocol revenue; it should not be described as a conventional exchange holding a pooled customer cash account.[38][34]

Governance can change commercial policy. The October fee-iteration draft seeks continuing discretion over fee experiments, while retaining treasury reporting and allocation conditions. Its draft status matters: discussing a policy and implementing it are different stages.[33]

Operator

CoW Hosting Limited

Exchange model

Decentralised

Service scope

Wallet-signed swaps, limits, TWAP and supported bridge routes through CoW Protocol.

Client types

Retail clients

Pricing publication

Public pricing

Other names

CoWSwap; CoW Protocol

Pricing scope

Volume fees, improvement sharing and network costs; partner and route charges can differ.

Funding scope

Crypto wallets, wrapping and supported bridge routes.

Custody and asset handling

Wallet assets and signed allowances; native-token and bridge routes can involve user-specific contracts.

Client eligibility

Legal capacity, applicable law and sanctions restrictions.

Support

Official Discord and contractual legal contact.

Authorisation and registration scope

No current entity-specific financial permission established in this review.

Exchange metadata checked 20 Oct 2026Source 1Source 25Source 28Source 29Source 14Source 7Source 24Source 31

Illustration: a TWAP instruction for 12 tokens in six equal parts schedules two tokens per part. If two parts expire unfilled and the other four fully execute, eight tokens trade and four remain unsold. This assumes equal parts and no replacement order; it is not a prediction of execution price or completion.[22]

The April recap dates the pilot’s launch to April 2026.[34]

The inspected current programme pages repeat the six-month term but do not establish an extension beyond that initial term. Their parameters are reported as published pilot conditions, rather than a promise that a newly referred October trade will earn a reward.[17]