Using LumosCore
Limit orders
Resting orders on the Stellar order book, why they are free, and how to manage them.
A limit order sets your own price and waits. Instead of taking whatever the market offers now, you place an offer on Stellar's order book and it sits there until someone trades against it, or until you cancel it.
#Placing an order
- Open Trade, choose the pair, and switch from a market swap to a limit order.
- Set the amount and the price you want. The total you will receive if it fills completely is shown as you type.
- Approve in your wallet. The offer is written to the ledger and is public from that moment.
Your open orders are listed on the same page, and can be cancelled at any time. Cancelling is itself a transaction, so it needs signing and costs the network fee.
#Limit orders are free
LumosCore takes no fee on a limit order, filled or not. You pay only Stellar's network fee to place it, and another to cancel it.
Why free
A resting order may never fill. Charging for one up front would mean charging for something that might never happen, and charging on the fill would mean a fee landing at a moment you are not present to see. Neither is defensible, so there is no fee.
#How filling works
Stellar matches orders at the protocol level. Yours can be filled by anyone trading the pair, whether they came through LumosCore or not — the order book belongs to the network, not to us.
Orders can fill partially. If someone takes half of your offer, half remains on the book at the same price. Your wallet balance changes as each part fills; there is nothing to claim afterwards.
#What holds your funds while it rests
The assets you are selling are committed to the offer while it is open. They stay in your account — nobody takes custody of them — but they are reserved against that offer and are not available to spend elsewhere until it fills or you cancel.
Each open offer also holds 0.5 XLM of your account's minimum balance, the same as a trustline does. Cancelling the offer releases it. See Trustlines for how the reserve works.
Orders do not expire
An offer placed at a price the market never reaches will sit on the book indefinitely, holding your assets and its reserve. If you have forgotten orders open, cancel them — check the open orders list on the Trade page.
#When a limit order is the better tool
- Thin pairs. On a market with little liquidity, a swap moves the price against you. A limit order lets the market come to you instead.
- A price you actually want. Rather than watching a chart, leave the order and let it fill.
- Providing liquidity to the book. A resting offer is what other people's swaps trade against.
Last updated 29 August 2026