---
title: Market Lifecycle
description: Understand market trading statuses, lifecycle filters, and expiration.
---

A market's `status` describes its current trading phase. Ending trading and paying out positions are separate events; single-leg and multi-leg markets expose only the trading lifecycle.

## Trading Statuses

| Status | Meaning |
| --- | --- |
| `unopened` | The market has not yet accepted orders. |
| `open` | Trading is available and the market accepts orders. |
| `paused` | Trading is temporarily interrupted during a period in which the market would otherwise be open. It can return to `open` without changing its trading schedule. |
| `closed` | The market has opened previously but is outside an active trading interval. It may return to `open` before expiration. |
| `expired` | The market has reached its terminal trading phase and cannot reopen. It may still be awaiting settlement. |

`paused` and `closed` both prevent new order entry, but they communicate different conditions. A paused market is experiencing a temporary operational interruption. A closed market has no active trading interval.

## Expiration

`expires_at` is the configured expiration timestamp. Its value may be in the future; `status` remains the authority for the market's current trading phase. Clients should not infer that a market has expired solely because their local clock has passed `expires_at`.

## Notifications

The WebSocket [`market_lifecycle`](/walkthroughs/discovering-markets?api=websocket#follow-catalog-changes) channel announces each of these transitions as it happens, along with publication, removal from the catalog, and edits to a market's public details. Settlement is not announced there; account settlement records remain the source.

## Transitions

The common path is `unopened` → `open` → `closed` → `expired`. Before expiration, a market may also move `open` → `paused` → `open`, or `closed` → `open` when another trading interval begins. Settlement does not replace the `expired` trading status; account [settlement](/concepts/clearing-and-settlement) records expose their own settlement times.