A transparent look at how Polyscope detects whale trades, probability shifts, volume spikes, and emerging markets — then turns them into useful Telegram alerts for traders.
Traders do not need more noise. They need to understand what is being measured, how fast it is measured, and why the alert is worth their attention. This page explains the core detection systems that power Polyscope.
Real-time whale watching via WebSocket
Polyscope connects directly to Polymarket's CLOB WebSocket feed and streams every trade event as it executes. There is no polling interval for large trade detection — trades are processed the moment they hit the feed.
For each trade, the scanner calculates the USD value by multiplying shares × price. If that value meets or exceeds a threshold, an alert fires immediately with trade direction, dollar size, and the market context.
Large size can matter before the market fully reprices. A meaningful buy or sell can reveal urgency, conviction, or liquidity pressure — especially when combined with tight spread, thin depth, or a follow-on move.
WebSocket endpoint: Polymarket CLOB WSS (last_trade_price events). Tokens are subscribed in batches,
and the connection auto-reconnects with backoff if interrupted.
Tracking consensus changes over a rolling window
Every 5 minutes, Polyscope snapshots each market's YES probability and stores those snapshots in a rolling 2-hour window. On each cycle, the current probability is compared against the oldest snapshot still within the active window.
If the absolute change in percentage points meets the threshold, an alert fires with direction and magnitude, showing exactly how much the market moved over the lookback period.
Probability movement is one of the clearest ways to see that the market's consensus is shifting. It helps traders separate active repricing from background chatter and spot momentum before it becomes obvious.
The lookback window defaults to 2 hours. Snapshots are timestamped and stored per market. When a shift is detected, the alert shows the baseline and current value so the change is immediately legible.
Detecting surging interest before prices fully move
Polyscope tracks each market's 24-hour trading volume across the same rolling snapshot system. The current 24-hour volume is divided by the baseline volume from the oldest active snapshot.
When that ratio crosses the configured multiplier — and the market also clears a minimum liquidity floor — a volume spike alert fires.
Volume often moves before price fully catches up. A sudden surge in activity can indicate fresh attention, new information hitting the market, or size entering before the crowd reacts.
Markets must also clear a minimum volume threshold so the system does not flood you with meaningless spikes from illiquid noise.
Spotting markets that are suddenly climbing the leaderboard
Every 5 minutes, Polyscope ranks active markets by 24-hour volume. The top 20 are compared against the previous cycle. If a market enters the top 20 and was not there before, it triggers an alert with the rank.
Markets that break into the top 20 are often pulling in fresh attention quickly. This can help traders find heating-up narratives earlier instead of arriving after volume is already crowded.
The infrastructure that makes alerts smarter, cleaner, and more actionable.
Each market has a 30-minute cooldown per trigger type, which prevents repetitive spam without suppressing other relevant alert categories on the same market.
Every alert is enriched with bid/ask spread, liquidity depth, and order book context so the trader sees more than just the headline event.
Buy/sell pressure is estimated from order book depth and summarized into readable sentiment buckets so the trader gets a quick directional read.
Regular digests summarize how many alerts fired across each category so even traders away from the feed can keep up with the pace of the market.
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