Polymarket continues to roll out new upgrades to make the short-duration 5-minute and 15-minute market trading experience smoother. This is not surprising, given that these markets have been generating close to 40% of Polymarket’s daily fees despite only contributing around 17% of volume. 5-minute markets have already surpassed 15-minute markets in both volume and fees generated, despite only launching in February. The appeal lies in the high volatility these markets create, which in turn attracts two kinds of traders. The first is the informed institutional trader, who places multiple small trades within each window to execute one of the following three strategies: (1) Pair harvesting: using volatility to accumulate both Yes + No < $1 and arbitrage the difference (2) Directional trading: using faster external price feeds (Binance, Coinbase) to front-run lags in the Polymarket order book, taking asymmetric positions on which side will win (3) Active trading: trading in and out within the market window, riding momentum on 5-minute markets (trend-following) or fading sharp moves on 15-minute markets (mean reversion) Sophisticated traders focus on consistency rather than hitting outsized wins, achieving a high win rate despite low PnL margins of around 1.2%–1.5%. While margins are small, they compound steadily given the short duration of these markets. The other side of this trade is the average retail participant. While they contribute close to 63% of volume in these markets, less than 40% have emerged profitable, and their average margin is negative. Winning in these markets is not very different from flipping a coin, yet the dopamine effect of potential large short-term wins keeps users engaged. Winning four windows in a row would likely result in a ~16x return in just 20 minutes. The appeal is strong enough to keep volumes flowing. With a similar product for stocks on the roadmap, along with the improved trading experience from the v2 upgrade, this dynamic will likely become even more attractive for retail participants. This, in turn, creates greater opportunities for sophisticated algorithmic traders. I expect short-term markets to generate close to 60%–70% of Polymarket’s fees over the next year.