MAINNEAT

How do Hyperliquid liquidations work?

Understand maintenance margin, liquidation flow and the limits of the liquidation tape.

By Mainneat / Reviewed / Independent documentation

What triggers a liquidation?

An account becomes eligible when equity falls below required maintenance margin. Hyperliquid uses mark price in the liquidation process. The most recent public execution price alone does not determine whether an account is liquidatable.

How is a liquidation executed?

The protocol can send liquidation orders to the book. If the account deteriorates far enough without sufficient execution, backstop liquidation can transfer positions to the liquidator vault. These mechanisms should not be counted as identical trade events.

Is every large sell a liquidation?

No. A discretionary trade, hedge or closing order can also be large. Classifying a liquidation requires explicit supporting data. The ordinary public trades stream does not justify labeling every large aggressive trade as forced.

Does Liquidations Tape show every liquidation?

The HyperTracker relay streams liquidation fills received while connected, without historical replay. Events before connection or during interruptions are not recovered. Session volume KPIs include only USDC markets; other quote currencies are displayed separately in the tape.

Why can an estimated liquidation price move?

Funding, account equity and other positions can change the threshold. Cross and isolated margin also behave differently. A displayed estimate should not be treated as a fixed future execution price.

Sources and methodology

Protocol details refer to the official sources below. Terminal behavior describes this site's implementation and its stated coverage limits. Examples are illustrative.

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