What circulating supply means
Circulating supply is the number of coins or tokens that a data provider treats as publicly available and able to trade right now. It is not everything that has been created. It is a judgment about which of those units are realistically in the market today.
That judgment matters because rankings multiply it by price. Circulating market cap = circulating supply × price, so a change in the supply count moves a token up or down the table even when the price does not move. For the market cap definition itself, see what is market cap in crypto. For how circulating supply compares with total and max supply in valuation terms, see FDV vs market cap. This page focuses on the counting.
What is usually excluded from circulating supply
Providers start from the tokens that exist and subtract balances that are not expected to trade soon. Common exclusions:
- Locked and vesting allocations: team, investor, and advisor tokens held in vesting contracts until a release date.
- Treasury and foundation wallets: reserves a project or DAO controls for grants, development, or ecosystem funds.
- Unminted or scheduled emissions: rewards that will be issued later through mining, staking, or liquidity programs and do not exist yet.
- Burned tokens: units sent to a provably unspendable address. These are gone for good and are usually removed from total supply as well.
- Bridge and wrapper escrow: tokens locked on one chain to back a representation on another, so the same units are not counted twice.
Some balances are judgment calls. Staked tokens, for example, are often still counted as circulating because their owners can unstake them, while tokens in long protocol lockups may not be. Providers make different calls here.
Why data providers disagree
Two reputable dashboards can show noticeably different circulating supply for the same coin. Typical reasons:
- Different exclusion lists. One provider may exclude a foundation wallet that another counts as circulating.
- Self-reported vs verified data. Projects often submit their own figures. Some providers publish them as given, others verify on-chain, and some flag unverified numbers.
- Refresh timing. Supply changes with unlocks, emissions, and burns. A provider that refreshes less often can lag a recent event.
- Multichain accounting. Tokens issued natively on several chains, or bridged between them, are easy to double-count or undercount.
Because of this, market cap rankings are only as consistent as the supply data underneath them. TokenCap uses CoinGecko’s figures throughout so every table on the site is sorted on the same basis.
How circulating supply changes over time
Circulating supply is not fixed for most assets. It grows when vesting tranches unlock, when new rewards are issued, or when a treasury distributes tokens. It shrinks when tokens are burned or bought back and retired. Stablecoins are a special case: their supply expands and contracts as issuers mint and redeem against reserves, which is covered in our stablecoins guide.
A useful habit is to compare circulating supply with total and max supply on the coin’s page. A small circulating share means more supply is still to come; a share near 100% means most tokens are already out.
How to check circulating supply on TokenCap
Open any coin from the live markets table. Its detail page lists circulating supply, total supply, and max supply loaded live from CoinGecko where the API provides them, alongside market cap and 24h volume. Category landings such as Ethereum tokens, Solana tokens, and DeFi tokens lead into the same live tables.
This page does not invent prices, supply figures, or search-volume stats. TokenCap stays clean: no ads, no affiliates.
Disclaimer
TokenCap provides market information only. Nothing on this site is financial, investment, legal, or tax advice. Cryptocurrency markets are volatile. Always verify figures on the live table and do your own research before making decisions.