How Oasis Vault swaps work

When you want to turn one asset into another - for example, swap some ETH for BTC - a swap is the way to do it directly from your vault. No need to move your funds to an exchange, transfer them, trade, and move them back.

What you’ll need

  • ✅ Oasis Vault mobile app installed
  • ✅ An active plan
  • ✅ A vault with the asset you want to swap

The simple version

  • You pick the asset you have and the asset you want.
  • Oasis Vault finds the best price and handles the swap on-chain.
  • The new asset lands back in your vault.
  • You keep holding your keys the whole time - nothing leaves your control.

What “on-chain” means

A swap is on-chain when it happens directly on the blockchain, rather than inside a company’s private books. An exchange swap is essentially a promise from the exchange (“trust us, you got the coins you asked for”). An on-chain swap is recorded publicly and settle with the actual assets - you can look it up on the blockchain yourself and verify it happened.

How Oasis Vault finds a price

Oasis Vault routes swaps through a technology called LI.FI. It’s not a single market - it’s a connector that checks many different trading venues at once and works out the best way to get you from one asset to another.

Because it scans across many sources, LI.FI can often find a better price or a route that another single app couldn’t. It’s the difference between asking one shop for a price and being able to compare a whole market of shops instantly.

Swaps between chains

Some swaps stay on the same network - like swapping ETH to a token that also runs on Ethereum. These are usually quick.

Other swaps go across chains - for example, turning ETH (on Ethereum) into BTC (on Bitcoin). A cross-chain swap is more involved because it moves value from one network to another, so it takes longer. Oasis Vault picks the right destination vault for you, and tells you up front what to expect.

A few things worth knowing

  • You always see the rate first. Oasis Vault shows you the exchange rate, the fee, and the estimated time before you confirm, so there are no surprises.
  • Same-chain swaps are fast. They typically complete in under a minute.
  • Cross-chain swaps take longer. Swapping between chains can take up to 30 minutes to an hour while the value moves across networks.

Still have questions?

If anything about swapping is unclear, reach out to us through the chat in the Oasis Vault app, and we’ll walk you through it.