CoW Swap has opened its time-weighted average price, or TWAP, orders to users of standard self-custody wallets, removing the previous requirement to route the feature through a Safe multisig account. The tool is now available on swap.cow.fi across the protocol’s supported EVM-compatible networks, allowing users to place, amend, and cancel scheduled large trades directly from an externally owned account, or EOA.
The change gives individual wallet holders access to an execution method commonly used by professional trading desks when moving sizeable positions. Rather than sending one large swap into a liquidity pool at a single moment, a TWAP order divides the transaction into a series of smaller fills over a selected time period.
That structure is intended to curb price impact, which occurs when an order is large enough to move the market against the trader while it is being executed. It can also reduce exposure to slippage—the difference between an expected price and the eventual execution price—during periods of uneven onchain liquidity.
Large swaps face substantial execution costs
Academic research cited in CoW DAO’s announcement, based on more than 500,000 real-world trades, found that price impact and slippage represented roughly 77% of the total cost of swaps above $100,000. On a pair with thinner liquidity, the two factors accounted for more than one-third of total trading costs for orders between $1,000 and $100,000, according to the study.
Those figures illustrate why transaction fees alone can give an incomplete picture of the cost of an onchain swap. A trader may pay relatively little in network and protocol fees but still receive a materially worse rate when a large order consumes available liquidity too quickly.
TWAP execution does not remove market risk or guarantee a better outcome. Prices can move during the order’s duration, potentially leaving a trader with a less favorable result than an immediate trade would have produced. The method instead exchanges single-point execution risk for a sequence of smaller trades, producing an average price across the chosen period.
That can be useful for holders converting a large token position into stablecoins, funds gradually accumulating an asset, or treasury managers seeking to avoid concentrating execution in one block or one short-lived market window.
Funds remain in the user’s wallet
CoW DAO said funds remain in the user’s wallet while a TWAP order is active. The system coordinates the order’s schedule and individual executions rather than requiring the full balance to be transferred into a separate trading contract for the entire duration.
Each fill is subject to the price protection chosen by the user, according to the DAO. In practical terms, this sets a limit on the price at which an individual portion of the order can execute. If market conditions move beyond that boundary, the relevant fill should not proceed at a price outside the user’s specified range.
The ability to edit or cancel an active order from an EOA wallet may be particularly useful in volatile conditions, when a trader’s original execution plan no longer matches the market or their portfolio needs. Under the earlier setup, using TWAP orders required a Safe account, a popular multisignature wallet framework often used by DAOs and teams but less convenient for ordinary users with a single wallet address.
Safe-based setups can provide additional controls for organizations managing shared funds, but creating and operating one adds steps for a person who only wants to schedule a trade from a wallet such as MetaMask or another EOA-based interface. CoW’s update removes that operational barrier while retaining the option of using more complex wallet arrangements where appropriate.
Treasury users have already tested the tool
The Ethereum Foundation has previously used CoW Swap’s TWAP functionality for ETH-to-stablecoin conversions associated with research and development, grants, and donations. CoW DAO said the foundation used the feature for a 5,000 ETH conversion in April 2026.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has also used the system for personal ETH-to-stablecoin transactions, including a conversion exceeding 3,100 ETH, according to the DAO.
Such transactions show the appeal of staged execution for entities that need to sell or convert meaningful amounts without broadcasting a single large market order into onchain liquidity. The approach cannot make a large sale invisible, particularly when transactions and balances can be tracked on public blockchains, but it can distribute the direct liquidity demand across multiple executions.
TWAP orders can also serve less dramatic purposes than treasury rebalancing. A user seeking regular exposure to an asset could schedule recurring purchases—for example, a fixed dollar amount every week or month—rather than manually making each swap. This resembles a dollar-cost-averaging approach, although the two strategies address different issues: dollar-cost averaging governs when capital is committed, while TWAP primarily governs how a planned order is executed.
CoW targets execution rather than just routing
CoW Protocol said it has processed more than $200 billion in user trading volume since launch and saved more than $1.5 billion in extracted value that was returned to users. The protocol’s model seeks to match compatible orders and use competition among solvers—specialized entities that find the best available execution path—rather than relying solely on a single automated market maker pool.
The EOA rollout extends that execution-focused model to a broader segment of self-custody users. For traders handling larger swaps, the practical question is no longer whether a Safe wallet is needed to use scheduled execution, but whether spreading the order over time fits their market view, urgency, and price limits.
A TWAP order can reduce the damage caused by pushing too much volume through limited liquidity at once. It also requires careful settings: a schedule that is too slow can leave the order exposed to changing market conditions, while price limits that are too restrictive may prevent fills from occurring.
Want tighter execution on big swaps? Learn how slippage management can further optimize your TWAP trading strategy.
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