How much Bitcoin is sitting on exchanges — and is it leaving? Live total BTC held across major exchanges, plus net flow on and off over 1, 7 and 30 days.
Exchange reserves are the total Bitcoin held in wallets controlled by the tracked centralised exchanges. They're a rough proxy for readily sellable supply: coins on an exchange can be sold in seconds, while coins held elsewhere take at least one more step first. The direction of reserves tells you where coins are sitting, which price alone can't.
Outflows (reserves falling) mean the tracked exchange wallets hold less than they did. The data cannot show where the coins went: self-custody, ETF and institutional custodians, corporate treasuries, OTC desks, collateral arrangements and another exchange all look the same from here. Inflows (reserves rising) mean more coins are sitting on exchanges, which is often read as supply being made available to sell, though the data cannot show whether it will be sold.
A popular reading holds that when reserves shrink while demand rises (for example, from ETF inflows), the same buying meets a thinner available supply and moves price further. It is a reasonable mechanism but a weak signal on its own: through 2022 reserves fell for most of the year while price fell from about $69k to under $17k. Read reserves alongside ETF flows and cycle valuation rather than as a verdict.
Read more: Coins Are Leaving Exchanges. That Proves Less Than You Think — where the coins actually went, and the year the supply-shock reading pointed the wrong way.