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GlossaryLightning

Inbound liquidity

Also · Receiving capacity · Lightning liquidity

Inbound liquidity is a Lightning node’s capacity to receive, the funds sitting on the far side of its channels. A new node that only opens channels can send but not receive.

In a channel, funds sit on 1 side or the other. What is on your side you can send. What is on your peer’s side is what you can receive, your inbound liquidity. Open a channel with 1 million sats of your own money and you can send 1 million but receive nothing until some of it has moved across.

This is the part of Lightning that surprises newcomers. Receiving a payment requires someone to have already committed funds towards you. Inbound comes from channels others open to you, from spending, from swaps that push your balance out, or from buying it on liquidity marketplaces and from Lightning service providers. Custodial and LSP-backed wallets hide the problem rather than remove it.

In French · Liquidité entrante

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Definition reviewed on October 22, 2026

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