92.6 Million ARB Every Month: When the Arbitrum Lockup Runs Out

The lockup on team and investor tokens at Arbitrum is running out. Every month exactly 92,645,833 ARB come out of the lock, and under DefiLlama's release model only five of those tranches are left, the last on February 14, 2027. That makes the question that really counts at ARB a datable one: not what happens on the next release day, but how much longer the monthly supply pressure lasts at all.

This piece answers both. It recalculates the monthly tranche from the Arbitrum Foundation's own allocation table rather than copying it off an aggregator, it names the remaining dates, and it points to the one spot where two serious sources are a month apart.

The Arbitrum lockup ends in the first quarter of 2027

The rule is set out in the documentation of the Arbitrum Foundation, and it is explicit: all investor and team tokens are subject to a four-year lockup, the first release takes place one year after the token generation event of March 16, 2023, and monthly releases follow over the remaining three years.

Work that through from the start and you get a cliff on March 16, 2024 followed by 36 monthly instalments. Where the last of those falls hangs on a single question: does the cliff month itself count as the first of the 36 instalments, or does the count begin the month after? The question sounds like bookkeeping, yet it moves the end by four weeks.

Both readings are out there. DefiLlama's emission model lists 36 insider releases, the first on March 16, 2024 together with the cliff, the last on February 14, 2027. The tokenomics services Tokenomist and CryptoRank, along with the literal four-year boundary from March 16, 2023, point to March 2027 instead. What holds up is therefore the range and not the single day: Arbitrum's insider lock ends between mid-February and the end of March 2027. Anyone who needs the exact day reads it off the vesting contract, not off an overview.

92,645,833 ARB a month: the tranche recalculated from the allocation

The monthly tranche can be reproduced in full from the allocation table, and that is why it can be trusted. The allocation under resolutions AIP 1.1 and 1.2 splits the ten billion ARB like this: 35.28 percent or 3.528 billion to the ArbitrumDAO treasury, 26.94 percent or 2.694 billion to team, contributors and advisors, 17.53 percent or 1.753 billion to investors, 11.62 percent or 1.162 billion to users of the platform through the airdrop, 7.5 percent or 750 million to the Arbitrum Foundation, and 1.13 percent or 113 million to DAOs building on Arbitrum.

Locked out of that are team and investors together, so 44.47 percent or 4.447 billion ARB. A quarter of that amount comes free at the cliff, and the remaining three quarters spread across 36 equal monthly instalments. That gives 4.447 billion times 0.75 divided by 36, so 92,645,833 ARB a month.

The check also works separately for each recipient group, and it comes out exactly. For the team: 2.694 billion times 0.75 divided by 36 gives 56,125,000 ARB. For the investors: 1.753 billion times 0.75 divided by 36 gives 36,520,833 ARB. Those are precisely the two amounts DefiLlama lists as two separate events on every release day. Two independently built calculations, the same figures down to the token: the tranche is therefore derived from the primary source rather than taken from an overview.

A footnote on diligence belongs here. Older notes in our date calendar carried the figure 93,159,180 ARB for the October date. That amount cannot be reproduced from the allocation table, while the 92,645,833 can be, three times over. We therefore carry the recalculated number and let the other one stand rather than stirring both into an average.

The cliff of March 16, 2024 freed a quarter of the insider tokens

The single biggest day in ARB's history is already behind us, and has been for two and a half years. On March 16, 2024, 673,500,000 ARB were released to the team and 438,250,000 ARB to investors, 1,111,750,000 ARB in total. That is exactly the quarter of the locked 4.447 billion that the four-year rule provides for after the first year.

On the same day the first monthly instalment of 92,645,833 ARB also ran, so the cliff day came to 1,204,395,833 ARB all told. For today's situation something reassuring follows from that: the peak in volume is in the past. What is still to come are even monthly instalments on the order of a thirteenth of that single day.

Team, investors and the foundation follow three different release rules

This is where the most common mix-up arises, and it distorts every estimate of supply pressure. Three different clocks are running at Arbitrum.

Team and investors share the same mechanics, the cliff after one year and 36 monthly instalments after that. The Arbitrum Foundation with its 7.5 percent or 750 million ARB runs separately and differently: the foundation's lockup began on April 17, 2023 and unwinds linearly over four years, enforced by the foundation's Vesting Budget Smart Contract Wallet. Under DefiLlama's model that works out at around 3.59 million ARB a week, so roughly 513,000 a day, and this stream does not end until April 17, 2027. The DAO treasury, finally, releases funds through irregular resolutions and counts as non-circulating in the emission models.

So anyone asking when the last token at Arbitrum comes free gets a different answer from the question about the end of the insider lock. The insider lock ends in the first quarter of 2027, the foundation stream in April 2027.

Lockup, cliff and vesting: the three terms in one sentence each

A lockup is the period in which allocated tokens may not be moved, either by contract or by a smart contract. A cliff is the date on which, after a waiting period, a larger share first comes free in one go. Vesting describes the release in instalments after that, monthly in Arbitrum's case. And an unlock or release is the individual event at which an instalment falls due.

Important for placing all this: a release does not mean tokens are being sold. Released only means they could be sold. The difference between the two is the whole reason release dates hit prices so differently. How to tell them apart in an individual case is something we worked through on another token in our guide to recalculating token unlocks yourself.

Five monthly tranches left: the release calendar to February 2027

Under DefiLlama's emission model, five insider tranches are outstanding as of the end of September 2026, each of 92,645,833 ARB:

• October 15, 2026
• November 15, 2026
• December 15, 2026
• January 14, 2027
• February 14, 2027

That adds up to 463,229,167 ARB coming out of the insider lock over the next four and a half months. On the reading that points to March 2027, a sixth tranche would be added and the total would rise to around 556 million ARB. Both figures sit far below what many people expect from the word lockup, and the reason is the 2024 cliff, which worked off the bulk of it long ago. Anyone wanting to see the date alongside the rest of this quarter's crypto dates will find it in our overview of the dates up to the end of the year.

A note on the times of day: the dates fall during the day rather than at midnight, and they shift by a few hours from month to month. For a decision on what to do, the date is enough.

1.32 percent of the circulating supply per tranche, 70.4 percent of tokens already in the market

An absolute figure says little until you set it against the circulating supply. Of the ten billion ARB, around 7.04 billion are in circulation, which is 70.4 percent. Locked or non-circulating are a further 2.96 billion or so, although that item includes the DAO treasury and the foundation's share and is therefore larger than the rest of the insider lock.

A monthly tranche of 92,645,833 ARB thus corresponds to 1.32 percent of the circulating supply. At an ARB price of around $0.20 at the end of September, that is just under $19 million of theoretical supply. For context: the circulating supply grew by around 108 million ARB over the preceding 30 days, so slightly more than one monthly tranche, because the foundation stream keeps being added.

Other models put the same amount at a somewhat different share. Tokenomist reports around 1.98 percent of the circulating supply for the same tranche, because a lower circulation assumption and a different split between team and investors underlie it there. The range of roughly 1.3 to 2.0 percent a month is therefore the honest answer, and it is precise enough for any decision a retail investor would hang on it. Which tools track supply data like this on an ongoing basis is shown by our comparison of analytics platforms.

What holders should watch before the next release on October 15

The next date is October 15, 2026. Less useful is the question of whether the price falls on that day, because uniform releases announced long in advance are known to the market. More revealing is what happens to the circulating supply and to exchange balances in the days afterwards, because that is where it shows whether the released tokens actually go into selling.

In practice that means: compare the circulating supply before and after the date, watch the inflows to exchanges, and set the tranche size against daily trading volume. A tranche that amounts to a fraction of one trading day is a different event from one that reaches a multiple of it. Anyone using Arbitrum on the network anyway will find the practical groundwork for this in our article on Arbitrum One, the bridge and gas.

Where to read the ARB release calendar yourself

The most reliable source is the Arbitrum Foundation's documentation, because it holds the allocation and the lock mechanics from which everything else can be derived. Anyone needing the calendar as a list will find the individual dates at DefiLlama; its model lists team and investors separately, so the total per date is made up of two lines.

With any such overview a counter-check pays off: multiply the stated tranche by the number of remaining dates and compare the result with the amount still locked. If the two diverge sharply, the overview is working from a different assumption about the cliff or the term. We had the same case recently at the end of Filecoin's vesting, where two services likewise differed by one instalment.

Tax and holding period: what applies in Germany when you sell after a release

For you as a holder in Germany, a release at another market participant has no tax significance. Tax only becomes relevant when you sell yourself. Gains on the sale of crypto assets count as a private disposal under section 23 of the German Income Tax Act. If you sell within a year of buying, the gain is taxable above the 1,000 euro exemption limit per year. Hold for longer than a year and the gain stays tax-free.

From that follows a connection often overlooked around release dates: if you are thinking of selling ahead of a date, your own purchase date helps determine what the decision costs. A sale eleven months after the purchase can be more expensive than a price drop you sit out. The tax office expects the entry in the SO annex to your tax return, and the burden of proof for the purchase date and price lies with you. Whether Arbitrum carries as a price story beyond this is something we looked at recently in connection with Robinhood Chain and RWA.

These statements describe the general legal position, not personal advice. With larger amounts, with staking income or with purchases in several tranches, a tax adviser will settle the individual case more reliably than any overview.

Arbitrum lockup: what to take away

Arbitrum's lockup is no longer an open question but a calendar with a foreseeable end. Five or six equally sized monthly tranches of 92,645,833 ARB each are outstanding, after which the insider lock is worked off, and the foundation stream runs out in April 2027. Three steps to make that usable for yourself:

1. Put the calendar in your diary. Note the five dates from October 15, 2026 to February 14, 2027 and treat them as known quantities rather than surprises. Where you can get ARB tradable and on what terms is shown by our comparison of crypto exchanges.
2. Know your own purchase date. Check when your positions reach the one-year mark before you line a sale up with a release date. The tools in our overview of tax software and portfolio trackers help with that.
3. Settle the custody question. If you want to hold ARB beyond the end of the lockup, the question of your own custody belongs with it; the differences are set out in our hardware wallet comparison.

And one last piece of context, so the figures do not look larger than they are: the remaining 463 million ARB amount to a good six percent of today's circulating supply, spread over more than four months. The day that really moved volume at Arbitrum was March 16, 2024, and that lies behind us.

(As of September 30, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)