Why can a Bitcoin transaction stay unconfirmed even with a higher fee?

[sportbitcoin]

Previously. I believed that if you pay a higher fee on the transaction to Bitcoin it was almost certain that it would be confirmed quickly, but it's not this simple. The fee rate. Typically expressed in sat/vB is more important than the overall fee. For instance, a higher amount of transaction could have a lower fee rate than a smaller amount of transactions even though the fees are higher. This difference may impact the profitability of mining transactions with block space being a constraint.
Another critically important consideration is the Mempool congestion. The more people competing for the same block space. The more the competition gets. The amount of the fee may be less competitive than it was when the transaction was made if network activity suddenly increases. That's why it's worth checking out the fee rates before you send BTC. Sometimes it's more beneficial than just the wallet with the highest fee.
It also just leaves me wondering about what other users do to deal with this. How often do you rely on the wallet for the fee recommendation. Or look into the fee market and mempool? Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

[Charles-Tim]

I use mempool for the fee estimation. It is better than many wallets that their fee estimation is not very accurate.

Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

If the mempool is very congested, it is possible that the purging fee rate can get to your transaction fee rate, that will make your transactions to be dropped from the mempool in a way that you can double spend the coin.

If the transaction get to the number of days set as default on the nodes, the transaction will be dropped in a way you can double spend the coin.

[notocactus]

Previously. I believed that if you pay a higher fee on the transaction to Bitcoin it was almost certain that it would be confirmed quickly, but it's not this simple.

Quick or slow, it depends on the fee rate you use for broadcasting your transaction, whether the used fee rate is on tip of Bitcoin mempools. Additionally, another factor is whether your transaction fee is also higher than other transactions with same fee rate but have lower transaction fees.

Or look into the fee market and mempool?

There is nothing like fee market but there are Bitcoin mempools and there are sites for observing Bitcoin mempools.
Mempool Observing tools

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Link

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Notes

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jochen-hoenicke.de

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You can use Count, Fee, Weight

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mempool.jhoenicke.de

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You can use Count, Fee, Weight

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mempool.space

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Transaction fee rate per priority, also a detailed chart like jochen-hoenicke site

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whatthefee.io

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Fee rate, time, probability of confirmation

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bitcoiner.live

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Bitcoin Fee Estimates

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@BitcoinFeesAlert_bot

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Telegram notification about Bitcoin transaction fee

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Fee Extension

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BTC Mempool Fees Extension (Firefox/Chrome browser)

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Bitcoindata.science

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BTC average transaction fee obsever

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Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

Most good non-custodial wallets have opt-in RBF, so except you disable RBF, your transactions will always are RBF and you can bump the fee later.

Otherwise, you can have another option, that is less convenient, it is Child Pay For Parents CPFP.
[Guide] Use CPFP if your stucked transactions from blockchain.com wallet
[TUTORIAL] Getting a low-fee transaction unstuck by creating a CPFP with Electrum.
All about transaction fees in Electrum.
Minimize your transaction fee with Electrum wallet.

[Upgrade00]

Consolidating your transactions at a time when transactions are very cheap will allow you to use a smaller fee rate later on even if the average feerate is higher and still get your transaction confirmed in good time.

Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

If I am in a hurry, yes. If not and I consider my feerate enough to get me in within a reasonable time, I would
I also used to use the free option to accelerate a transactio which some mining pools had. I've not used it in a while, but I hope they still leave some blockspace for this option.

[notocactus]

Consolidating your transactions at a time when transactions are very cheap will allow you to use a smaller fee rate later on even if the average feerate is higher and still get your transaction confirmed in good time.

Consolidate small UTXOs as inputs is a good preparation for transactions in the future and it means more in fee saving if transaction fee in the future is expensive.

About that, there are guides

• Minimize your transaction fee with Electrum wallet.
• [Sep 2026]Mempool empty, Consolidate your small inputs @0.32 sat/vbyte.
• How to make a bitcoin transaction and pay less than 1 sat/vByte

[PostQuantumBTC]

Consolidating your transactions at a time when transactions are very cheap will allow you to use a smaller fee rate later on even if the average feerate is higher and still get your transaction confirmed in good time.

Consolidate small UTXOs as inputs is a good preparation for transactions in the future and it means more in fee saving if transaction fee in the future is expensive.

About that, there are guides

• Minimize your transaction fee with Electrum wallet.
• [Sep 2026]Mempool empty, Consolidate your small inputs @0.32 sat/vbyte.
• How to make a bitcoin transaction and pay less than 1 sat/vByte

This is true but for anyone that want to be consolidating the UTXO need to know about how it can affect privacy. You consolidate small input, it means it can connect your past addresses and transactions together. Using coins control is very important if there are some addresses that you do not want to link together.

[hugeblack]

Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

It is best to make sure that the RBF does not lead to the transaction failing, as some services follow the first TXID, and if the RBF is used, it may lead to stopping the processing of the transaction as it will become invalid, and then you will need to contact the support team to update your balance.

[coinlary]

How often do you rely on the wallet for the fee recommendation. Or look into the fee market and mempool? Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

It works sometimes,but it can also be inaccurate. It could retain  stale data and make you endup paying  2x or more of the high priority feerate, which is likely to even be a little bit worse/ worse if you're combining  multiple UTXOs as you may  endup paying huge amount in fee altogether.

I've only use RBF I think 2wice or thrice to reverse a transaction back to my wallet and countless time to bump fee if it's urgent(not like really that much ).

[PostQuantumBTC]

It is best to make sure that the RBF does not lead to the transaction failing, as some services follow the first TXID, and if the RBF is used, it may lead to stopping the processing of the transaction as it will become invalid, and then you will need to contact the support team to update your balance.

I have used RBF in some places before, the place I noticed this more is the centralized exchanges I will still see the coin if I use RBF. But the worse place you can use it are transaction processed by payment processors and other sites that will give you an invoice to pay to. The problem is that the invoice has expiration time also which can be 10 minutes. If the transaction is not confirmed on time, the 10 minute expiration time can be over or the person will still be credited for the payment?

[Muskanrani]

Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

It is best to make sure that the RBF does not lead to the transaction failing, as some services follow the first TXID, and if the RBF is used, it may lead to stopping the processing of the transaction as it will become invalid, and then you will need to contact the support team to update your balance.

Your observation about exchange backend API limitations is so accurate according to your experience most of the advanced exchanges are updating their node infrastructure.
 So they track their replaced transactions accurately do you prefer CPFP on RBF to avoid the limitations of exchange .

Do you adjust feerates manually before strating the broadcast??

How do you access that any service is supporting or not  RBF replacement before sending funds ??

What do you think that by using full-RBF increase the risk of mempool  dropouts for low-fee transactions??

[Aanuoluwatofunmi]

Before making your transaction, don't conclude by saying that you are using a high transaction fee, things don't work like that, the first go to the mempool to check the transaction fee, what you may call as a high transaction fee may be low when the mempool is congested and you need to use a more higher fee rate for your transaction, but this shouldn't also be the only reason why it should remain stucked, because you could virtually bump the fee if your wallet supports RBF, however, hence you can refer to order suggestions raised above.

[EarnOnVictor]

-snip-
How often do you rely on the wallet for the fee recommendation. Or look into the fee market and mempool? Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

Since you've already established a viable point that factors must be considered and not automatically assume your fee is big enough, let's move to the questions.

1. Only a novice would rely on the wallet's recommendation; though it's often cool, you might overpay if you don't take care to protect yourself. I check mine manually via the mempool.
2. An experienced Bitcoin sender would always use RBF, as no one can be perfectly sure and anything could happen unannounced. But I don't see the benefits of leaving your transactions unconfirmed for the longest. That is carelessness.

[UchihaSarada]

1. Only a novice would rely on the wallet's recommendation; though it's often cool, you might overpay if you don't take care to protect yourself. I check mine manually via the mempool.

You can check it with different Bitcoin mempool sites, more careful than checking with only one site.

2. An experienced Bitcoin sender would always use RBF, as no one can be perfectly sure and anything could happen unannounced.

Right but now wallets no longer use On / Off for RBF in wallet customization interface, so Bitcoin senders with self custodial wallets will mostly use RBF by default settings for their transactions.

They don't use that only if the wallet they use is terrible, does not have default RBF, or they proactively customized wallet settings and disable RBF.

But I don't see the benefits of leaving your transactions unconfirmed for the longest. That is carelessness.

It's more likely inconvenient and uncomfortable for your experience than careless, I think. Because if you broadcast a Bitcoin transaction from a self custodial wallet, only you can double spend the transaction or bump the transaction fee with RBF or use CPFP but CPFP has conditions to use, not only available.

You don't lose your coins by that, it's not like carelessness.

Usually most Bitcoin mempools will drop low fee rate transactions from their mempools after 2016 blocks or about 14 days, and you can broadcast your transaction again but it depends on them while with RBF, you can control better.

[Ambatman]

I have used RBF in some places before, the place I noticed this more is the centralized exchanges I will still see the coin if I use RBF. But the worse place you can use it are transaction processed by payment processors and other sites that will give you an invoice to pay to. The problem is that the invoice has expiration time also which can be 10 minutes. If the transaction is not confirmed on time, the 10 minute expiration time can be over or the person will still be credited for the payment?

It depends on the merchant
And that would require you informing support about your situation.
Definitely because the invoice time elapsed doesn't mean the blockchain would reject it.
The transaction can remain valid and unconfirmed after the invoice expires
So whether you still get credited depends on the merchant's payment policy.

[Darker45]

For instance, a higher amount of transaction could have a lower fee rate than a smaller amount of transactions even though the fees are higher.

Because it's not about the amount of transaction but the size of transaction. And when it comes to the size of data, a 1BTC transaction could be smaller than a 0.01BTC transaction.

The amount of the fee may be less competitive than it was when the transaction was made if network activity suddenly increases. That's why it's worth checking out the fee rates before you send BTC.

But checking the fee rates doesn't give you an idea whether the network activity suddenly increases or not. So, if you don't want your transaction to get delayed in case there's a sudden spike in activity, you can pay a bit more than the fee suggested. But if it's all right with you for the transaction to get confirmed much later, you can stick with the minimum. If it gets dropped from the mempool, then you can rebroadcast it with a higher fee. 

How often do you rely on the wallet for the fee recommendation. Or look into the fee market and mempool? Do you typically use RBF to offer a higher fee for transactions if they take longer to become confirmed or do you just wait for a transaction to get confirmed?

There are wallets that only allow you fee options but not full freedom as to how much you're willing to pay. Depending on how important that your transaction gets confirmed right away, you could either choose a lower or higher fee. Typically, I just wait, but for transactions that I want to get confirmed right away, I often choose the fastest option.

[Cookdata]

It's more likely inconvenient and uncomfortable for your experience than careless, I think. Because if you broadcast a Bitcoin transaction from a self custodial wallet, only you can double spend the transaction or bump the transaction fee with RBF or use CPFP but CPFP has conditions to use, not only available.

The term double spend does not fit RBF and CPFP, you don't double spend with these two, you are replacing transaction either by bumping the fee if an RBF is enabled by default in your software wallet or if the transaction sequence is RBF signaled on your transaction, while CPFP is paying a high fee to replace your initial(parent) transaction.

You said only you(sender), but CPFP can be replaced by either the sender or anyone who controls the private keys to any of the outputs. If the output involves two or more addresses and they control the private keys, they can CPFP for the transaction to replace the initial by paying an effective fee for miners to confirm the transaction.

Usually most Bitcoin mempools will drop low fee rate transactions from their mempools after 2016 blocks or about 14 days, and you can broadcast your transaction again but it depends on them while with RBF, you can control better.

Transactions can be dropped from a node mempool after 14 days, but that doesn’t mean they will be dropped from every other node at the same time. It depends on when each node received the transaction.

For example, if the first node received the transaction today and another node received it a few days later and it doesn't get confirmed, the first node may drop it after 14 days, while the other node could still keep it in its mempool for a few more days.

[Catenaccio]

But checking the fee rates doesn't give you an idea whether the network activity suddenly increases or not. So, if you don't want your transaction to get delayed in case there's a sudden spike in activity, you can pay a bit more than the fee suggested. But if it's all right with you for the transaction to get confirmed much later, you can stick with the minimum. If it gets dropped from the mempool, then you can rebroadcast it with a higher fee. 

Bitcoin market is unpredictable so it can have either long squeeze or short squeeze which causes sudden demand for on chain transactions like moving coins to exchanges for potential fud news or selling. The sudden on chain pending transactions will cause more load on Bitcoin mempools, and give Bitcoin miners more choices to pick best transactions in terms of transaction fee which is one part of their mining income.

To avoid any unpredictable situations with Bitcoin market, mempools and probability of your transaction (be stucked in mempools for 14 days before possibly dropping by nodes), using Replace By Fee RBF is very important. Having RBF for your transaction also avoid inconvenience of using Child Pay For Parents CPFP.

[Livingleged]

You said only you(sender), but CPFP can be replaced by either the sender or anyone who controls the private keys to any of the outputs. If the output involves two or more addresses and they control the private keys, they can CPFP for the transaction to replace the initial by paying an effective fee for miners to confirm the transaction.

This is true actually, I also was mistaking few things in the past, I had thought that the CPFP could only be done from the receiver’s side only, little did I know that its depend on the situation at that moment. And the CPFP could be done by either the sender or receiver, depending on who controls the UTXO needed to create the child transaction.
Like for example:
A senders original transaction is not yet confirmed, the sender can easily create a child transaction spending one of its output and attached a higher fee, and this make the miner considers both both the parent and the child fees together.

And for the receivers case, assuming he has received an output from the unconfirmed transaction, it’s easy to spend that in a child transaction with a higher fee which will also help get the original transaction confirmed quickly.

An explanation for why it’s possible for one to receive unconfirmed transaction, and even possibly try to spend part of it will just make everything seat well with me as I’m not so into technical.

[lionheart78]

It's more likely inconvenient and uncomfortable for your experience than careless, I think. Because if you broadcast a Bitcoin transaction from a self custodial wallet, only you can double spend the transaction or bump the transaction fee with RBF or use CPFP but CPFP has conditions to use, not only available.

The term double spend does not fit RBF and CPFP, you don't double spend with these two, you are replacing transaction either by bumping the fee if an RBF is enabled by default in your software wallet or if the transaction sequence is RBF signaled on your transaction, while CPFP is paying a high fee to replace your initial(parent) transaction.

True! The term replacing a conflicting unconfirmed transaction is more fitting than double-spending because it does not successfully confirm both transaction but only the one used to replace the transaction to bump it for confirmation.  To further explain:
RBF:
Spending the same UTX but with increase fee to send the transaction to the same address

Doubles Spending
Spending and amount of BTC to recipient 1, and at the same time spending the same BTC to recipient 2.

So I view this as RBF is a legitimate use of replacing an unconfirmed transaction, while double-spending is a fraudulent use of spending the same UTXO

You said only you(sender), but CPFP can be replaced by either the sender or anyone who controls the private keys to any of the outputs. If the output involves two or more addresses and they control the private keys, they can CPFP for the transaction to replace the initial by paying an effective fee for miners to confirm the transaction.

True, to explain it further, if the sender sends 0.3 BTC from wallet A and the address holds 0.5BTC, the transaction will be 0.3 BTC goes to address B (recipient Address) and 0.2 to address C (sender's change address).  CPFP can be done by the recipient Address B, and also by the sender address C, since the sender also has control on spendable output of the unconfirmed transaction through the change address C.

[LoyceV]

Allow me to link my topic here: [Sep 2026]Mempool empty, Consolidate your small inputs @0.32 sat/vbyte.