For more than five years, we have been building and refining one of the most impactful innovations in decentralized trading: 0x’s proprietary Request-for-Quote (RFQ) system.

What began in 2019 as a forward-looking experiment has become a critical piece of 0x’s institutional-grade crypto trading infrastructure. Today, RFQ is a cornerstone of our Swap API, seamlessly weaving together professional off-chain liquidity with onchain markets to deliver consistently superior trade execution. 

0x’s RFQ system provides competitive pricing and reliable execution. Thanks to the expertise of sophisticated market makers, 0x RFQ delivers better prices 52% of the time for the most highly traded pairs compared to AMMs. RFQ opens up additional avenues for trade route optimization and ensures your users get the best executed prices. 

In this article, we’ll unpack the history, design, and performance of 0x RFQ - and explain why it continues to set the benchmark for execution in DeFi.

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Why RFQ matters

0x Swap API routes across 150+ liquidity sources to find thebest executed price for a given trade. These sources include automated market makers (AMMs) alongside exclusive liquidity from professional market makers surfaced through 0x RFQ. Deeper liquidity and greater diversity of sources means better pricing for end-users.

Unlike traditional DEX models, RFQ connects directly with professional market makers who provide competitive quotes to traders. These quotes are used in combination with onchain AMM liquidity by Swap API’s best-in-class routing algorithm, ensuring that every trade is executed at the best possible price.

0x RFQ significantly improves pricing and execution quality - delivering better prices 52% of the time for blue chip pairs, which includes some of the most highly traded pairs like USDC-WETH, WBTC-WETH, and USDT-WETH. Overall, RFQ outperforms AMMs 25% of the time for all pairs.

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How 0x RFQ works

In 2019, we introduced the first purpose-built RFQ system for crypto, designed to address the limitations of AMMs. Since then, we’ve refined the system through continuous iteration and real-world usage at scale, making RFQ one of the most battle-tested components of decentralized trading infrastructure.

At the heart of 0x RFQ is the expertise of sophisticated market makers. These market makers must beat the onchain price of AMMs in order to be included in a quote. At the same time, they also must compete with other RFQ market makers. This competition can drive large price improvements of AMMs.

The 0x RFQ system is carefully designed to be both efficient and trustless:

• Multiplex routing: 0x can combine liquidity from multiple market makers and/or AMMs in a single trade.
• Multihop routing: Trades can route through multiple pairs for different legs of a trade.
• Zero Slippage: Because RFQ quotes are personally tailored for each trade on the smart contract level, users never incur slippage on the RFQ portion of their trades. Users will never pay a price worse than the quoted offer.‍
• Lower Reverts: Trades utilizing RFQ consistently see lower average revert rates than AMM-only routes.

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RFQ wins trades not by preferential routing, but by offering better pricing. 0x Swap API is neutral and only selects RFQ orders when they provide the best price. This architecture enables professional liquidity to be integrated into DeFi in a permissionless and open way.

0x’s RFQ technology provides competitive pricing and reliable execution:

• Improved pricing: RFQ liquidity delivers better prices X% of the time compared to AMMs.
• Execution reliability: Reduced revert rates improve the overall user experience.
• Institutional readiness: The ability to aggregate competitive quotes from professional market makers makes RFQ suitable for larger, more complex trades.

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Institutional grade trading Infrastructure

0x APIs offer the infrastructure layer to unify DEX liquidity and deliver a seamless trading experience to users. 0x utilizes a state-of-the-art pricing engine, underpinned by RFQ technology, to deliver optimal trade execution - bringing a CEX-like experience to DeFi with lightning fast latency and the lowest revert rates in the industry.

Featuring protection from MEV attacks, zero slippage, and highly efficient execution, RFQ unlocks the full power of decentralized trading.

0x RFQ bridges the efficiency and sophistication of traditional markets with the permissionless nature of DeFi - delivering institutional-grade trading infrastructure onchain.

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