The Shape and Limits of a Prediction Service Close to Immediate Settlement and Finalization: Limitless, Kalshi, and Polygon in 2025 A prediction market truly feels like a service when the time users wait for results is short, the process is simple, and the cost and delay consistently remain similar. The provided information contains both elements that quickly create this "service-like feeling" and factors that extend the time. Therefore, the question of "whether results are finalized and settled immediately" is not a hypothetical about the future, but rather a way to identify where the current near-immediate intervals exist and where they stop. First, Limitless is noted to operate on Base L2 rather than Polygon as of December 2025. Here, the key point is that speed and process are simplified through an on-chain structure. Limitless's markets are designed around short, time-based binary outcomes, and trades are offered in a combined CLOB and AMM format, as described in the data. Users connect their wallets and can buy or sell Yes or No shares using both market and limit orders. Settlement is automatic after the result is finalized, and no manual claims are required. Particularly, time-based markets are said to resolve within five minutes after expiration, and under normal conditions, the delay from the event's end to when funds become available is less than ten minutes. As a result, the data shows that Limitless's closest form to "immediate finalization and settlement" is an automated resolution process with minimal human intervention and short payment delays. However, Limitless's "speed" is presented alongside the diversity of result confirmation methods. While there is an automated oracle resolution, in cases requiring complex interpretation, the data also mentions decentralized or centralized procedures such as human review or verification by trusted entities. Additionally, in terms of liquidity, the data includes observations such as wide spreads in thin order books and high concentration in token holdings among top addresses. This information functions as factual evidence showing that speed itself does not directly equate to "a consistently high-quality service." Kalshi, on the other hand, creates "finalization" from the opposite structural direction. Kalshi is summarized as a regulated prediction exchange in the U.S., operating under the CFTC's designated contract market status. The data explains that event definitions and result verification are carried out based on rules and specified official sources. Kalshi's events are composed of accessible APIs and markets, and binary markets are described as having a $1 settlement per contract. The bottleneck after trading ends is "verification." According to the data, after an event ends, Kalshi's market team review can take one hour to more than twelve hours, and verification is conducted based on contract conditions and pre-specified information sources. Once verification is complete, settlement is performed immediately, with $1 paid to the winning side. In other words, while "immediate settlement" in Kalshi occurs right after verification is completed, the data does not describe the verification process itself as an automated structure, but rather as a human-centric procedure, meaning it does not finalize immediately right after the event ends. Kalshi's service nature is created not by hiding slowness, but by clearly establishing the basis for finalization. The data includes explanations such as customer funds being held in segregated U.S. bank accounts, the DCO model where the clearinghouse becomes the counterparty to reduce bilateral risk, and all positions being fully collateralized in cash. Additionally, there are regulatory limitations on event types, and the listing and expansion of new events involve procedures that take several days to weeks. These are summarized as factual elements that emphasize "clear rules and accountability, like a service," rather than "repeating quickly like a service." In short, Kalshi appears closer to fixing the basis of finalization in documents and regulations, in exchange for time. Polygon appears in the data as a layer that provides the "physical lower limit" for how fast settlement can be. As of December 2025, the average TPS of the Polygon PoS chain is stated to be approximately 68 to 78, with a block time of about 2 seconds and finality of about 5 seconds. Transaction fees are stated to average around $0.002, embedding the condition that frequent settlements are economically feasible. Additionally, the data includes explanations that oracle feeds such as Chainlink and Pyth are widely used on Polygon.This combination technically enables the procedure of "finalizing results and quickly settling on the blockchain after the fact," serving as the basis for such a process. However, the historical fact that Polygon's "fast finality" has not always flowed consistently is also presented. According to the data, on September 10, 2025, a consensus-related bug caused finality to be delayed from 10 to 15 minutes, and in some cases up to an hour. At that time, block production continued, but the finality delay lasted approximately 12 hours. This record is interpreted as a concrete example illustrating how a single chain-level consensus issue can directly affect the entire user experience when a prediction market aims to offer on-chain settlement as a service. In short, the data categorizes Polygon as a platform that typically offers fast finality but also has a history of extended tail delays in exceptional situations. Returning to the question, the discussion of whether Limitless, Kalshi, and Polygon can collectively "turn prediction into a service" is based on three key facts. First, as of December 2025, Limitless operates on Base, and there is no evidence in the data that Limitless, Kalshi, and Polygon are directly integrated in a live production environment. Second, Limitless explicitly outlines a "near-instant" procedure for time-based markets, where resolution occurs within five minutes after expiration, automatic settlement is enabled, and under normal conditions, the time from event closure to fund availability is under ten minutes. Third, Kalshi employs a user-centric verification process that can take between one to twelve hours or more, but once verification is complete, settlement is immediate. Polygon, on the other hand, offers two-second blocks, approximately five-second finality, and low fees, but it also has a documented history of chain-level incidents, such as the finality delay in September 2025. When these three points are connected, the phrase "instant finality and settlement" does not appear as a single, unified state within the data. Some markets on Limitless are described as having results finalized and automatically settled within minutes after the event ends. Kalshi, in contrast, is presented as having a structure where the verification phase can take a long time after the event ends. Polygon, while offering metrics that shorten the time to settle finalized results on-chain, also includes a history of past incidents where this speed was disrupted. Therefore, the scene where prediction feels like a service varies depending on "where the finality is created." In short-term markets with oracle-based automatic resolution, finality and settlement reach users quickly. In markets centered on regulations and official source verification, finality may arrive later, but the basis for that finality is clearly documented in procedures. Meanwhile, the chain as a settlement layer usually lightens the process with fast finality and low fees, but the data also shows that infrastructure fluctuations, such as past consensus failures, can still impact user experience. Ultimately, the conclusion presented in the data is straightforward. As of December 2025, Limitless, Kalshi, and Polygon are not a single combined product, but rather components that each provide different methods of finality and settlement at different points: "near-instant on-chain resolution," "regulation-based result verification and immediate settlement," and "fast finality and low-cost settlement infrastructure." The feeling that prediction becomes a service is clearly revealed through the data's numbers and procedural descriptions, depending on which component reduces user wait time, which component anchors the basis of finality, and which component lowers payment costs and time.