Polygon’s DeFi ecosystem has come into full force in recent years, with Polygon’s tech stack and community growing steadily as the chain sets itself apart from other networks – especially in terms of stablecoin railways and P2P payments.

And today, it accelerates: the canonical PoS USDT token on Polygon is now upgraded to the USDT0 standard!

This integration completes a $1B+ migration of USDT liquidity to USDT0 and solidifies it as the de facto transfer standard for stablecoin movement between chains. With Polygon now natively connected to the growing network of USDT0-enabled ecosystems, the most capital-efficient deployment of the world’s leading stablecoin is live on one of the most popular blockchains in existence.

Your USDT0, now natively available on Polygon.

What’s New?

With this deployment, Polygon joins Arbitrum, Unichain, HyperEVM, Flare, Plasma and many more upcoming chains in adopting the fastest growing and largest crosschain value transfer infrastructure in crypto. This marks a foundational shift in how USDT is supported on Polygon, enabling faster bridging, lower fees, and improved liquidity, fully backed 1:1 by USDT.

More specifically, this migration transitioned USDT on Polygon PoS from a bridged version of Tether (via the PoS bridge) to a native deployment of USDT0 on the network. During the migration, USDT transfers through the Polygon Portal were temporarily paused while bridge contracts were upgraded. All contracts remained live and non-USDT bridging was unaffected.

Now that the migration is live, users and builders alike can benefit from USDT0’s deep, omnichain USDT liquidity layer via the same Polygon interface they’ve always used to transfer USDT. Thanks to a coordinated effort between USDT0, Tether and the Polygon team, USDT on Polygon has retained its original contract address for user convenience, while running on an entirely new, omnichain liquidity layer for its crosschain settlements powered by LayerZero’s OFT (Omnichain Fungible Token) standard.

In short, Polygon’s existing USDT has been automatically upgraded to USDT0 –  with zero action needed on your end! So if you’re already holding PoS USDT on Polygon, there’s nothing you need to do as part of this migration process. Similarly, all existing institutional integrations, including centralised exchanges, payment providers and DeFi apps, remain unchanged.

To transfer your USDT0 from Polygon back to Ethereum, users can now use usdt0.to frontend or interact with the smart contract directly.The supply backing PoS USDT on Polygon has now been migrated to the USDT0 lockbox on Ethereum mainnet, making it auditable by anyone at any point in time.  The USDT lockbox can be found here.

What Does This Upgrade Unlock?

This integration delivers unified liquidity and seamless transfers across Polygon and a dozen other blockchains already served by the unified liquidity layer for Tether. The addition of 1B+ new USDT0 and 6M unique wallets into our ecosystem unlocks new possibilities for capital formation and DeFi interoperability. With this upgrade, all USDT0 on Polygon is:

• Still backed 1:1 by USDT on Ethereum

• Transferable in and out of Polygon within seconds

• Fully composable between USDT0 chains, like Arbitrum, HyperEVM, Flare, Plasma, and beyond

That means when users or protocols transfer USDT0 between Polygon and any other supported chain, tokens are burned on the origin chain and minted on the destination. This ensures maximum reliability and native compatibility without the need for wrapped tokens or extraneous trust assumptions.

For instance, Polygon’s previous PoS bridge could take up to three hours to finalize outbound transfers. USDT0 dramatically shortens this wait time while ensuring each USDT0 token is backed by a canonical USDT supply on Ethereum – unlocking more rapid, reliable capital deployments wherever opportunity arises.

"Polygon’s integration of USDT0 and XAUt0 marks a major step in making asset-backed liquidity seamless across the multichain ecosystem. For our builders, it means direct access to two of the most trusted digital assets, the world’s leading stablecoin and gold, without the friction of bridges or wrapped tokens. For enterprises and institutions, it’s another example of how Polygon is delivering the scale, security, and asset diversity needed for real-world finance to thrive onchain."

Aishwary Gupta, Head of Enterprise at Polygon Labs

Enter XAUt0: Introducing Native Gold-Backed Liquidity on Polygon

Alongside USDT0, XAUt0, the omnichain version of Tether Gold, is also now live on Polygon, bringing native gold-backed liquidity to Polygon for the first time. Like USDT0, XAUt0 provides a universally accessible and composable liquidity layer through omnichain mint and burn transfers powered by LayerZero.

This dual integration means DeFi protocols and users on Polygon can now natively integrate gold-backed collateral for borrowing, hedging, and asset management strategies. And as the demand for RWA integrations grows, having gold liquidity that moves natively between chains makes Polygon a natural home for serious asset-backed finance.

Why Polygon?

Polygon is evolving from a high-performance chain into a full-stack, multichain coordination layer. The initial rollout of Polygon’s Bhilai Hardfork last week, coupled with the launch of AggLayer last year, has put Polygon in a much stronger position to become a global powerhouse for stablecoin payments, mass-market DeFi, and beyond.

Beyond infrastructure, Polygon is also positioning itself as the go-to destination for enterprise and institutional adoption. With growing support for tokenized RWAs, DePIN, and enterprise APIs, the network is broadening its use cases while still serving one of the most vibrant DeFi ecosystems in onchain finance. Developers on Polygon are already building for this future, and native access to omnichain USDT and gold-backed liquidity will further accelerate that progress.

“Unified liquidity is what makes the multichain future actually work. Now that USDT0 and XAUt0 are live on Polygon, it’s a lot easier for builders to plug into the assets that matter most, on a chain that’s built for serious scale. Whether you’re moving funds between rollups or building a new DeFi or RWA platform, this makes everything faster, simpler, and more connected.”

Lorenzo R., Co-Founder of USDT0

Omnichain, Multi-Asset Liquidity: Now Available on Polygon

The multichain future demands unified liquidity. And with this integration, Polygon now natively  supports both USDT and XAUt in their most accessible, efficient form. Whether you're building a new DeFi protocol or a next-gen RWA platform, Polygon now offers seamless access to the two most important stable assets in crypto.

As USDT0 and XAUt0 expand across apps and ecosystems, their native deployment on Polygon ensures the ecosystem is a nexus of onchain activity, whether it involves cross-chain capital flows or more complex DeFi integrations. Liquidity has never been this seamless, and one of the most important ecosystems in modern finance now has unified liquidity  for the world’s most popular stablecoin and the most trusted store of value.