How withdrawals work

Level: Beginner → Intermediate · Read time: 9 min

Withdrawal behaviour depends on the vault. The vault page in the Concrete app says which model applies. There are three.

1. Atomic vault - instant

withdraw() / redeem() deallocates from strategies (in a configured order), burns your shares and sends assets in one transaction. Suits strategies whose liquidity is always available on-chain.

2. Queued withdrawal vault - epochs (most common)

Used where strategies involve off-chain custody or slower unwinds.

Request ──► Epoch collects requests ──► Cutoff ──► Process ──► Claim
 (shares       (you may cancel             (locked)   (price fixed,   (assets
  held by       until cutoff)                          shares burned,  arrive in
  vault)                                               assets reserved) wallet)

Submit on the vault's Withdraw tab. Your shares are held by the vault and join the current epoch.
Cutoff. The epoch closes at a scheduled time. Cancel only before it; after that you are locked in and a new epoch opens.
Process. Shortly after the cutoff, the share price is locked at processing time (not request time), shares are burned and assets are reserved - first from idle balance, then by the Allocator deallocating from strategies.
Claim. Status moves Queued → Processing → Available; click Claim. Several ready epochs can be claimed together.

Withdrawal caps

Some vaults limit each epoch to a percentage of TVL. If requests exceed the cap, the remainder rolls to later epochs in FIFO order, and you keep earning until your portion is processed.

Example (from the docs' pattern): weekly processing, 20% cap. A request submitted on a Friday joins the next Tuesday's epoch; if under the cap, funds are claimable a few days later. If over the cap, you're served in submission order across later epochs.

Cooldowns

Some vaults add a withdrawal cooldown: shares from each deposit only become withdrawable/transferable after that deposit's cooldown ends (each deposit has its own clock). Early exit, where allowed, may cost a fee paid in shares (0-1%, decaying toward expiry). Cooldown applies in addition to queues and caps.

Things to know

Not instant: expect a delay set by epoch cadence + unwind time (the WBTC vault card showed a 21-day queue at snapshot time).
Final amount = share price at processing, so it can move between request and settlement.
Each vault has minimum and maximum withdrawal sizes.
Requests can roll over when caps bind or processing is delayed.

3. Pre-deposit (cross-chain) vault - claim, not queue

Used for launch campaigns: you deposit on a source chain, the vault locks, assets bridge to the target chain, and you claim shares there through LayerZero messaging. You need control of the same address on the destination chain and enough native token on the source chain for the fee. See Campaigns & pre-deposits.

Priority withdrawals (advanced footnote)

Async vaults have a privileged PRIORITY_WITHDRAWAL_EXECUTOR that can fast-track a payout against the active epoch at grossAssets − unwindCost, with unwindCost capped by an admin setting (default 500 bps, ceiling 10,000 bps). It is a trusted operational role, not an automatic user feature. See Async withdrawals deep dive.

Next: 06 · Fees.