Coldkey Swap Announcement Delay
Coldkey swap announcement delay is a network-global setting, listed in the documentation as
ColdkeySwapAnnouncementDelay, that defines the duration in blocks of the waiting period before a
coldkey swap can finalize. The reference documents a default of 36,000 blocks, which the coldkey
swap documentation describes as roughly five days
(Subnet Hyperparameters,
Rotate or Swap your Coldkey).
What It Controls
The setting sizes the mandatory delay between announcing a coldkey swap and completing it. A coldkey swap migrates a wallet’s full on-chain identity to a new coldkey, and the owner first announces the swap on chain, which locks the wallet against transfers and staking. This delay is how long that pending window lasts before finalization (Rotate or Swap your Coldkey).
The waiting window is part of the security design rather than incidental latency. It prevents a compromised key from continuing to move balances or stake during recovery and gives observers time to notice an unexpected swap announcement, during which the swap can be disputed but not completed (Rotate or Swap your Coldkey).
Reannouncing Has Its Own Delay
Clearing or reannouncing a pending swap is also time-gated. The coldkey swap documentation states that a swap can be reannounced only after a separate reannouncement delay has passed, which by default is 7,200 blocks (about one day) after the initial announcement delay period expires (Rotate or Swap your Coldkey).
Scope and Permission
Coldkey swap announcement delay is a global value rather than a per-subnet hyperparameter, so the
same window applies network-wide rather than being tuned per netuid. The documentation groups it
with variables configured under root permission and changed through the
sudo_set_coldkey_swap_announcement_delay extrinsic
(Subnet Hyperparameters).
The constants reference exposes both windows as startup values. The announcement delay is
api.consts.subtensorModule.initialColdkeySwapAnnouncementDelay, listed as 36000, and the
reannouncement delay is api.consts.subtensorModule.initialColdkeySwapReannouncementDelay, listed
as 7200. At 12-second blocks those initial spans correspond to about five days and one day; each
names the launch value, while the live ColdkeySwapAnnouncementDelay and
ColdkeySwapReannouncementDelay storage values are the root-settable values the network uses after
launch
(Subtensor Constants: initialColdkeySwapAnnouncementDelay,
Subtensor Constants: initialColdkeySwapReannouncementDelay).
Because it is global, the live value is chain state that can differ from the documented default, so current figures belong in references and live chain state rather than being assumed fixed (Bittensor Networks).
Distinction from Coldkey Swap
Coldkey swap is the staged operation that migrates a wallet’s on-chain identity to a new coldkey. Coldkey swap announcement delay is the setting that sizes the pending window inside that operation, so the swap is the action while this value is how long its mandatory wait lasts (Rotate or Swap your Coldkey).
- Coldkey swap — the staged migration of a wallet’s identity to a new coldkey.
- Coldkey swap announcement delay — the block-counted wait before that migration finalizes.
Distinction from Hotkey Swap
Hotkey swap rotates only the operational key under an unchanged coldkey owner. Coldkey swap announcement delay governs the timing of the heavier coldkey-identity migration, not operational-key rotation (Coldkey and Hotkey Workstation Security, Rotate or Swap your Coldkey).
- Hotkey swap — operational-key rotation under the same coldkey owner.
- Coldkey swap announcement delay — the wait before a full coldkey identity migration completes.
Distinction from the Announcement Fee
The documentation states a coldkey swap announcement requires a 0.1 TAO fee available in the source coldkey when the swap is announced. The announcement delay is a separate dimension: the fee is a cost paid to announce, while this delay is the time that must pass after announcing before the swap can finalize (Rotate or Swap your Coldkey).
- Announcement fee — 0.1 TAO that must be available to announce a swap.
- Coldkey swap announcement delay — the block-counted wait after announcing.
Reader Boundary
This page defines the concept at a high level. It does not report the live delay value in force, the status of any pending swap, or a step-by-step swap procedure. The block count can change on chain, so current figures should be checked against references and live chain state. The default of 36,000 blocks is the documented value, and the setting is global and root-controlled.