Pancakeswap is undoubtedly one of the largest decentralized exchanges. Built on the BNB Chain, it handles more than $80 million daily crypto asset trading.
With Pancakeswap, traders can buy and sell a wide range of cryptocurrencies using the smart contract-based platform. The DEX has gained popularity in the cryptocurrency community due to its fast transaction speeds and low fees, making it an attractive alternative to other DEXs.
One of the key features of PancakeSwap is its use of automated market makers (AMMs). AMMs are smart contracts that use algorithms to determine the prices at which trades can be executed. This allows PancakeSwap to operate without the need for traditional order books, which can be slower and more expensive to use.
In addition to its AMM-based trading platform, PancakeSwap also offers a number of other features that make it a useful tool for cryptocurrency traders.
Despite its popularity, Pancakeswap users occasionally encounter errors while using the platform, especially with the increasing number of daily transactions.
One of the common ones is the “cannot estimate gas” error. If you’ve encountered this error or just came across it, it’s a minor error that can arise for many reasons.
Regardless of the reason, this article will highlight some of the easiest ways to quickly fix the “cannot estimate gas” error on Pancakeswap.
Ways to fix “Cannot Estimate Gas” Error on Pancakeswap
Blockchain is a publicly decentralized distributed ledger technology. This allows users to control, maintain and make decisions over their network.
However, some people dedicate their time to maintaining a network and validating transactions. Their reward for doing this is the gas fees.
Gas is the fee a network user needs to successfully complete a transaction or execute a chain of smart commands. Fees are a small percentage of the transaction used to reward validators for verifying the legitimacy of a transaction.
Without the gas fee, a validator cannot pick up a transaction from the transaction pool. Hence, the transaction cannot be successfully verified.
On Pancakeswap, Cannot Estimate Gas simply means that the platform cannot estimate the amount of gas needed to execute a transaction or smart contract on the platform.
This error often leads to transaction failure and, as expected, can be very frustrating. When this occurs, users may see “The transaction cannot succeed due to error: cannot estimate gas; transaction may fail or may require manual gas limit.”
One of the reasons why this error message pops up is when the number of tokens you’re swapping has too many decimals.
Another reason can be because liquidity has been removed for the token or the sell function has been disabled. This is especially common with scam tokens or projects.
However, you can easily fix this error hassle-free by following the tips below:
1. Reduce the number and decimals of the token you want to swap
The first tip for getting rid of the error is to reduce the number of tokens you want to swap and remove all numbers after the decimal point.
Go to pancakeswap.finance/swap on your web browser. Click on CONNECT WALLET and choose your preferred wallet.
Sign the permission to link your wallet before going forward with the transaction. Once you connect your wallet, choose the tokens your want to swap, then:
- Reduce the number of tokens you want to trade
- Get rid of all decimal numbers after the whole number. Alternatively, you can change all decimal numbers to 00.
For instance, if you want to swap 138484.9497, replace all numbers after the decimal point (9497) with 0.
2. Adjust Slippage Tolerance
Another way to get rid of the Cannot Estimate Gas error is by adjusting your slippage tolerance. This means the price slippage you are willing to tolerate for a trade.
The slippage tolerance settings on Pancakeswap show the least amount of token you can accept if the price slips below or above the trade price.
Slippage tolerance differs with each token. Typically, some tokens cut up to 15% for slippage tolerance, while some go as low as 2%.
To adjust the slippage tolerance, click on the SETTINGS icon on the top right corner of the swap page.
Under SLIPPAGE TOLERANCE, select any higher slippage tolerance percentage or input higher tolerance in the space provided.
Finally, click on X from the top right corner of the SETTINGS tab to save your settings, and that’s all. Try increasing the slippage tolerance if the current one doesn’t work.
3. Increase Transaction Speed
Another setting that directly influences gas fees is the transaction speed that raises or decreases the GWEI.
The higher your transaction speed, the higher the GWEI, the higher the gas fees, and the higher the chance of success.
You can change the transaction speed between RPC DEFAULT, STANDARD, FAST and INSTANT in the SETTINGS tab of the Pancakeswap swap.
To increase transaction speed, click on the SETTINGS icon. Under DEFAULT TRANSACTION SPEED (GWEI), select FAST or INSTANT options if you don’t mind paying extra bucks for gas fees.
Conclusion
Pancakeswap remains the top go-to exchange for decentralized crypto trading on the BNB Chain. Like many exchanges and dApps, Pancakeswap users can encounter simple errors like the Cannot Estimate Gas error.
However, these errors are easy to fix. Meanwhile, the Pancakeswap team is working relentlessly to level the playing field and set industry standards for existing and upcoming dApps and exchanges.
If you’re stuck with the Cannot Estimate Gas error, this article has highlighted simple ways to easily fix the error.
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