TON Liquid Staking Explained: How to Stake Gram

Liquid staking lets you earn TON staking rewards without locking up your position. Here’s how it works on TON, and how to stake Gram with KTON.

Updated June 2026 · By KTON

What is liquid staking?

Staking is how proof-of-stake networks like TON stay secure. Validators lock up the network’s asset as collateral to process blocks, and earn rewards in return. Normally, staked assets are locked for the duration of a validation cycle, so you can’t move, sell, or use them while they’re earning.

Liquid staking removes that trade-off. When you stake through a liquid staking protocol, you receive a liquid staking token (LST) in return. The LST is a transferable token that represents your staked position and the rewards it accrues. You keep earning staking rewards, and you also hold a liquid asset you can transfer or trade rather than waiting out a lock-up.

How staking works on TON

On TON, validation happens in cycles. Validators are elected for each cycle and must put up a stake. At the end of the cycle, stakes and rewards are returned and a new election runs. Solo validating requires running infrastructure and a large minimum stake, which is impractical for most holders.

Nominator (staking) pools let smaller holders contribute to a validator’s stake and share rewards. The contributed assets are still locked for the cycle, though, and you have to manage entering and exiting rounds yourself.

Liquid staking sits on top of this: the protocol handles validator participation and the staking cycle for you, and hands you an LST so your position stays liquid the whole time. Instead of tracking election rounds, choosing a pool, and re-entering each cycle, you make one deposit and receive a token that keeps working in the background. The protocol pools deposits from many users, runs the validator infrastructure, and folds rewards back in for everyone, which is why liquid staking has become the most common way for ordinary holders to participate.

How to stake Gram with KTON

KTON is the institutional-grade liquid staking protocol on TON. The team has run public TON staking pools since 2022 (starting with TonStake), and the KTON V2 protocol launched in 2025 as a publicly-audited TonCore LST V2. Staking takes a few minutes:

1. Open the KTON app. Go to app.kton.io and connect your wallet. KTON supports staking from most TON wallets: any wallet that supports TON Connect can connect and stake, including Tonkeeper, MyTonWallet, Wallet in Telegram, and OKX. You can also use the KTON Telegram Mini App.
2. Stake Gram. Deposit Gram into the KTON staking pool. A minimum of 1 Gram is required.
3. Receive KTON. You instantly receive KTON, a liquid staking token that represents your staked Gram and accrues staking rewards automatically as the KTON/Gram exchange rate rises.
4. Hold or exit. Keep KTON to keep earning. The recommended way out is to unstake through the protocol: you return KTON, an NFT receipt is issued and burnt automatically, and your Gram is released once the current validation round finalizes, so the wait can be up to about 36 hours (one validation round). If you genuinely cannot wait for the round, a KTON/Gram pair also exists on STON.fi, a TON DEX, as an emergency option, but its on-chain liquidity is thin, so it suits only small amounts and is not the recommended way to exit.

KTON’s rewards auto-compound, so there is no manual claiming or restaking. KTON does not charge a separate deposit or withdrawal fee beyond the usual TON network gas, but the protocol takes a 16% governance fee on staking rewards (a commission on the yield, not on your principal); the APY shown is already net of it.

What about fees and unstaking?

KTON does not charge a separate deposit or withdrawal fee beyond the usual TON network gas, but the protocol takes a 16% governance fee on staking rewards (a commission on the yield routed to the protocol Treasury, not a charge on your principal). The APY shown is already net of this fee. When you stake or unstake, your wallet attaches a small amount of Gram (about 1.15 Gram) of network gas to cover the transaction, and any unused portion is refunded to your wallet. The minimum stake is 1 Gram, so you want about 2.15 Gram in your wallet to cover the stake plus gas.

The recommended way to get your Gram back is to unstake through the protocol. You return KTON, the protocol issues an NFT receipt, and that receipt is burnt automatically. Your Gram is released once the current validation round finalizes, so the wait can be up to about 36 hours (one validation round); it can be faster if you unstake near the end of a round. Keep the NFT receipt until the withdrawal completes.

KTON keeps essentially all staked Gram working with validators rather than reserving an idle buffer for instant withdrawals. That is a deliberate design choice: full deployment means more of your Gram is actually earning instead of sitting idle as a withdrawal buffer, which is how KTON pursues the highest possible staking yield and capital efficiency. The trade-off is that unstaking is not instant. KTON does not offer instant-unstake, so you wait out the cycle. If you genuinely cannot wait, a KTON/Gram pair exists on STON.fi, a TON DEX, as an emergency option, but its on-chain liquidity is thin, so it suits only small amounts and is not the recommended way to exit.

Is TON liquid staking safe?

Liquid staking adds smart-contract risk on top of normal staking risk, so the security of the protocol matters. KTON’s contracts have been audited by TonBit, a primary security assurance provider in the TON ecosystem, and KTON is the first publicly-audited TonCore LST V2. The contracts are open-source and verifiable, and validators are monitored 24/7. You can read the full audit report and review the open-source contracts on GitHub.

As with any on-chain product, only stake what you understand, and review the audit and documentation first.

KTON is built on a TON staking lineage dating to 2022, and a key part of its honest liquidity story is what happens when you want to exit. KTON is genuinely a liquid staking token in the way that matters: you receive KTON the moment you stake, it stays transferable, and it keeps earning the whole time you hold it, so you are never locked into managing per-cycle rounds yourself the way a nominator-pool depositor is. When you want your Gram back, the recommended path is to unstake through the protocol, which releases your Gram once the current validation round finalizes, so the wait can be up to about 36 hours (one validation round). A KTON/Gram pair also exists on STON.fi, a TON DEX, but only as an emergency option for anyone who cannot wait for the round: its on-chain liquidity is thin, so it suits only small amounts and is not the recommended way to exit. That pair is also KTON’s only DeFi venue. KTON is not used for lending, yield farming, or as collateral, so the token is tradable there rather than spread across lending markets or yield farms.

Why choose liquid staking over locked staking?

• Liquidity: your capital isn’t frozen. You hold a transferable LST the whole time, it keeps earning while you hold it, and the recommended way to exit is to unstake through the protocol (your Gram is released once the current validation round finalizes, so the wait can be up to about 36 hours, one validation round). A thin KTON/Gram pair on STON.fi exists only as an emergency hatch, not a primary exit.
• Broad wallet support: stake from most TON wallets through TON Connect, so you can use the wallet you already have.
• No round management: the protocol handles validator participation and cycles for you.
• Auto-compounding: rewards reinvest automatically, with no manual claiming or restaking. The protocol takes a 16% governance fee on staking rewards, and the APY shown is already net of it.

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