Question 1

Transaction stuck pending

Accepted Answer

You set a gas fee below what the network is currently accepting, so validators keep skipping your transaction. It is queued, not lost. Fix: 1. Open the transaction in your wallet activity and look for Speed Up. That resubmits the same transaction with a higher fee. 2. If there is no Speed Up button, use Cancel. That sends a zero value transaction to yourself using the same nonce, which replaces the stuck one. 3. If your wallet offers neither, send a new transaction to your own address with the same nonce and a much higher gas price. The nonce is the key: two transactions cannot share one. 4. Check the current network fee on a gas tracker before you retry, so the replacement is actually above it.

Question 2

Transaction failed but the gas was still taken

Accepted Answer

Gas pays validators for the computation they performed. They performed it, the contract rejected the result, and the work still happened. This is how the network is designed rather than a fault. Fix: 1. Open the transaction on the block explorer and read the revert reason. It usually names the actual problem. 2. For a swap, the usual cause is slippage: the price moved past your tolerance while the transaction was in flight. Raise slippage slightly and retry. 3. For a token with a transfer tax, slippage must exceed the tax or every swap reverts. 4. For an NFT mint, the supply probably sold out while your transaction was queued.

Question 3

Token is not showing in my wallet

Accepted Answer

Wallets only display tokens they know about. If the token is not on the wallet’s list, you have to add it by contract address. The balance was always there. Fix: 1. Check the address on the block explorer for that chain first, to confirm the tokens genuinely arrived. 2. Copy the contract address from the explorer or from the project’s official site. Never from a Telegram message or a reply on X. 3. In your wallet choose Import tokens or Add custom token, paste the contract address, and the symbol and decimals fill in automatically. 4. Confirm you are on the right network. Tokens on Base do not appear while the wallet is set to Ethereum.

Question 4

I sent tokens to the wrong network

Accepted Answer

Most EVM addresses are identical across chains, so the funds usually did arrive. They are sitting at your address on a different chain. Fix: 1. Search your address on the explorer for the chain you actually sent to. If the balance is there, you still control it. 2. Add that network to your wallet, then add the token by contract address to make it visible. 3. You will need a small amount of that chain’s native gas token to move anything. Send yourself a little first. 4. Bridge the tokens back if you want them on the original chain.

Question 5

My swap keeps failing

Accepted Answer

Usually slippage, a transfer tax, thin liquidity, or a missing approval. The DEX interface rarely tells you which. Fix: 1. Check you have approved the token for the router first. Selling a token requires an approval transaction before the swap. 2. Raise slippage in small steps. If the token charges a transfer tax, slippage must be above that tax. 3. Reduce the trade size. Thin liquidity means a large order moves the price past your tolerance on its own. 4. Try a different route or aggregator. Sometimes the pool the interface picked is simply too shallow.

Question 6

Not enough gas, but I have plenty of tokens

Accepted Answer

Fees are always paid in the chain’s native coin, never in the token you are moving. USDC on Ethereum needs ETH. Anything on Cronos needs CRO. Anything on BNB Chain needs BNB. Fix: 1. Identify the native coin for the chain you are on. 2. Send a small amount of it to the same address, from an exchange or another wallet. 3. Wait for it to arrive, then retry.

Question 7

How to check and revoke token approvals

Accepted Answer

Using a DEX grants that contract permission to spend a token, often unlimited and forever. If that contract is later exploited, the permission is still live. Fix: 1. Go to revoke.cash or the Token Approvals tab on the block explorer for your chain. 2. Connect your wallet, or just paste your address to look without connecting. 3. Review every approval. Anything you do not recognise or no longer use should go. 4. Click Revoke and confirm. Each revoke is its own transaction and costs gas.

Question 8

My wallet has been drained

Accepted Answer

Almost always a malicious approval you signed, a fake site, or a compromised seed phrase. Move first and work out which afterwards. Fix: 1. Assume the seed phrase is compromised. Create a brand new wallet, ideally on a different device. 2. Move anything of value to the new wallet immediately, starting with the most valuable. You may be racing an automated script. 3. Do not send gas to the old wallet expecting to rescue things slowly. Sweeper bots take it within seconds. 4. For a hardware wallet where the seed was never typed anywhere, revoke the malicious approval instead and keep the wallet. 5. Check the drainer transaction on the explorer to learn which approval or site did it, so you do not repeat it.

Question 9

My bridge transfer is stuck

Accepted Answer

Bridges are two transactions. The second one may be waiting on confirmations, or may need you to claim it manually. Fix: 1. Confirm the source transaction succeeded on the source chain explorer. 2. Go back to the bridge interface with the same wallet connected. Many bridges have a Claim step that people miss entirely. 3. Check the bridge’s own status page or explorer using your source transaction hash. 4. Give it time. Some bridges settle in seconds, others wait for finality and take twenty minutes or more. 5. If it is still missing after the stated window, open a support ticket with the source transaction hash.

Question 10

My wallet will not connect to a site

Accepted Answer

Usually a stale session, a second wallet extension fighting for the same slot, or the site expecting a different chain. Fix: 1. Disconnect the site inside your wallet, refresh the page, and connect again. 2. Disable any other wallet extensions. Two extensions competing to be the browser wallet breaks both. 3. Switch to the chain the site actually wants before connecting. 4. Clear the site’s cached connection, or try a private window. 5. On mobile, use the wallet’s built in browser rather than Safari or Chrome.

Question 11

Nonce too low, or a nonce error

Accepted Answer

The nonce is a counter of transactions from your address. Your wallet’s idea of the count has drifted from the network’s, usually after a stuck or cancelled transaction. Fix: 1. In MetaMask, go to Settings, Advanced, then Clear activity tab data. This resets the local count and touches nothing on chain. 2. Refresh and retry. 3. If it persists, check the explorer for a pending transaction from your address and clear that one first.

Question 12

Gas fees are too high to do anything

Accepted Answer

Ethereum mainnet fees rise with demand. At busy times a small trade genuinely is not economic. Fix: 1. Check a gas tracker and wait. Fees swing enormously across the day, and weekends are usually cheaper. 2. Use a layer 2 such as Base, Arbitrum or Optimism, where the same swap costs cents. 3. Batch what you can. One transaction that does several things beats several transactions. 4. Set a lower priority fee if you are not in a hurry, but expect it to take longer.

Crypto problems and the fixes that actually work