Gasless transfer
Transferring a TON asset without holding TON to pay gas. The gas is paid by a relayer (taking a fee in the transferred jetton); the user just signs the message.
Aliases: gasless, sponsored transaction
Gasless transfer is the pattern where a user sends a jetton or TON without needing TON on the balance to pay gas. The real gas is paid by a relayer, which collects its reward from the transferred jetton (e.g., USDT).
Why it exists
The big UX pain point on TON and any account-abstraction blockchain: “I have USDT but no TON, so I can’t send it.” Gasless solves this — the relayer spends TON, keeps an equivalent in USDT, and the sender doesn’t even know gas exists.
How it’s implemented on TON
- Wallet V5 introduced the extension mechanism, which the relayer uses to add its own messages to the user’s action list.
- TON Connect 2.x supports gasless intents: the DApp sends an intent to the relayer provider, which builds an extended action for the user’s wallet to sign.
- Tonkeeper and MyTonWallet have shipped gasless USDT in their UI since 2024-2025.
The price of convenience
The relayer takes a small premium (~$0.05-0.10) in USDT per transfer. If you have TON on the balance, a direct transfer is cheaper.