examples

Examples

Runnable examples demonstrating the pykalshi library.

Setup

1. Install the library:

   pip install pykalshi

2. Create a .env file with your Kalshi API credentials:

   KALSHI_API_KEY_ID=your-key-id
   KALSHI_PRIVATE_KEY_PATH=/path/to/private-key.key
   

   Get your API key from kalshi.com → Account & Security → API Keys.

Examples

File	Description
basic_usage.py	Browse markets, check balance, view positions
stream_orderbook.py	Real-time WebSocket streaming
place_order.py	Place, modify, and cancel orders
momentum_bot.py	Simple momentum trading bot

Running

python examples/basic_usage.py
python examples/stream_orderbook.py
python examples/place_order.py

Demo Environment

For testing without real money, use Kalshi's demo environment. Create credentials at demo.kalshi.com, then set up .env:

KALSHI_API_KEY_ID=your-demo-key-id
KALSHI_PRIVATE_KEY_PATH=/path/to/demo-private-key.pem

client = KalshiClient.from_env(demo=True)

Ticker Hierarchy

Kalshi organizes contracts as Series → Events → Markets. You can read the tickers directly from any Kalshi URL:

https://kalshi.com/markets/kxpresperson/pres-person/kxpresperson-28
                        ─────────────  ──────────  ──────────────
                        series_ticker     slug     event_ticker

• Series (KXPRESPERSON) — a category of related events (e.g., "Presidential Person")
• Event (KXPRESPERSON-28) — a specific question, often with multiple markets
• Market (KXPRESPERSON-28-JOSS) — a single yes/no contract you can trade

The middle URL segment is a display slug — not used in the API. Market tickers aren't in the URL; find them through the event:

# Top-down
series = client.get_series("KXPRESPERSON")
events = client.get_events(series_ticker="KXPRESPERSON")
event  = client.get_event("KXPRESPERSON-28")
markets = client.get_markets(event_ticker="KXPRESPERSON-28")

# Bottom-up
market = client.get_market("KXPRESPERSON-28-JOSS")
event  = market.get_event()
series = event.get_series()

Tickers are case-insensitive — "kxpresperson-28" and "KXPRESPERSON-28" both work.