The Activity list still shows Pending on an example send of 250 USDT, and you can wait, press Speed up, or press Cancel.

Speed up resubmits that same transfer at a higher fee. Cancel tries a different transaction on the same nonce. The network confirms only one of those versions.

Match the amount, the address, and the network on your own screen. The 250 USDT figure is only the example.

You pay the fee of whichever version the network confirms, and nothing on this page is a recommendation to replace, wait, or send again.

Why is the send still pending?

On Ethereum the payment stays unfinished until a validator includes the transaction. Until then MetaMask shows Pending. Ethereum’s transaction page describes that wait. MetaMask’s pending-transaction guide says part of the fee is a priority fee, a bid to be picked sooner. A low bid can leave the row waiting.

The fee is paid in ETH, even when the transfer is USDT. Planning gas is how you keep a little ETH beside the tokens.

Each send carries a nonce. MetaMask says the counter starts at 0 and rises by 1. Ethereum says each account can execute only one transaction per nonce. Etherscan says a lower nonce goes first, so an older pending send blocks later ones from that account.

What does a stuck nonce look like?

In the drawing, nonce 7 is the example 250 USDT send. Nonces 8 and 9 wait on it. MetaMask’s example says you cannot cancel nonce 10 before nonce 9. Speed up and Cancel reuse that stuck nonce and raise the fee.

Example nonce queue with one replacementNonce 7 · Send 250 USDTPending · fee too low · stuckNonce 8 · waiting on 7Nonce 9 · waiting on 7Replacement · nonce 7Same nonce, higher feeSpeed up or a 0-value cancelThe network confirms one nonce 7.The other copy is dropped.Nonces 8 and 9 can moveonly after that.
An example queue. Your nonce is the number on your own transaction, not 7.

How do you check the row before you change it?

  1. Quit the browser, open it again and unlock MetaMask. On a phone, close the app and reopen it. MetaMask asks for that restart first.
  2. Copy the hash. On Extension 13.30 or later, for Ethereum, Linea, BNB Smart Chain, Arbitrum, Base, and Polygon, open the Transaction submitted notice, then the detail view. That notice is extension-only. On the phone, open Activity and the Pending row.
  3. Open the explorer for that network. Ethereum mainnet uses Etherscan. Reading a block explorer covers the fields.
  4. Pending means you can still try a replacement. Success means the USDT already moved. If it landed on the wrong network, follow the wrong-network guide and leave Speed up alone. Picking the network is the check before the next send.
  5. Read the nonce in Activity, or on Etherscan under More details, then Other Attributes. Finding the nonce walks through both. Replace the smallest pending nonce from that address first.
  6. A missing hash can be Smart Transactions. MetaMask says the feature turns on automatically, charges no extra fee, and covers Ethereum Mainnet, Linea, Base, Arbitrum, BNB Smart Chain, Polygon, and Robinhood. A pending one might stay off a public explorer until it confirms.

Do not send another 250 USDT to the same address while this hash is pending. If the first send confirms, the second is a separate payment. Before the next send, read sending from self-custody.

When should you wait?

MetaMask lists waiting first. Leave the row if the payment can be late and the explorer still says Pending. The guide gives no count of minutes. It points you to Etherscan’s gas tracker. If the tracker moves back toward the bid you signed, the row can confirm without a new signature.

How do you speed the send up in MetaMask?

Read the new fee before you confirm. The replacement reuses the nonce, and you pay the higher fee on the copy the network confirms. Keep enough ETH in the account.

  1. Open the oldest pending nonce. A later row is only waiting behind it.
  2. On the phone, open Activity, open the Pending row, and tap Speed up. On Extension 13.30 or later, click Transaction submitted, open the detail view, and click Speed up.
  3. Check the recipient and the amount against the original send. Then confirm.

How do you cancel it?

While the row is pending, Cancel builds a 0 ETH send to your own address, on the same nonce. Etherscan describes that replacement. A confirmed transaction cannot be reversed. If the cancel confirms first, the example 250 USDT send is dropped and the tokens stay in the account. You still pay the cancel fee, in ETH. If the USDT send confirms first, the cancel drops and the tokens have left.

Etherscan’s dropped-and-replaced note says the assets and the gas in the dropped transaction are not taken. When several transactions share a nonce, the highest fee is usually the one included.

  1. On the phone, open the Pending row and tap Cancel. On Extension 13.30 or later, open the detail view from Transaction submitted and select Cancel.
  2. Read the fee on the confirmation.
  3. Confirm only if you want the original payment to lose. Then read the explorer.

How do you type the nonce yourself?

Use this when Speed up and Cancel are missing on the oldest pending row. A wrong nonce can queue another transaction behind the stuck one, or send the USDT a second time. Read the number on the explorer before you type.

MetaMask’s nonce article says the custom field stays hidden while Smart Transactions is on for Ethereum Mainnet, Base, Arbitrum, or BNB Smart Chain. Turn it off under Settings, then Transactions, and turn it back on after you submit. On the phone, use Speed up or Cancel in Activity, or set a custom nonce under Settings > Advanced.

  1. To speed the payment up, send the same amount to the same address. To cancel, send 0 ETH to your own address.
  2. On the extension review screen, turn on Show advanced details. Enter the pending nonce in Custom nonce.
  3. Open the pencil and choose Advanced. Set the gas limit comparable to the pending transaction, or slightly higher. Set the priority fee at least 10% higher. Set the max fee at least 30% higher. MetaMask’s illustration is 30 Gwei raised to 33 to 35 Gwei, and a 150 Gwei max fee moved toward 200 Gwei. Read the gas tracker, then use the numbers on your screen.
  4. Confirm.

What do you look for on the explorer afterward?

  • Success on the USDT transfer means the payment is done. The other hash should read Dropped & Replaced.
  • Success on the 0 ETH transfer to yourself means the cancel won. The USDT is still in the account. The fee on that row is what you paid.
  • Dropped, with no replacement in a block, means the pool let it go. Etherscan says this is more common when the network is busy, often because the fee was low. The tokens stay with the sender. Send again only after that hash is gone and no older nonce is still pending.
  • Failed means the network included the transaction and the transfer did not complete. MetaMask shows Transaction failed. Read the error before a new send.

What if the stuck payment is bitcoin?

A stuck bitcoin payment usually has a fee too low for miners to pick it up.

While the payment is still unconfirmed, replace-by-fee lets the sender broadcast a new transaction that spends at least one of the same inputs and pays more. BIP 125 describes the older opt-in signal. Bitcoin Core’s mempool policy says full replace-by-fee has been the default since version 28.0, and signaling is no longer required. A wallet may still show the bump only when the original was marked replaceable. Use the control in the wallet that signed.

Child-pays-for-parent spends an output of the unconfirmed parent and pays enough that a miner wants both. The Bitcoin wiki says the recipient can do this, and so can the sender when they still control the change.

Why does Tron usually skip the fee queue?

Tron’s transaction docs set an expiration on each transaction. The default is 60 seconds after the head block’s timestamp, and the node then drops it. Until the block is solidified, which typically takes about a minute, the transaction counts as pending.

A TRC-20 transfer spends Energy, and the bytes spend Bandwidth. The resource model says stake can cover both. Bandwidth has a free quota. Energy has no free quota. If Energy is still short, the call fails with OUT_OF_ENERGY. Tron’s error page says Energy already spent is not refunded. The caller’s fee_limit caps that Energy budget.

Speed up and Cancel, as MetaMask documents them, are the Ethereum replacement. Look the id up on Tronscan. If the receipt says the call ran out of Energy, the next attempt needs TRX or staked Energy.

What if an exchange says Processing?

That withdrawal sits in the exchange’s queue. The exchange holds the keys. Coinbase Exchange marks a withdrawal Pending while it is in progress, and Completed when the hash is provided. MetaMask cannot speed up a send it never signed.

Open support inside that company’s app or site. If their screen has a cancel control, use that one. Do not send the same 250 USDT again from a wallet you control.

What do you refuse while you wait?

Close any chat that offers to unstick the transaction and asks for your secret recovery phrase. MetaMask’s safety tips say MetaMask will never ask for that phrase, and the warning covers websites and apps. Spotting fake wallet apps is the longer note.

A site that calls itself a transaction accelerator and asks for the phrase, or for a private key, is making the same request. Change the fee in the wallet that already holds the keys.

Keep the hash. The explorer asks for it the next time you check.