← All articles · September 2026 · 3 min read
Prediction Market Alternatives: 6 Ways to Track Forecasts
You do not need a market to forecast well. Forecasting platforms, team methods, and personal logs — what each is good for.
What Prediction Markets Do Well
In a prediction market, people trade contracts that pay out if an event happens, and the price can be read as the crowd's probability. The Iowa Electronic Markets, run by the University of Iowa since 1988, are the best-studied example; a 2008 study by Joyce Berg, Forrest Nelson and Thomas Rietz found that their prices were more often closer to final election results than the polls taken at the same time. Commercial markets such as Kalshi and Polymarket now list questions on politics, economics and more.
But markets are not for every situation. Real-money markets are regulated differently from country to country and the rules have been changing; they need enough traders to work; and they answer the questions the market lists, not the ones your team cares about. If you want to improve your own forecasting or your team's planning, there are simpler options.
1. Forecasting Platforms (No Money)
Metaculus and Good Judgment Open let you forecast on public questions, aggregate everyone's forecasts, and score you when questions resolve. They are the closest thing to a market without trading, and they give you a track record against other forecasters. Limitation: you forecast on their questions, and your record lives on their platform.
2. Play-Money Markets
Platforms such as Manifold run markets with play money, and anyone can create a question. They keep the price mechanism and much of the fun without financial risk. Limitation: when nothing real is at stake, some participants trade less carefully, so treat thin markets with caution.
3. Independent Team Estimates
Ask several people to estimate the same number independently, then take the median. In 1907 Francis Galton reported that the median of about 800 guesses of an ox's weight at a country fair was within 1% of the true weight. The key word is independently: if people see each other's estimates first, or the boss speaks first, the errors stop cancelling out. Use a form, reveal the answers together, then discuss the outliers.
4. The Delphi Method
Developed at the RAND Corporation in the 1950s, Delphi runs several anonymous rounds: experts give estimates and reasons, see a summary of the group's answers, and revise. It is slower than a quick poll but useful for long-range questions where you want reasoning, not just a number.
5. A Personal or Team Forecast Log
For your own questions — revenue next quarter, launch dates, hiring outcomes — a simple log is often the best tool. Record the question, the probability, the deadline and the resolution source, then score with a Brier score or a calibration table. Review every quarter. It costs nothing and it teaches you where your judgment is good and where it is not.
6. A Timestamped Record for the Calls That Matter
A log you control can be edited, so it does not convince outsiders. When you want to be able to show later exactly what you predicted and when — to investors, a client, or an audience — you need a record nobody can change. icalledit.io writes a SHA-256 hash of your written prediction into its own Bitcoin transaction and gives you a PDF certificate and a proof.json file that anyone can verify without us. It is not a market and it does not score or resolve predictions; it complements your log for the few calls you want to prove. $19 per registration, one-time.
Which One Should You Use?
Want a scored public track record on general questions: a forecasting platform. Want market-style prices without money: a play-money market. Planning inside a team: independent estimates or Delphi, recorded in a shared log. Improving your own judgment: a personal log with regular scoring. Needing to prove a specific call later: add a timestamp. Most people who get good at forecasting combine two of these: a log for practice and something public or tamper-evident for the record.
A timestamp proves that content existed at a point in time. It is not legal advice, a patent, a trademark or a copyright registration. Compare the options.