Understanding how an auction is structured is essential to understanding how it behaves.
Different auction formats create different buyer experiences, different seller controls, and different governance requirements. A live auction works differently from a timed auction. A hybrid auction introduces a different transition between bidding and approval. A tender or sealed bid process introduces different rules around confidentiality, deadline, and manual review.
This section explains the main auction structures used across online and hybrid auction environments, along with the shared terms that shape how those auctions run in practice.
Whether you are trying to understand auction formats, bidding mechanics, closing rules, or approval workflows, the pages below explain the definitions clearly and show how these models work in the real world.
Live auctions are real-time sales led by an auctioneer, often supported by a clerk, where bids are accepted and acknowledged as the lot is offered.
Topics covered include webcast auctions, room bidding, online participation, and the governance of live auction events.
Timed auctions allow bidders to place bids over a defined bidding window, with each lot closing according to configured closing rules rather than an auctioneer’s live call.
Topics covered include soft close, popcorn bidding, cascading lot closing, bid extensions, maximum bids, quick bids, and sequential lot closing behaviour.
Hybrid auctions combine timed bidding behaviour with a live auction event or approval process, allowing bids to be captured digitally before the final result is confirmed through a live or manual governance layer.
Topics covered include pre-bidding, live transition, manual close, and how captured bids may remain pending approval until reviewed lot by lot.
Infinite auctions are an auction type where the lot does not move toward a conventional fixed closing point in the same way as a scheduled timed auction.
Topics covered include always-on auction environments, differences between timed and infinite formats, and the governance rules that apply when lots remain open within an ongoing auction structure.
Reverse auctions work differently from traditional seller-led auctions. Instead of buyers bidding upward to purchase a lot, suppliers or participants compete by improving their offer downward.
Topics covered include procurement-style bidding, commercial comparison, and how reverse auction logic differs from standard auction behaviour.
Tender and sealed bid auctions use confidential or deadline-based submission processes rather than open visible bidding.
Topics covered include sealed bids, tender formats, best-and-final offers, manual close, and how results may remain pending until formally reviewed and approved.
