Solana and Hyperliquid led crypto economic activity in 2025

Solana is the leading chain for yearly revenues, as the chain carried several of the most prominent trends for the year. Hyperliqid’s native chain came second, with $816M in revenues. 

For 2025, Solana locked in $1.3B in generated revenues, becoming the leader in the most active on-chain economies. Solana went through several leading trends over the past 12 months, including a highly active meme season, AI agent creation, as well as DeFi in the latter part of the year. 

For more than seven months, Solana also led other chains in terms of app revenues, reflecting real-world usage. The exact numbers on Solana revenues differ, but the chain is among the top revenue producers from app usage. 

Over some months in 2025, Solana passed Ethereum’s economic activity, with more users, transactions, and apps. However, Ethereum still holds more value and settles larger sums based on its DeFi liquidity.

Solana becomes the leading all-purpose chain

Solana even passed Base, which was always pushing for more low-cost apps and seamless on-chain activity. Base is ranked seventh, with $76.4M in annual revenues. The latest Cryptorank data show a shift in chain rankings, as legacy networks were almost forgotten. Apps switched to a new set of chains. 

Even the most active Ethereum and BNB Chain fell to positions 4 and 5. Ethereum achieved $524M in yearly revenues, while BNB Chain locked in $257M. The year 2025 marked a watershed for crypto platforms, where usage shifted from novelty and hype to established products. 

This also led to more predictable revenues from apps, with clear leaders emerging on the most active chains. The leading chains for 2025 also relied on app adoption, instead of only airdrop farming or incentives. Apps on Solana became key infrastructure and went beyond just novelty or point-farming hubs.

Previous leaders from the past years, including Avalanche, Filecoin, and TON, did not re-enter the top 10 of the best revenue producers. The rankings showed a shift of apps to a new selection of L1 chains and L2, for both general and specialized usage. The EdgeX chain became a part of the top 10 based on its native DEX performance. Axelar, Bittensor, and Optimism joined the top 10 based on one or two outperforming leading apps. 

Hyperliquid ends its most active year

Hyperliquid ended its most active year, when it emerged as a first mover, and as a leader after the creation of several competing perpetual futures DEXs. 

The DEX drew in a total of $3.87B in deposits, with over 609K new users joining the platform. Based on the DEX self-reported results, the native HyperCore chain achieved over $908M in annual revenues.

Over $848M came from the main activity in trading perpetual futures. The top 100 whales spent $5.7M on gas fees going to the protocol’s reserves. Hyperliquid became one of the platforms with predictable revenues as a result of maturing crypto markets. 

Builders on the Hyperliquid ecosystem shared the revenues, with over $46M received for the past year. The platform also raised additional revenues from ticker auctions, with nearly $1M in fees for the GOD ticker.

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