Solana Blockchain Beats Ethereum on Popularity Quotient, Memecoins Contribute

Crypto enthusiasts are seemingly taking advantage of the ongoing bull run, generating major activities across blockchain networks. The eco-friendly Solana blockchain, on the scale of most popular, has managed to defeat Ethereum in recent days. The credit for this goes to the frenzy of Solana-based NFTs and memecoins that have captured the attention of the members of the global Web3 community. As per data collected by Coinbase, in the last 24 hours alone the Solana blockchain saw transactions worth $11 billon (roughly Rs. 91,703 crore) with people purchasing small tokens and memecoins based on the network.

In a recently published analysis, CoinGecko ranked Solana number one on the list of most popular blockchains. As per its data, Solana commands 49.3 percent of global crypto investor interest.

Solana was launched in 2020 by Solana Labs, which was founded by Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal in 2018. At the time of its launch SOL, the native token of Solana was priced at $0.22 (roughly Rs. 18). Now, with the spike in Solana-based activities, the price of its token is also on a surge. This week, the price of the SOL token breached the mark of $200 (roughly Rs. 16,700) for the first time since its inception. After undergoing a slight price correction period, SOL is presently trading at $175 (roughly Rs. 14,600). In fact, in the last one year, the value of SOL has escalated by a remarkable 700 percent.

The Solana blockchain has reportedly managed to garner $150 million (roughly Rs. 1,252 crore) through the sale of memecoins like Bonk and Slerf. Subsequently, the transaction fees on Solana has also witnessed a spike in recent months despite the blockchain being famous for having comparatively cheaper gas fee charges.

“Solana has shown immense strength. The total trading volume of DEXes also has been largely skewed towards SOL with a total volume of more than $6 billion (roughly Rs. 50,190 crore) on the Solana chain in the last 24 hours; it has been only close to $2.1 billion (roughly Rs. 17,566 crore) in the case of Ethereum. Memecoin mania is the biggest driver of the on-chain trading that we are seeing today,” the CoinSwitch Markets Desk told Gadgets360.

As far as Ethereum is concerned, the blockchain did undergo an important update called Dencun earlier this year. On the sidelines of this, the Ethereum blockchain has secured the second rank on the most popular blockchains list compiled by CoinGecko. Ethereum holds 12.73 percent of the global traffic share between January 1 and March 18, 2024.

“This is likely because Ethereum is already well-established as an ecosystem and familiar to investors, such that it is no longer considered a new, trending crypto narrative,” the analysis noted.

The BNB Chain, Cosmos, Avalanche, and Arbitrum secured ranks third to sixth on CoinGecko's list.