 Solana revenues outpace Ethereum, L2s despite market dip 
2025-02-11
Category: None

The Solana network continues to generate more revenue than Ethereum despite a cooling cryptocurrency market and a slowdown in retail trading activity, according to data from DefiLlama. 
The outperformance is even more pronounced among the networks’ applications, with revenues from Solana apps exceeding rival Ethereum apps by as much as ten-fold, crypto researcher Aylo noted in a Feb. 10 post on the X platform. 
Solana’s strength holds even after factoring in Ethereum’s layer-2 scaling chains (L2s), which host a large portion of the network’s trading activity, the researcher noted. 
“You can plug in any L2 you want and add it on top and it doesn’t make any difference right now,” Aylo said. Solana generated over $8.4 million in revenue on Feb. 9, while Ethereum's revenue stood at $875,571.
Ethereum’s top L2s are Arbitrum and Base, with roughly $14 billion and $11.5 billion in total value locked (TVL), respectively, according to data from L2Beat. 
Solana’s TVL continues to dramatically lag Ethereum’s, at $9.5 billion versus nearly $56.8 billion, according to data from DefiLlama. 
Memecoin frenzy 
The surge in Solana’s revenues has largely stemmed from increased memecoin trading, which was the driving force of the network’s decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem in 2024. 
According to Messari, a crypto research firm, Solana’s cumulative app revenue increased by 213% in the fourth quarter of 2024, primarily due to memecoin speculation.
Memecoin launchpad Pump.fun clocked $235 million in Q4 revenues, for a quarter-over-quarter increase of some 242%, Messari said. 
“Just like online gambling never ceases, neither will this gambling/speculation, whether you like it or not (people like to play unwinnable lotteries). Solana has captured one of crypto’s biggest use cases,” Aylo said. 
He added that “[t]his provides a baseline of solid metrics that supports SOL’s valuation,” which has grown at nearly double the pace of ETH’s since the start of 2024, according to data from TradingView. 
Despite the SOL token’s outperformance, “Solana is in a great position and nowhere near as overvalued as almost all other L1s/L2s,” according to Aylo. 