Introducing Solana Activity Monitor: What Drove User Activity on January 26th, 2024?

What applications and users drove Solana user growth yesterday?

Using the Artemis Activity Monitor, we see that in the last 24 hours, DeFi and Token Transfers drove a significant amount of active addresses: DeFi users went from 178k on Thursday, January 25th to 400k users on Friday, January 26th. Similiary, Token Transfer Active Addresses grew 3x from ~55k on Thursday to 167x on Friday.

It's worth noting that 37% of the daily active addresses yesterday were new-- they could be new wallets and organic users coming to Solana or bots opening new wallets and hence new addresses to take advantage of the Jupiter or $WEN airdrop (read on more below on why it doesn't really matter given eligibility requirements for both airdrops)

The application that drove most of the new active addresses yesterday? By taking a look at the applications table below we find that it's Jupiter -- the DEX aggregator on Solana which is having of the most widely anticipated airdrops on January 31st, 2024

We see that over 520k active addresses interacted with Jupiter's smart contracts by mostly returning users (62%) vs new users (38%)

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It is worth noting that the the average gas consumed per user on Jupiter (total gas paid on Jupiter / total Jupiter daily active addresses) was roughly $0.3 versus on Solana overall it was $0.49. Ethereum as a benchmark had an average gas consumed per user of $13.55. The lower gas fees on Solana makes for a much easier chain to facilitate more transactions.

Why was there more activity on Jupiter yesterday?

In short, the $WEN airdrop and anticipation for the $JUP airdrop.

For context:

• At its peak, over 117k+ addresses were active at the same time yesterday according to Stepn Finance during the Airdrop‍
• Phantom shared performance issues due to the massive activity around the WEN airdrop
• On Jupiter, there were large amounts of swaps (52.7m) yesterday between SOL-USDC and ~$48m of WEN to SOL and USDC in trading volume. Source: Dune Dashboard build by @ilemi

Our best guess on what drove token transfer volume (non-SOL related transfers so think $WEN transfers between wallets / smart contracts) and swaps on Jupiter yesterday are:

1. ‍Folks looking to buy $WEN on Jupiter (or sell): given the price run up for $WIF and $BONK, traders may want to position for another price run-up.‍
2. Folks aiming to farm the $WEN airdrop and Jupiter airdrop: However it's worth noting that actions taken yesterday don't affect airdrop eligibility for either tokens:

• The $WEN airdrop eligibility requires up to $5 swapped in the last 6 months up until Jan 19th, 2024 so any actions taken post-Jan 19th don't affect airdrop eligibility or amount since the airdrop was evenly distributed per qualified wallet. (Source: https://lfg.jup.ag/wen)
• The $JUP airdrop eligibility requires actions taken before November 2nd, 2023 (source @phantom) so any actions taken after don't affect airdrop eligibility.

Conclusion

There's a question by both institutional investors and protocols of what will ultimately drive the next wave of crypto users.

Phantom shared in its 2023 Year in Review that over 600,000 installs took place after Breakpoint so in the 3 months between September 2023 - December 2023 which also coincided with Solana's price rising, the FTX trial ending, and the $JTO airdrop

It seems that meme coins like $WIF $BONK $WEN and the anticipation of airdrops clearly play a role in drawing net new users as we've seen in the number of new active address growth in mid December and January 26th.

We hope Artemis Activity Monitor will help as you look to investigate which apps ultimately draw in the next wave of users and potentially even long-term and enduring users. We will continue to improve our platform to help investors, protocols, and analysts better understand these questions. Stay tuned for what's to come.

Disclaimer: The authors, affiliates, or stakeholders of Artemis may hold interests in the tokens or protocols mentioned in this content. This disclosure highlights potential conflicts of interest and is not an endorsement to buy or invest in any specific token or protocol. The content is for educational and informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice in any form. Readers should approach this information cautiously and consider their unique circumstances before making investment decisions. The views and opinions expressed are subject to change without notice, and Artemis bears no liability for any loss or damage arising from the use of this information.