In the second half of 2024 to September 2025, the cryptocurrency market experienced an unexpected 'track change' — the trading volume of decentralized exchanges (DEX) in the Solana ecosystem continued to rise, ultimately achieving a phased surpassing of Ethereum. According to authoritative data platforms such as DeFiLlama, Dune Analytics, and CoinDesk, as of September 7, 2025, the cumulative trading volume on Solana's DEX has exceeded Ethereum's level during the same period, with some monthly trading volumes even surpassing 30%. However, in stark contrast to the impressive data, the on-chain address activity shows a 'pulsating' characteristic, with over 96% of active addresses generating transactions only on a single day and then falling into silence the next day, leading to a core bottleneck in the ecological development due to user 'hit-and-run' phenomena.

1. The underlying logic behind the explosive trading volume of Solana DEX: the dual dividends of speed and cost.

The ability of Solana to achieve a 'curve-over-take' over Ethereum in the DEX track essentially lies in the precise match between its underlying architectural characteristics and market demand, rather than the natural maturity of its user ecosystem. Specifically, the core factors driving the surge in trading volume can be summarized in three points:

1. High throughput and instant finality, suitable for high-frequency trading scenarios.

Solana adopts a hybrid consensus mechanism of 'Proof of History (PoH) + Proof of Stake (PoS)', with theoretical TPS (transactions per second) reaching 65,000, while the actual on-chain processing speed remains stable at 2,000-3,000 TPS, far exceeding Ethereum L1's 15-30 TPS. More critically, its final transaction confirmation time only takes 2-3 seconds, while Ethereum L1 usually requires 10-15 seconds without using Layer2. This 'fast-paced' characteristic precisely meets the high-frequency strategy needs of market makers and quantitative trading bots — for instance, well-known market maker Jump Crypto has an average holding time of less than 5 minutes for its market-making orders on the Solana chain, with daily trading frequencies reaching tens of thousands, far exceeding its operating frequency on Ethereum.

2. Extremely low transaction costs create a 'price depression' effect.

The cost advantage is another key factor attracting trading flow to Solana. According to statistics from the Artemis on-chain data platform, from January to August 2025, the average fee for DEX trades on Solana L1 is only 0.02-0.05 USD; if using its Layer2 solution (such as FireDancer), the fee can be further reduced to below 0.01 USD. In contrast, the average fee for DEX trades on Ethereum L1 during the same period is 5-15 USD, even when using Layer2 solutions like Arbitrum and Optimism, the average fee still needs to be 0.5-2 USD. This cost gap has led small traders and high-frequency arbitrageurs to turn to Solana — Dune Analytics' user profile data shows that among Solana DEX users, 68% of transactions are below 100 USD, while this ratio for Ethereum DEX is only 32%.

3. Algorithmic trading and incentive activities temporarily boost the scale of trading volume.

In addition to the underlying advantages, short-term incentive measures also play a 'catalytic role' in trading volume. Starting from the fourth quarter of 2024, multiple DEXs within the Solana ecosystem (such as Raydium, Orca) launched 'trading mining' activities, where users can receive platform token rewards by completing designated transaction counts; meanwhile, the rebate ratio for market makers has increased from the usual 0.1% to 0.3%, attracting numerous quantitative teams to enter. According to Chainalysis statistics, in the second quarter of 2025, the proportion of trades driven by robots and algorithms on the Solana chain reached as high as 72%, while Ethereum's corresponding ratio was 45%. This 'machine-led' trading model, although boosting trading volume data, also leads to a disconnection between trading activity and real user demand.

2. The truth behind user 'escape': The structural issues behind a 96% daily attrition rate.

The trading volume frenzy of Solana DEX has not translated into a stable user ecosystem. The user retention issues revealed by on-chain data are far more alarming than surface data, reflecting a structural flaw in the ecosystem's 'heavy trading, light retention.'

1. Retention data: A cliff-like decline from 'daily active' to 'annual dormancy.'

According to Dune Analytics' cohort analysis of Solana DEX users from October 2024 to August 2025, user retention shows a 'cliff-like' downward trend:

24-hour retention: Among any active addresses on a trading day, only 3.8% will conduct DEX trading again the next day, with over 96% of addresses becoming 'one-time users.'

30-day retention: The proportion of addresses able to conduct DEX operations again within 30 days after their first transaction is only 1.2%, of which 70% of users only generate one additional transaction.

90-day retention: The retention rate further drops to below 0.5%;

365-day retention: Among addresses first active in September 2024, only 0.21% continued to engage in DEX trading as of September 2025, and these 'core users' are mostly market makers or project addresses, rather than ordinary investors.

In contrast, the 24-hour retention rate for Ethereum DEX is 18%, the 30-day retention rate is 8.5%, the 90-day retention rate is 4.2%, and the 365-day retention rate is 2.1%, significantly higher than Solana.

2. Reasons for attrition: Short-term speculation dominates, lacking 'customer retention' scenarios.

The root cause of the high user attrition rate on Solana lies in the fact that the ecosystem has not yet built a 'long-term value scenario' that can retain users, with user participation mainly driven by short-term speculative behavior.

Speculation-driven rather than demand-driven: Over 80% of trades in Solana DEX involve short-term trading of SOL or small-cap tokens within the ecosystem, rather than asset exchanges based on actual demand (such as cross-chain transfers and payment scenarios). After experiencing a 120% monthly fluctuation in SOL prices in May 2025, the 30-day retention rate of newly added addresses dropped to 0.8%, confirming the strong correlation between 'price speculation' and 'user retention.'

The ecosystem's applications are singular, and user stickiness is insufficient: The Solana ecosystem currently primarily consists of DEX and NFT trading platforms, accounting for over 75% of the total ecosystem TVL, whereas in the Ethereum ecosystem, diversified applications such as lending (e.g., Aave), derivatives (e.g., dYdX), and stablecoins (e.g., USDC) have formed a synergistic effect, allowing users to complete the entire process of 'deposit - lending - trading - wealth management' on a single chain, resulting in stronger stickiness.

The infrastructure experience still has shortcomings: Although Solana's trading speed is fast, it has historically experienced multiple network interruption issues (three instances exceeding one hour in 2024), and the complexity of wallet operations is relatively high — new users need to complete multiple steps such as 'creating a wallet - buying SOL to pay Gas - transferring assets across chains', making the process more cumbersome than the MetaMask + Layer2 combination in the Ethereum ecosystem, leading some users to abandon follow-up use after their first transaction due to operational barriers.

3. The relationship between surpassing trading volume and long-term adoption: Can data frenzy be transformed into ecosystem value?

Solana DEX's trading volume surpassing Ethereum is essentially a temporary suppression of 'operational advantages' (speed, cost) over 'ecosystem advantages' (user base, application diversity), but whether this suppression can transform into a long-term competitive advantage still raises three core questions:

1. Quality of trading volume: 'Machine trading' accounts for too high a proportion, diluting real demand.

As previously mentioned, 72% of the trading volume in Solana DEX comes from bots and algorithmic trading, while this ratio for Ethereum is 45%. The high proportion of machine trading leads to two problems:

Trading volume data is 'inflated': Some quantitative strategies create false trading volumes through 'wash trading' to obtain platform incentive rewards. In July 2025, a certain DEX in the Solana ecosystem was exposed for having 'fake trades', with 60 million USD out of its 120 million USD trading volume on that day coming from a loop of trades by the same batch of bot addresses.

Unfriendly to ordinary users: Machine trading occupies a large amount of network resources, causing occasional delays in small transactions for ordinary users, and the DEX slippage is higher than Ethereum — the average slippage for a single transaction on Solana DEX is 0.8%, while the average slippage for Ethereum Layer2 DEX is 0.3%, further lowering the trading experience for ordinary users.

2. Ecosystem maturity: There is still a gap from 'trading track' to 'full-scene ecosystem.'

Surpassing trading volume does not indicate leading ecosystem maturity. From the comparison of core ecosystem indicators, there are still significant gaps between Solana and Ethereum:

Indicator Solana (September 2025) Ethereum (September 2025)

Total TVL (Total Value Locked) 180 billion USD 850 billion USD

Number of active DApps 320 1250

Stablecoin market share 12% 45%

Non-trading applications TVL proportion 25% 68%

The low market share of stablecoins and the scarcity of non-trading applications indicate that the Solana ecosystem has not yet formed a 'value closed loop that breaks away from speculation'; users lack other long-term participation scenarios beyond trading.

3. Market cycle dependency: Can the bull market dividends withstand the tests of a bear market?

The recent explosion in Solana's trading volume is largely benefited from the cryptocurrency bull market cycle of 2024-2025 — overall market activity has increased, and small speculative trades have risen, exactly aligning with its low cost and high speed characteristics. However, looking back at the bear market of 2022, the monthly trading volume of Solana DEX plummeted from a peak of 8 billion USD to 500 million USD, a decline of 93%, while Ethereum's decline during the same period was 65%. This indicates that Solana's trading activity is more dependent on market cycles, and if the market enters a bear phase in the future, its trading volume and user retention may face dual pressure.

4. The road to breaking through: How to convert 'trading volume advantages' into 'user retention advantages'?

To solve the user retention problem, Solana needs to shift from 'short-term traffic attraction' to 'long-term ecosystem construction', building user stickiness from three dimensions:

1. Enriching application scenarios: From 'trading' to 'full-chain services.'

Strengthening infrastructure-based applications: promoting the development of essential applications such as stablecoins, lending, and derivatives. For example, introducing more compliant stablecoin issuers (such as Circle further integrating USDC into Solana Layer2) to reduce users' dependence on SOL price fluctuations; developing on-chain credit tools for small and medium enterprises to attract real economy scenarios.

Exploring the integration of Web3 with traditional scenarios: Utilizing high throughput advantages to explore non-trading scenarios such as NFT ticketing, on-chain gaming, and supply chain traceability. For example, the Solana ecosystem has already partnered with certain music festivals to launch NFT tickets, allowing users to participate in subsequent community activities through ticket NFTs. This 'transaction + rights' model can effectively enhance user retention — pilot data shows that users participating in NFT ticket activities have a 30-day retention rate of 8.5%, far higher than ordinary trading users.

2. Optimize user experience: Lowering barriers and enhancing stability.

Simplifying the onboarding process: Promoting account abstraction technology, allowing users to register on-chain accounts via email or phone number without manually managing private keys; cooperating with centralized exchanges (such as Coinbase) to achieve 'one-click cross-chain transfers' to reduce user operation steps.

Strengthening network stability: Continuously optimizing the PoH consensus mechanism to reduce the risk of network interruptions. In June 2025, Solana's 'dynamic sharding' upgrade has reduced network downtime to less than 10 minutes per month, and further enhancement of attack resistance is required in the future.

3. Designing reasonable incentives: From 'trading mining' to 'long-term loyalty rewards.'

Abandoning short-term trading incentives: Stopping the model of 'rewards based on transaction counts' and instead launching incentive plans for 'long-term holding + ecosystem participation.' For example, providing additional token rewards to users who remain active for 30 consecutive days and participate in ecosystem governance voting; offering annual yield bonuses to users who lock their assets in lending protocols for a long time.

Distinguishing real users from bots: Identifying bot addresses through on-chain behavior analysis (such as trading frequency, IP addresses, and sources of funds), excluding them from incentive scopes, and ensuring that rewards genuinely flow to ordinary users.

5. Conclusion: Trading volume is just the starting point; retention is the 'lifeline' of the ecosystem.

The trading volume of Solana DEX surpassing Ethereum is an inevitable result of its underlying technical advantages during specific market cycles and an important signal of the 'multi-chain competition' pattern in the crypto industry. However, the impressive trading volume data cannot mask the core issue of extremely low user retention rates — a 96% daily attrition rate and a 0.2% annual retention rate indicate that its ecosystem is still in the 'traffic carnival' stage and has not yet formed a stable user base.

For Solana, the next 1-2 years will be a critical window: If it can seize the bull market dividends, rapidly enrich application scenarios, optimize user experience, and design long-term incentive mechanisms, it can transform 'trading volume advantages' into 'user retention advantages', potentially securing a place in multi-chain competition; conversely, if it continues to rely on short-term speculative trading to support data, once the market enters a bear phase, its ecosystem may face the dilemma of 'dual attrition of trading volume and users.'

The competition in the cryptocurrency industry ultimately revolves around 'ecological value' rather than 'short-term data.' The story of Solana is both a testament to technological advantages and a warning for ecological construction — only by retaining users can the future of the ecosystem be secured.