Overview: The importance of airdrops
The airdrop mechanism designed in the new IOST token economy is a key strategic reward plan aimed at incentivizing long-term holders, ensuring that token distribution aligns with continuous network participation rather than merely pursuing short-term speculation. Many blockchain projects in the past have suffered from one-time, lack of strategic airdrops, leading to immediate market sell-offs, supply concentration, and insufficient long-term participation.
To address the fundamental issues including those mentioned above, IOST has carefully designed the airdrop model to ensure:
Provide fair and proportionate rewards based on existing holdings;
Release in stages according to the rules to reduce market volatility;
Provide continuous incentives for long-term holders through a holding time doubling method.
IOST's airdrop model serves as a well-thought-out incentive mechanism that not only provides a short-term liquidity injection through 'rewards' but also maintains the network's long-term stability and continuous user participation, achieving an effective combination of short-term gains and long-term development.
Airdrop token distribution
A total of 1.7056 billion IOST is allocated for this airdrop, and airdrop users are divided into the following two categories:
1. L1 users (852.8 million IOST)
Rewards are proportional to the amount of IOST held by users at the time of the snapshot.
Adopt a holding time doubling method to incentivize those who hold long-term.
Adopt a 48-month linear release distribution method to ensure sustainable long-term incentives.
2. Exchange users (852.8 million IOST)
For details, please see below.
IOST collaborates with partner exchanges to determine the allocation mechanism based on user participation, historical activity, and staking behavior.
The combination of this release model and the holding time doubling method ensures that users who continuously support IOST can maximize their benefits, effectively avoiding short-term speculators from immediately selling after receiving the airdrop.
L1 user airdrop calculation mechanism
L1 users (852.8 million IOST)
Overview:
The mechanism design of this airdrop aims to reward existing IOST L1 token holders (including exchange users), with specific amounts based on holdings. In addition to basic allocation, we also introduced the staking time doubling method to incentivize long-term stakers and reduce short-term speculative behavior.
Total allocation = 852,800,000 IOST
Release schedule:
No instant unlock: Distribution will begin after the snapshot is taken.
Linear release: Total rewards will be unlocked linearly over 48 months (i.e., 4 years).
Monthly release: 1/48 of the total rewards will be distributed monthly.
Minimum holding amount: 1000 IOST
Release schedule: Ensure long-term consistency
To prevent market instability and maintain the long-term effectiveness of rewards, IOST implements a strict linear vesting model for airdrop rewards.
Key release rules:
No instant unlock: After the snapshot, the tokens will remain fully locked.
48 months linear release:
Monthly distribution of rewards is 1/48.
This measure can prevent large-scale selling and ensure gradual distribution.
3. Encourage long-term holding: Users who continuously hold throughout the release period will be able to maximize their returns.
Compared to traditional airdrop models
Example calculation
The following is a demonstration of the actual scenario airdrop reward calculation.
Example scenario:
The total allocation for L1 airdrop is 852.8 million IOST.
The total amount of eligible IOST held by all users is 8.528 billion.
User Alice holds 100,000 IOST at the time of the snapshot and continues to hold for 12 months.
Summary: Why is this airdrop model effective?
Key advantages of the IOST airdrop model:
✅ Rewards long-term holders — the holding time doubling method ensures loyal users receive more rewards.
✅ Prevent instant selling — the 48-month vesting period effectively curbs large-scale sell-offs.
✅ Ensure fairness — proportional distribution ensures rewards are linked to actual network participation.
✅ Stabilize the market — the gradual release mechanism prevents price volatility.
Comparison with other blockchain airdrops:
Historically, many blockchain projects have suffered severely due to poorly designed airdrop models, leading to a series of negative consequences:
❌ A large number of tokens are quickly sold off, causing price collapse.
❌ Wealth is overly concentrated in a few wallet addresses.
❌ Lack of long-term incentives leading to user attrition.
In contrast, IOST's carefully designed model introduces mathematical precision, strategic vesting, and incentive consistency, ensuring that the airdrop is not just a one-time event, but a long-term value driver for the ecosystem.
Airdrop targeting CEX holders
Exchange users (852.8 million IOST)
Important note:
Exchanges will personalize the IOST airdrop claim plan, and detailed tutorials will be provided, so please pay attention to official announcements.
The list of exchanges participating in the event will be announced next week via IOST's official X and Telegram channels.
IOST holders should ensure they meet the minimum requirement of holding 1,000 IOST tokens.
Introduction to IOST
IOST was founded in 2017 and is headquartered in Singapore, supported by top global investment institutions such as Sequoia, Matrix, and ZhenFund.
IOST 3.0 is a BNB Chain Layer 2 solution focusing on Real World Assets (RWA), aimed at bringing institutional-level financial infrastructure into the Web3 space, building a bridge between Traditional Finance (TradFi) and Decentralized Finance (DeFi).
Through RWA tokenization, liquidity engines, and PayFi solutions, IOST 3.0 will provide enterprise-grade on-chain payment and asset management services, enhancing asset liquidity, transparency, and trading efficiency, and promoting blockchain financial innovation.
Official website: iost.io
Block explorer: iostscan.com
Link3: link3.to/iost
Zendesk: iost.zendesk.com
IOST Chinese Community X: x.com/IOST_CN
IOST Chinese Community Telegram: t.me/IOSTChina
IOST Chinese Community Medium: medium.com/iost-cn
IOST Community Long-Term Rewards: Over 1.7 billion IOST token airdrop details was originally published in IOST_CN on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.