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in the encryption industry summarySolana in the third quarter of 2025 presents a dual look. On the surface, the memecoin collapse caused the market to cool down, the number of daily active addresses dropped, and user attention was eroded by competitors. But beyond the surface, the fundamentals of this public chain are getting stronger. The Solana core team continues to advance the most ambitious technology roadmap in the crypto industry. The total value locked in the third quarter increased by more than 26%, and the stablecoin supply nearly doubled from the beginning of the year. This report will comprehensively cover the technology upgrades that define Solana's future (such as Alpenglow and Agave), provide in-depth analysis of on-chain data, dApp ecological health, and distill the core point of view - why Solana is consolidating its status as the default high-performance public chain.  Multi-dimensional technological innovationWhile most users are immersed in the hype of the latest meme coin, the Solana core team is full steam ahead with the most ambitious technology roadmap in the crypto industry. This upgrade is not a fine-tuning of a single indicator, but a comprehensive network infrastructure innovation that directly addresses the four core pain points of performance, security, decentralization and user experience. These initiatives fall into three main categories: Category 1: Core engine (consensus and client)This is a fundamental overhaul of the Solana engine. The core goal is to improve raw performance, speed and security at the most basic level. If you are interested, you can view the visual chart of the current staking ecosystem.  Category 2: Network Channel (Throughput and Efficiency)This category focuses on widening network channels and managing traffic more efficiently to match new speed levels and prevent congestion. If you want to attract institutions, there is no way they can tolerate poor latency performance.  Category 3: Application scenarios (new features: ecological and decentralized applications)These are new features that developers and users will have direct contact with, which can not only support the implementation of new applications, but also further enhance the degree of decentralization.  Practical application impactSpecifically:
Empirical Case: PUMP Initial Coin Offering Stress TestIn July 2025, Pump.fun's ICO put Solana to the test. In just 12 minutes, Pump.fun raised US$500 million through on-chain decentralized exchanges and US$100 million through centralized exchanges, bringing its fully diluted valuation to US$4 billion. 3,878 investors transparently completed orders through Solana decentralized exchanges such as Raydium and Jupiter, while centralized exchanges such as Bybit experienced multiple failures (unexpected application program interface delays), resulting in approximately 2,500 buyers who had confirmed payment, but were unable to complete the transaction due to application program interface delays, and were eventually forced to refund their money. Have we seen a glimpse of the future where decentralized blockchains begin to overtake centralized exchanges? Solana Current Status: Data InterpretationMemecoin traders are turning to the perpetual contracts market, a trend that affects Solana’s core indicators. The ratio of on-chain handling fees to Solana's market capitalization has dropped by more than 60% from the July high.  While stablecoins are a hot topic on Capitol Hill and Wall Street, Ethereum and Tron still dominate. Solana is in the third tier together with platforms such as Base, BSC, and Arbitrum.  Judging from the proportion of stablecoin total locked value (TVL), competition between Ethereum and Tron has been fierce in the past few quarters, and new application-specific stablecoin projects such as Plasma have also begun to emerge.  Even so, Solana still provides a fast, low-cost and high-liquidity platform for USDC-related activities - this may be the reason why Western Union chose this chain to build its stablecoin business. Innovative experimentation will be the core theme of this report, and this trait also extends to Solana’s stablecoin ecosystem. Multiple new projects are gradually weakening the dominance of USDC.  Which ecosystem players drive on-chain growth?Among the growth in the total value locked (TVL) of Solana’s top applications, staking products performed outstandingly. Binance, Bybit’s staking service and Sanctumso all saw total value locked (TVL) increase by more than 50% in the third quarter.  The total value locked (TVL) of DEX, DeFi and infrastructure applications all increased slightly, but none exceeded Solana's own 28% increase - which means that, at least in Solana terms, these categories experienced net outflows in the past quarter.  But the shortcoming of staking products is the profit margin: on average, a staking protocol requires 21.7 times the total value locked (TVL) of a decentralized exchange (DEX) to generate the same revenue. This data suggests that businesses for speculators are more profitable than those for savers.  When it comes to decentralized exchanges (DEX), Orca_so has an absolute advantage in total value locked (TVL) efficiency (i.e. turnover rate). At the same level of DEX liquidity, tokens change hands most frequently on Orca per $1.  Although Solana is known for being fast and low-cost, there are exceptions. For example, the average daily gas expenses of heavy users on trading platforms such as tradewithPhoton and AxiomExchange are much higher than expected. However, for most users, the average daily cost of using mainstream applications on Solana is only a few cents.  Solana vs. major competitorsGlobal on-chain locked TVL almost exceeded the historical high of nearly $180 billion in 2021, but compared with Solana and some competitors, its quarter-on-quarter changes were minimal.  The proportion data in the figure below shows that the weekly changes in the total value locked (TVL) of these competing public chains are highly synchronized. As Isaac Newton said, capital at rest tends to remain at rest.  In terms of user scale, Binance Smart Chain (BSC) stood out in the third quarter with the launch of Aster, a perpetual contract decentralized exchange (DEX) associated with Changpeng Zhao (CZ). Users will either exit the market in early summer or migrate from Base and Solana to the BSC ecosystem.  While Solana's user growth was strong in the second quarter, interest declined in the third quarter, coinciding with a cooling of enthusiasm for memecoin trading.  But what is cause for optimism is that Solana has benefited from the surge in stablecoin attention. From the beginning of the year to the end of the third quarter, the stablecoin supply nearly doubled. Facts have proved that speed and low cost are a major selling point for stablecoin promotion, especially when combined with Solana’s mature DeFi ecosystem.  These charts illustrate the current market landscape but do not capture the full picture. Solana’s positioning has always been an innovative experiment chain. To predict future application scenarios and narrative directions, we need to pay attention to which experimental projects have received financial support. Where do VC funds flow?The following are some projects that received investment from well-known funds in the third quarter:
What are the opportunities and risks?Solana’s third quarter was a quarter of both breakthroughs and challenges. On the one hand, innovative applications gradually achieve product-market fit, and digital asset library (DAT) companies perform brilliantly ； On the other hand, ecology also has to face some inherent problems. Highlights of the third quarterAmong the many emerging decentralized applications (dApps), the following online projects stood out in the third quarter:
DAT development momentumIn the third quarter, the Solana digital asset library raised approximately US$4.25 billion through private placements, pre-IPO financing and equity issuance, the largest of which was Forward Industries (FORD) - the company spent approximately US$3.5 billion to acquire 14.5 million Solana, accounting for 2.3% of its total circulating supply. Despite this, the Solana digital asset library was not immune to the net asset value (mNAV) compression problem commonly faced by the encrypted digital asset library ecosystem in the third quarter.  Respond to common criticismsLike almost all crypto projects, Solana is still evolving and is far from perfect. But in our opinion, the following doubts are just part of its growth process. However, these pain points still deserve attention:  Core risk - brand positioningSolana’s positioning as an innovation proving ground has always been its core strength. Trading robots, initial coin offerings, consumer applications, artificial intelligence agents - these were all first implemented on Solana. But this cycle, Solana faces a dilemma. Attention is scarce, and product-market fit seems limited to a handful of applications in a handful of areas. This stagnation creates opportunities for competitors to seize the narrative:
This leads to the core risk: Pump.fun is admittedly a money-making machine, successfully fending off competition from both outside (Base/BSC) and inside (BonkFun). But that success came at a price -- potentially permanently labeling Solana a casino chain. To change this, Solana must champion new ideas. Maybe the answer still lies with Pump.fun, but with the help of its streaming platform ； Perhaps MetaDAO’s rugpull risk-free initial coin offering and new governance model ； Or perhaps Toly builds a product that surpasses Hyperliquid. Ecology needs new breakthroughs to get rid of the stigma of being a gathering place for short-term speculators. Our vision for the future of SolanaAlthough the market has cooled after the memecoin craze, short-term price fluctuations are becoming less important. Solana has established itself and is here to stay. The newly launched high-performance public chains (such as Sui, Aptos, Sei) do not pose a threat to it like the last round of Solana challenging Ethereum. Although some competitors theoretically have more advanced technology, Solana's speed and cost are enough to provide a good user experience and support a huge dApp ecosystem. Technical capabilities and smooth user experience are the cornerstones of application popularity. Rather than resting on its laurels, Solana is pursuing the upgrades detailed in this report to build on its strengths and expand its offerings. Because of this, developers still default to Solana as the first choice for high-performance public chains - a trend that will not be reversed in the short term. Solana exemplifies the tenacity, innovation, and ultra-capitalistic nature of the crypto industry and is the premier arena for validating product-market fit. No matter which way this cycle goes, Solana will survive and thrive. Although it may lose some transaction volume to professional application chains, we firmly believe that Solana will continue to maintain its leading position in the general public chain field. Author: blocmates Source:X Original link: https://x.com/blocmates/status/1989013995903414764 Golden Elephant was born for the continuous improvement of Web3 ecology! Golden Elephant, focusing on Web3 ecological system construction and operation! Pay attention to the golden elephant! Contact us! Receive information and join the group…… Please scan the code to add Xiang Xiaosuke  |
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