Solana and Base Dominate Chain-Specific Trends

Solana: The Most Popular Blockchain Ecosystem

According to a CoinGecko report, Solana (SOL) has maintained its position as the most popular blockchain ecosystem in 2024, accounting for 38.8% of global crypto investor interest in chain-specific narratives. This dominance is attributed to several factors:

• A strong start to the year with Solana rallying back to 2021 levels.
• The outperformance of key ecosystem project tokens and native meme coins.
• The chain’s speed and low gas fees, which attracted meme coin traders.
• The virality of the meme coin generator Pump.fun.

Despite its continued popularity, Solana’s share of investor interest has dropped by 10.5 percentage points compared to Q1, as other ecosystems ramp up their efforts.

Base: A Rising Star Among Blockchain Ecosystems

Coinbase’s Base ecosystem has emerged as the second most popular blockchain ecosystem in 2024, capturing 16.8% of investor interest. Key highlights from the report include:

• A fivefold increase in investor interest since Q1.
• A rise in rankings from seventh to second, surpassing Ethereum.
• Nine times more investor interest compared to the next most popular layer 2 ecosystem, Arbitrum.
• Its growing appeal as a market for meme coin trading.

Ethereum Ecosystem: A Decline in Popularity

The Ethereum ecosystem moved down to the third spot, holding a 10.8% share of investor interest. Compared to Q1, Ethereum’s mindshare has decreased by 1.9 percentage points. CoinGecko attributes this to:

• Ethereum’s established reputation, making it less of a trending narrative.
• Investor attention dispersing across layer 2 ecosystems built on Ethereum.

TON and Sui Ecosystems on the Rise

The TON and Sui ecosystems have gained traction in 2024, overtaking BNB Smart Chain, Cosmos, and Avalanche. Key statistics include:

• TON: A 6.2% share of global investor interest, up by 4.3 percentage points since Q1.
• Sui: A 4.8% share of global investor interest, up by 2.7 percentage points since Q1.

Other Notable Trends

Several blockchain ecosystems have seen changes in popularity throughout 2024:

• Rising ecosystems: Bitcoin, Tron, and Blast entered the top 20 rankings.
• Declining ecosystems: BNB Smart Chain, Cosmos, and Avalanche lost market share, along with Injective, PulseChain, and Hedera.

The Bitcoin ecosystem, for instance, saw its investor interest grow from 0.01% to 1.07%, driven by narratives around building on Bitcoin and the adoption of the Runes standard for native meme coins.

Study Methodology

CoinGecko’s research examined non-botted global web traffic from January 1 to November 11, 2024. The analysis included only ecosystems with active listed coins and a measurable share of traffic.

Overall, the 20 most popular blockchain ecosystems represent 97.0% of investor interest, while the remaining 3.0% is spread across 47 other ecosystems.