Can Base Challenge Solana's Dominance in Meme Coins?
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Can Base Challenge Solana's Dominance in Meme Coins?
Solana has built a diverse and thriving ecosystem through technological advancements, airdrops, and community support, while Base focuses more on cryptocurrency users.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: David C, Bankless
Translation: Kate, Mars Finance
Solana dominates the meme coin space... for now.
So far, Solana's comeback has been the story of this cycle, with the network rising on the back of technological improvements, lucrative airdrops, and most notably, meme coins.
Meme coins have evolved from being seen as unserious, fleeting assets into a forward-looking alternative to low-liquidity, high-FDV tokens that lack sufficient retail upside potential.
Today, most meme coin activity occurs on Solana, although activity is increasingly migrating to Ethereum L2s like Arbitrum and Base. Base has recently become particularly active. While Coinbase’s incubated L2 does show promise as a potential meme hub, Solana continues to dominate and retain its ecosystem’s momentum. Can Base compete with Solana on the meme coin stage?
In this article, we’ll examine the current state of these platforms, their capital flows, and key projects to understand why Solana has become the center of meme coin capital—and how Base compares.
The Solana Meme Coin Scene
A key reason Solana has become the darling of this cycle is its vibrant meme coin activity.
Fueled by insider inflows from airdrops such as Jito, Jupiter, Kamino, Parcl, and Tensor, the market cap of meme coins surged to $1 billion within a week—an impressive feat and brilliant marketing campaign—while the chain’s TVL has now surpassed $4.8 billion.
Solana’s narrative momentum owes much to the meme coin craze, evident in the activity on popular meme coin launcher pump.fun, which at times accounted for 83% of all token launches and even outearned Solana in 24-hour revenue. However, this success would not have been possible without the network’s robust meme coin arena, anchored by major players like WIF, BONK, and BODEN.
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Dogwifhat (ticker: WIF; market cap: $3.3 billion) features an adorable Shiba Inu wearing a knit cap. Thanks to its memorability, widespread promotion by Crypto Twitter influencers, and the loyalty generated as your token rockets from a $10,000 market cap to billions, it has become Solana’s mascot.
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Jeo Boden (ticker: BODEN; market cap: $194 million), centered around U.S. President Joe Biden, sparked political controversy and also calls Solana home. Delivering 1000x returns in its first week, its performance is undeniably intertwined with the SOL meme coin scene.
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Bonk (ticker: BONK; market cap: $2.65 billion) is Solana’s OG meme coin—a Shiba Inu launched in December 2022. It experienced incredible price action last fall and kicked off the meme wave on the chain.
Overall, Solana not only hosts the most iconic meme coins of this cycle but also boasts a wide array of themed tokens—from dogs and cats to politicians.
The Base Meme Coin Scene
Base has rapidly emerged as one of Ethereum’s top L2s, with its meme coin ecosystem helping establish a consumer-friendly reputation.
Projects like DEGEN and friend.tech have brought sustained activity to the network and cultivated a culture around Base as a social hub. That said, while the network saw an epic rebound in TVL in March, growth has recently stalled. Although Base’s TVL still lags far behind Solana’s, its daily trading volume is impressive. Last week, the network hit a record single-day trading volume of $854 million.
Blue represents TVL, green represents trading volume
While the 2023 BALD rug may have left early meme gamblers with a sour taste, the ecosystem has gained more momentum in the recent meme cycle, despite still feeling like the wild west.
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Brett (ticker: BRETT; market cap: $440 million) is a token inspired by a character from Matt Furie’s comic “Boy’s Club,” the creator of Pepe. While niche appeal can be beneficial, it may also limit audience reach and thus reduce demand for the token.
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Toshi the Cat (ticker: TOSHI; market cap: $146 million), named after Brian Armstrong’s cat and Bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto, is Base’s leading pet-inspired meme coin.
https://x.com/BasedBrett/status/1785151748358979891
Traders show loyalty to chains that help them build wealth. While SOL traders were able to buy tokens at a fraction of their current market cap, Base still lacks a native token due to regulatory scrutiny. If and when it launches one, retail traders’ available upside will likely be relatively limited. Meanwhile, unlike the Solana community, Base has had almost no landmark ecosystem airdrops.
While Base has developed a unique meme coin community, its appeal doesn’t extend broadly beyond other ecosystems like Solana’s. Instead, it caters more to crypto-native users. This distinctiveness sets Base apart, but its narrow thematic scope may limit its success as a leading meme hub.
Although Base has leveraged its cheaper and faster transactions to bootstrap early meme activity, Ethereum’s strongest meme communities still primarily reside on the mainnet. Solana has stronger momentum and clearer narratives this cycle. While Base remains one of the more active L2 ecosystems, it still has significant ground to cover in the meme coin arena.
Conclusion
When it comes to meme coins, Solana and Base operate on different levels.
Solana has solidified its position through massive airdrops and a diverse, thriving meme ecosystem backed by strong community support. In contrast, despite Base’s impressive growth and backing from Coinbase, it hasn’t yet reached the same level of mainstream appeal or capital generation required for a full-fledged degen environment.
Solana’s continued expansion, reflected in its growing TVL and daily trading volume, underscores its central role in this cycle. As the meme coin landscape evolves, it will be interesting to see whether Base can cultivate standout meme coins that elevate it above peers both within and beyond the Ethereum ecosystem.
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