Sui vs. Aptos: Which Has a More Scalable Blockchain Ecosystem?
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Sui vs. Aptos: Which Has a More Scalable Blockchain Ecosystem?
In the absence of a main narrative, focusing on public chain ecosystems to identify Beta and Alpha opportunities may be a viable trading strategy for the foreseeable future.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsWritten by: Metrics Ventures
As BTC price breaks through $89,000, a long-awaited bull market sentiment has returned. Altcoins have surged significantly, with several Layer 1 tokens nearly doubling. However, this market recovery hasn't brought about dominant thematic narratives, and the lack of clear mainstream storylines may persist in the near term. Without a strong overarching narrative, seeking Beta and Alpha opportunities through the lens of Layer 1 ecosystems could be a viable trading strategy for the coming period. Therefore, we’ve developed an analytical framework and applied it to analyze and compare two recently outperforming chains—Sui and Aptos.
1. Analytical Framework: How to Evaluate a Layer 1 Ecosystem?
The most direct driver behind a Layer 1 breakout is massive capital inflow. A surge in liquidity fuels ecosystem development, and the resulting wealth effect attracts further attention and capital, continuously boosting ecosystem activity. When evaluating a Layer 1 ecosystem, we focus primarily on factors that could drive large-scale capital inflows, the chain’s capacity to absorb liquidity, and data indicators reflecting user and capital inflows.
(1) Native Transaction Activity: Whether it was ETH during the ICO and NFT eras, SOL during the Memecoin boom, or BTC during the Ordinals era (where both mining and purchasing increased demand and consumption of BTC), native tokens serve as the base currency for transactions. When NFTs or Memecoins generate significant wealth effects, users must purchase the native token to enter these new Crypto Casinos, creating strong organic demand for the Layer 1’s token and driving up its price and ecosystem vitality. These major “casinos” not only contribute directly to ecosystem growth but also attract substantial capital onto-chain. The overflow of liquidity then enriches other ecosystem projects, revitalizing the entire network. In this regard, there's inherent tension between Layer 1s and centralized exchanges: many high-quality projects launch directly on CEXs without benefiting the underlying blockchain. To foster native token transaction volume, chains need assets that exist exclusively (or initially) on-chain—like NFTs, inscriptions, or Memecoins. We closely monitor emerging asset models with wealth-generation potential across different chains. Currently, however, no groundbreaking innovations have emerged, so in the short term, we pay attention to which chain can capture more liquidity spillover from Solana in the Memecoin space.
(2) Maturity of Ecosystem Infrastructure and Liquidity Attraction Mechanisms: The completeness of infrastructure determines whether capital will stay after entering. User-friendly experiences and diverse yield strategies enhance user and capital retention. Entry points and incentives for attracting liquidity are crucial for drawing capital in. Primary capital sources include other blockchains, CEXs, and Web2 platforms, with friction increasing at each level. The broader the range of capital sources a chain can attract, the better its chances for success. For example, Base leverages Coinbase to enable seamless onboarding from exchange to chain, while its cbBTC and liquidity incentives have boosted TVL. Similarly, Solana is pushing Payment and PayFi initiatives to onboard Web2 users and capital.
(3) Chain Development Strategy and Positioning: This includes a chain’s roadmap, target markets, and core focus areas. For instance, Solana has had a clear development path this cycle—starting with Memecoins to attract users and liquidity, then aggressively promoting PayFi and DePIN to leverage its high-performance architecture, bringing in flagship projects like Render, Grass, and IO.net. In contrast, Ethereum lacks a coherent strategic direction this cycle, and its Rollup-centric roadmap has faced criticism.
(4) Capital and User Data Trends: TVL is commonly used to measure capital scale, but it’s heavily influenced by token prices and mainly consists of native and ecosystem tokens, making it unreliable for tracking actual capital inflows. Additionally, platforms like Defillama calculate TVL by summing individual protocol TVLs without accounting for circulating supply, which may indicate stronger trading demand. Therefore, this report focuses on stablecoin market cap growth, net capital inflows, and DEX trading volume as better indicators of liquidity trends, alongside user engagement metrics.
(5) Token Distribution and Price Performance: Ecosystem growth and token price typically reinforce each other. Rising token prices draw market attention, prompting investors to seek higher returns within the ecosystem. This liquidity spillover enhances ecosystem prosperity and wealth creation. Tokenomics and distribution structure determine resistance levels and timing for price appreciation. Tokens with lower sell pressure and greater upside potential are more likely to catalyze broad ecosystem growth.
2. Sui Ecosystem Analysis
2.1 Chain Overview and Recent Developments
Sui is a high-performance Move-based Layer 1 blockchain developed by Mysten Labs. According to Sui Foundation data, its theoretical peak TPS reaches 297,000, with real-world performance peaking around 800 TPS.
Sui raised $336M across Series A and B rounds, with a Series B valuation of $2B. Backers include top-tier funds such as A16z, Coinbase Ventures, and Binance Labs.
Sui mainnet launched on May 3, 2023. Over the past year and a half, its ecosystem TVL has grown rapidly, now ranking 5th among all Layer 1s. It has established a solid DeFi infrastructure including DEXs, lending, stablecoins, and liquid staking. While early adoption lacked consistent daily active users, Sui began attracting significant traction starting in May 2024 and currently maintains a stable DAU of around 1 million.
SUI token entered a rapid uptrend in September, becoming one of the best-performing crypto assets of the month, significantly outperforming both BTC and SOL. Recently, its price has approached previous highs. Alongside price momentum, Sui announced several key ecosystem developments:
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September 2, 2024: Sui unveiled SuiPlay0X1, a handheld gaming console natively supporting Sui games and Steam/Epic libraries. Priced at $599, it will ship in 2025.
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September 12, 2024: Grayscale launched the Grayscale SUI Trust, open to qualified investors. By October 8, AUM exceeded $2.7M.
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September 17, 2024: Sui partnered with Circle to bring USDC to its network. Native USDC went live on Sui mainnet on October 8.
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October 1, 2024: Sui Bridge launched on mainnet, enabling ETH/WETH bridging between Sui and Ethereum, secured by Sui validators.
2.2 Native Transaction Activity
Sui hasn’t spawned many novel asset formats, but Memecoin trading picked up in early October. Tokens like HIPPO, BLUB, FUD, AAA, and LOOPY performed strongly, with HIPPO generating particularly notable wealth effects. It’s now the third-largest token in the Sui ecosystem after CETUS and DEEP. Despite dropping over 70% from its peak, HIPPO has rebounded sharply, up over 50x from its lows. Memecoin enthusiasm is reflected in surging new token creation: since mid-September, over 300 new tokens were created daily on Sui, exceeding 1,000 per day in October, though activity has since cooled.
In terms of Meme trading infrastructure, Cetus serves as the primary AMM, PinkPunkBot is widely used for trading bots, and Movepump functions as a Pump.fun-like Memecoin launchpad. Once liquidity thresholds are met, tokens list on BlueMove DEX, contributing to sharp increases in Cetus’ TVL and trading volume in early October.
2.3 Ecosystem Overview
According to Sui Directory, there are 86 projects in the Sui ecosystem, dominated by gaming (23) and DeFi (16) outside core infrastructure. Per CoinGecko, few Sui-native projects have significant market caps: aside from SUI, only HIPPO ranks in the top 500. Within the top 1000, excluding stablecoins, only FUD, CETUS, BLUB, and NAVX qualify—all either Memecoins or leading DeFi projects—indicating limited investable opportunities.
DeFillama reports 40 DeFi protocols on Sui, led by NAVI Protocol (lending), Cetus AMM (DEX), and Suilend (lending). Scallop Lend (lending) and Aftermath Finance (aggregator and liquid staking) follow closely. Other notable protocols include AlphaFi (yield aggregator), Bucket (stablecoin), and Bluefin (derivatives).
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NAVI Protocol: Sui’s leading lending protocol with $314.8M TVL, $464.63M total borrowed, and $149.83M lent. Its TVL is primarily composed of WUSDC and SUI/SUI derivatives. Of the $283.05M WUSDC on Sui, NAVI holds approximately $900M worth, over 30% of its TVL. NAVI is developing Volo, a liquid staking solution for SUI. NAVX, its governance token, has performed well—up over 6x from its August 5 low of $0.003 to current levels (~$0.19). On October 4, NAVX listed on Bybit and launched a Launchpool.
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Cetus AMM: A DEX operating on both Sui and Aptos, and the most mature DEX in the Sui ecosystem. It supports AMM swaps, limit orders, and DCA strategies, using concentrated liquidity (CLMM). Integrated with Wormhole SDK, it offers cross-chain bridge functionality via its frontend. CETUS token has also performed strongly, rising nearly 5x from its August 5 low ($0.038), and more than doubling again after listing on Binance. With a current market cap of ~$260M, Cetus saw trading volumes exceed $100M daily in October, surpassing its March–April peak.
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Suilend: Sui’s second-largest lending protocol, with $227.58M total supplied and $57.69M borrowed—lower than NAVI in both volume and utilization. Like NAVI, its TVL is dominated by SUI and WUSDC, with comparable total value, though it doesn’t yet support SUI derivatives. Built by the Solend team, Suilend allows wrapping SOL into Sui for yield generation. Both Suilend and NAVI incentivize borrowing using SUI or its derivatives—Suilend uses SUI, while NAVI uses vSUI. In May 2024, Suilend launched a points program rewarding depositors.
2.4 Ecosystem Development Strategy
Web3 Gaming has always been central to Sui’s strategy. Sui’s Move-based language uses an object-oriented model where objects are the basic unit of data storage, unlike traditional account-based models. This enables richer, composable on-chain game assets. Combined with Sui’s scalability and features like zkLogin, it delivers a Web2-like gaming experience.
In Sui’s early days, flagship game Abyss World attracted considerable attention, backed by AMD and Epic Games. On June 24, 2023, a major Japanese social gaming company joined as a validator and announced game development on Sui. On September 22, 2023, Korean developer NHN was reported to be building a blockchain game on Sui. On September 28, 2023, Sui launched Play Beyond, a Web3 gaming portal for easy discovery of Sui-based games. However, due to poor overall performance in the blockchain gaming sector this cycle, no breakout titles have emerged on Sui. Data shows gaming and social apps were the main user drivers in 2023, but Sui’s ecosystem stagnated in 2024.
Recently, Sui has gained momentum across multiple fronts, resembling Solana’s early trajectory: rapid SUI price appreciation, emergence of wealth-generating Memecoins, broad ecosystem token rallies, coupled with positive catalysts like Grayscale launching a Sui trust, native USDC deployment, ecosystem tokens listing on major CEXs, and Sui Foundation announcing investments in ecosystem projects. All this has rapidly drawn market attention, reigniting “Solana Killer” discussions. Gaming remains a core strategic pillar, evidenced by the SuiPlay0X1 launch and Grayscale’s promotional video highlighting Sui gaming.
Additionally, the Korean market shows strong interest in Sui, with SUI consistently ranking among the top traded pairs on Upbit. In spot trading volume, Upbit trails only Binance, underscoring Korea’s significance to Sui’s ecosystem.
2.5 Capital and User Data Trends
On the capital side, Sui’s TVL grew rapidly from ~$300M in early August to over $1B. However, since TVL is largely composed of SUI and ecosystem tokens, this figure doesn’t accurately reflect real capital inflows.
Better indicators are stablecoin market cap and net capital inflows. Sui’s stablecoin market cap is ~$380M, briefly rising to $437M post-August 6 before declining. Net capital inflows over the past one and three months remain positive, ranking third among all Layer 1s. Most inflows and outflows originate from Ethereum.
In terms of trading activity, Sui ranks 6th in DEX volume across all Layer 1s. Volume has recovered significantly since September, now surpassing its March–April peak, with daily volume exceeding $200M. Cetus accounts for over 85% of this volume, primarily from SUI-USDC, SUI-wUSDC, HIPPO-SUI, and CETUS-SUI pairs.
On the user side, total active users have risen, but activity is concentrated in social apps like RECRD, BIRDS, and FanTv. These apps haven’t seen corresponding increases in market discussion, raising questions about genuine user engagement. Excluding Social and BIRDS’ "Other" category, overall user activity remains flat. Notably, DeFi dapps see only 1K–5K daily active wallets—weak compared to Ethereum or Solana—and user structure appears unhealthy. October saw a Memecoin-driven spike with over 50K daily active users, but the trend faded quickly, and Meme activity has since declined.
2.6 Tokenomics and Price Performance
The flow of SUI within the system is illustrated below. Sui operates a Storage Fund that receives part of user-paid Storage Fees and Stake Rewards. The capital flow per epoch works as follows:
- User submits transaction, paying Computation and Storage Fees; Storage Fees go directly to the Storage Fund
- Newly minted SUI and Computation Fees together form Stake Rewards
- Total staked amount per epoch includes: user stake × α% + Storage Fund share × (1−α)%
- γα portion of Stake Rewards distributed to stakers and delegators
- Remaining (1−γ)(1−α) of Stake Rewards transferred to Storage Fund
- If users delete stored data, Storage Fund refunds part of the storage fees
Thus, in Sui’s early stages, the Storage Fund accumulates value without outflows (except for data deletion refunds), effectively locking up SUI. When locked amounts exceed inflation, SUI enters deflationary mode.
Total SUI supply is 10B. The token unlock schedule, last updated June 29, 2023, is shown below. According to Token Unlock data, the pie chart illustrates allocation. Current circulating supply is 2,763,841,372.61 (27.64%). Main inflation pressures come from staking rewards and scheduled unlocks. Since April 2024, monthly unlocks began for investors, early contributors, and team members. On November 1, 2024, 64.19M SUI will unlock (2.32% of circulating supply). Ongoing unlocks and inflation could pressure SUI’s price.
Price-wise, SUI/BTC has shown strong momentum. After dipping on October 29, it quickly rebounded, continued rising after consolidation, and broke its年初 high on November 9 with strong volume expansion.
2.7 Summary
Over the past month+, market attention toward Sui has surged, driven by wealth-generation effects from SUI and its ecosystem tokens. We’re seeing synergy forming as Sui leverages price pumps and positive news to capture attention. But is Sui truly shaping up to be a “new Solana”?
- Positively, capital is flowing into Sui. While TVL data is inflated, Sui ranks third in net bridge inflows, indicating real appeal for on-chain capital.
- Sui saw promising Memecoin activity in early October and gained some visibility, but momentum and buzz still fall short of Solana or Ethereum. No evidence yet of Meme capital shifting from ETH or SOL to Sui, and the Meme wave wasn’t sustained—user activity quickly collapsed.
- Gaming remains a core strategic pillar, but this sector underperforms this cycle. Even TON’s mini-games, once seen as vehicles for mass adoption, are being questioned. If Sui’s projects fail to deliver after this hype cycle, the ecosystem risks fading into obscurity.
- Daily active users have surged in number, but breakdown reveals structural weaknesses—possibly inflated figures. Like its strategy, this raises concerns about Sui’s health and sustainability.
- Token-wise, SUI faces prolonged inflation pressure from ongoing unlocks, posing headwinds for price growth. Many compare SUI to early SOL, but SOL had mostly unlocked by its rally phase, facing minimal inflation. SUI’s unlock schedule and token structure need close monitoring—if the native token struggles to break out, ecosystem growth could stall.
3. Aptos Ecosystem Analysis
3.1 Chain Overview and Recent Developments
Aptos is another high-performance Move-based Layer 1, but retains more Diem DNA compared to Sui, which introduced greater architectural changes. The biggest difference lies in Sui’s object-based model versus Aptos’ account-based model. They also differ in parallel execution approaches. In short, Aptos emphasizes modular design and optimization of traditional blockchain structures, while Sui pursues bolder architectural innovation. According to Chainspect, Aptos’ theoretical max TPS is 160,000, with a real-world peak of 10,734 TPS and typical operation between 500–1,000 TPS.
Aptos raised funds across multiple rounds in 2022, with a Series A valuation of $2.75B, backed by A16z, Binance Labs, Coinbase Ventures, and others. On September 19, 2024, MEXC Ventures, Foresight Ventures, and Mirana Ventures jointly launched a fund to support Aptos ecosystem projects.
Aptos mainnet launched October 17, 2022. TVL began rising sharply in 2024, tripling since年初 and now ranking 12th among Layer 1s, with a relatively mature DeFi infrastructure. It saw strong initial DAU post-launch, then entered a six-month lull before regaining traction in August 2023. Current daily active addresses hover around 500K–600K.
APT has more than doubled from its August 5, 2024 low but remains far from its all-time high. Aptos hasn’t had any major recent catalysts. Key developments include:
- September 19, 2024: MEXC Ventures, Foresight Ventures, and Mirana Ventures jointly launched a fund to support Aptos ecosystem projects.
- October 3, 2024: Aptos Labs acquired HashPalette, developer of Palette chain, to strategically expand into Japan, promoting Web3 adoption in entertainment, gaming, and digital assets.
- October 2, 2024: Franklin Templeton extended its on-chain money market fund to Aptos.
- October 28, 2024: Native USDT launched on Aptos mainnet.
3.2 Native Transaction Activity
Aptos lacks mechanisms for native transaction activity. There are no prominent or active Memecoins, indicating the ecosystem is still very early-stage.
3.3 Ecosystem Overview
Per Aptos’ official site, 192 projects are built on the chain—far exceeding Sui. DeFillama lists 49 DeFi protocols, similar in count to Sui. However, few projects have issued tokens. Among those in the top 1,000 by market cap, only Propbase (RWA platform) and Thala are native to Aptos. CELL, Cellana’s token, ranks just above #1,300.
- Thala: Aptos’ leading DEX, responsible for ~50% of chain-wide volume. Core products include Swap, liquid staking, and an overcollateralized stablecoin. Functionality is relatively basic—primarily AMM trading—with added liquid staking offering thAPT (liquid staking token) yielding ~8% APR. Thala issues MOD, Aptos’ native stablecoin, minted by overcollateralizing APT, thAPT, or sthAPT. Compared to LiquidSwap and Cellana Finance, Thala has the strongest recent volume, driven mainly by MOD/zUSDC (LayerZero’s USDC), with ~$6M 24h volume. Stablecoin-to-APT and derivative pairs also show strong volume. THL launched in June 2023, listed only on MEXC and Gate.io. Most trading occurs on-chain via THL/MOD pair. THL peaked around $3 in Q2 2024 and now trades near $0.8.
- LiquidSwap: Aptos’ second-largest DEX, capturing 22% of chain volume. Developed by Pontem Network, its primary pair is USDC-APT (24h volume ~$3M, TVL ~$20M), accounting for half of LiquidSwap’s volume and TVL.
- Cellana Finance: Launched in February 2024, already the highest cumulative volume DEX on Aptos. From January to October 2024, it maintained daily volume over $25M, but crashed after October 18, now down to ~$2M. Volume previously came from amAPT-APT swaps, which dried up post-October 18. Cellana is one of the few protocols to issue a token (CELL), which can be staked for veCELL. Voting power depends on lock duration, determining next round’s liquidity incentives across pools. veCELL voters receive 100% of fees from their voted pool. CELL trades only on Cellana, with 88% of volume from CELL-APT pair.
- Aries Markets: Aptos’ largest lending protocol and highest TVL DeFi app. Total supplied: $664M, total borrowed: $402M. TVL has grown significantly over two years. Main assets: zUSDT, zUSDC, stAPT, APT. Depositors earn ~12% APR on stablecoins, subsidized by APT, making it a key yield destination. Beyond lending, Aries integrates AMM, limit orders, and cross-chain bridges. No token yet, but running a points program rewarding depositors and borrowers.
- Amnis Finance: Aptos’ largest liquid staking protocol. Deposit 1 APT → get 1 amAPT; stake amAPT → get stAPT (~9% yield). Launched Oct 2023, TVL steadily growing, now second-highest in Aptos DeFi. amAPT/stAPT widely integrated. Since Nov 2023, Amnis runs points and retroactive airdrop programs, explicitly linking points to future AMI token distribution.
- Echo Lending: Echo brings BTC assets to the Move ecosystem by bridging uBTC from Bsquared Network to Aptos as aBTC. Users lend aBTC on Echo to earn APT subsidies (~12% APR), hitting deposit caps. Users gain multi-layered yields: Bsquared points, Echo points, and APT rewards. Since launch, Echo’s TVL surpassed $170M, ranking fourth on Aptos.
3.4 Ecosystem Development Strategy
Aptos and Sui pursue different strategic focuses. Aptos’ recent priorities include RWA, Bitcoin ecosystem integration, and AI.
RWA: Aptos actively advances tokenization of real-world assets and institutional financial solutions. In July 2024, it integrated Ondo Finance’s USDY, available across major DEXs and lending apps. As
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