Layer-1 network Aptos sees a 3,570% increase in its daily volume after recording 51.6 million transactions

The surge in transaction volume was due to the launch of a new version of the click-to-earn game Tapos 2.

Layer-1 blockchain Aptos (CRYPTO: APTOS) saw a 3,570% increase in its daily transaction volume on August 13 after recording 51.6 million transactions.

The massive surge in transaction volume was largely attributed to the launch of a new version of the popular click-to-earn game Tapos 2 on the Aptos network.

Interestingly, the launch of the first version of the game in May also caused a similar surge in Aptos activity. At the time, the network achieved its highest-ever daily transaction volume with 115.4 million transactions and a peak transaction per second (TPS) of 32,000 TPS.

Aptos daily transaction volume now ranks two out of the top three transaction volumes ever by a Layer-1 network following its recent record transactions. The network’s 115.4 million transactions on May 25 remain the highest ever, followed by Sui Network’s 65 million.

Launched in 2022 by former Facebook engineers, Aptos blockchain was designed to be a better alternative to first-generation smart contract networks like Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) and Solana (CRYPTO: SOL). While it has shown its higher capacity, the network has yet to see much adoption.

However, the arrival of Tap Cat and other decentralized applications has brought a new wave of users to the platform. Tap Cat is a tap-to-earn game where users earn $HEART tokens by tapping on a virtual cat. Despite attracting gas fees, they are negligible, and the first 72 hours of playing time are free, encouraging more users to try it out.

Despite the high volume of transactions, the network’s transaction costs have remained largely unaffected. Aptos’ gas fee remains very low even as it processes more transactions, highlighting the network's strength as a scalable layer-1 contract capable of high performance regardless of on-chain activity.

Having seen increased adoption this year, Aptos now boasts 20 million unique users in 2024 and has already processed over 1 billion transactions. More decentralized finance protocols are also launching on the network, causing its total value locked (TVL) to double this year.

Despite its high throughput, whether the network could compete with established heavyweights such as Ethereum and Solana is questionable. According to Defillama, Its $389.17 million TVL ranks it 20th among all Layer-1 and Layer-2 blockchains.

While Aptos fans believe this will happen and point at its TPS, which is 50x higher than Ethereum’s and 10x above the Base network, that might take a while as it does not have a first-mover advantage, and its programming language, Move, is relatively new.

On the other hand, the surge in Aptos blockchain activity had a positive impact on the Aptos token APT price today, rising from $6.595 to $6.953. Nevertheless, the gains were shortlived, and the token is now down 2.5% along with the rest of the market.

Despite the price decline, APT remains one of the best-performing assets over the last seven days, rising 32.5%. Investors are hoping the token will sustain that positive momentum for longer, enabling a reversal of its poor performance in 2024. The token has declined by 32.5% year-to-date.

The biggest factor behind APT’s poor performance has been the multiple unlocks of Aptos tokens, increasing supply. The project has been unlocking 11.31 million tokens on the 11th and 12th of each month since May 2024 and will continue until October 2026.