Memecoins Drive DEX Growth on Solana, with PumpDotFun Leading the Charge

Solana has a DEX, and in 2025 it started showing signs of recovery, with trading volume increasing to upwards of $6 billion per day

Solana's DEX volumes have recovered to mid-February levels, with daily total volumes crossing $6 billion and memecoin volumes now at nearly $4 billion. Despite constant remarks about the supposed ephemerality of memecoin trading, the sector has continuously adapted to new narratives.

This type of trading has shown itself to be quite sturdy, adapting to—and sometimes leading—new trends and narratives.

From late 2023 to early 2024, trades involving memecoins have provided between 40% and 70% of the total trading volume found on Solana DEXs. This kind of trading is far from the total collapse we seemed set for in 2022 and at the beginning of 2023, with trades found in Solana memecoins likely as safe as any trades found on centralized exchanges.

Solana DEX volumes are experiencing a resurgence, and that revival is closely linked to trading “memecoins.” A new player in this realm is @pumpdotfun, which seems to have quickly inflated to near the top of the Solana DEX leaderboard, commanding over 20% of DEX volume in recent weeks. @pumpdotfun features a unique bonding curve and automated market maker (AMM) functionality that have made it popular with users.

This growth has not come without consequences, though, as it has seemingly and at least to some extent displaced @RaydiumProtocol in the DEX trading mix.

Previously, Raydium held a commanding percentage of the Solana DEX market, accounting for as much as 60% of the total DEX volume. But the memecoin trading movement—taking place on platforms such as PumpDotFun—has blasted off and is now wrecking what’s left of the Solana DEX ecosystem. Raydium is not even mentioned as a key player in the latest segment of the Solana DEX ecosystem on DeFi Lama.

Tokens like those traded on PumpDotFun represent an enduring sector on Solana: the memecoin. These offshoots of the meme economy reach obscene heights, and on Solana (as elsewhere), they are propped up by a few factors.

High volatility lends them an aura of potential profitability, which attracts traders. Still, they maintain a decent amount of user engagement—because, at the end of the day, what are these tokens but a joke? A joke waiting to be told, retold, and riffed on, the surface reason why the value of these tokens might go up. What are trading memes if not a punchline?

Memecoin Empire: New Launchpads and Apps Drive Shift in Market Share

While PumpDotFun has held a dominant position for a long time, newer projects and platforms are starting to make a big splash in Solana's DEX landscape.

AxiomExchange's recent rise has been key to the overall increase in app activity across Solana, contributing 5-10% of total trading volume and about 15% of memecoin trading volume. This is a shift that shows the Solana ecosystem is becoming more diversified and that users are exploring a new set of applications and exchange platforms.

Additionally, the excitement around memecoin projects and the appearance of new launchpads have turned up the competitive intensity. One notable instance comes from @RaydiumProtocol's LaunchLab, which has been riding the coattails of @bonk_fun, a top-shelf memecoin that has driven attention and traffic to the platform. This instance illustrates the new-wave project fishing for momentum using the Solana DEX infrastructure to create a buzz around itself.

Maybe the most amazing change has occurred with @MeteoraAG, whose market share has rocketed upward thanks to the rising enthusiasm around @believeapp. The roll-out of Believe has sparked fresh interest in the Solana memecoin scene, as the platform really leans into the Internet Capital Markets story.

Over just a couple days, Meteora's market share has blasted up to 25%, while PumpDotFun has seen a slight dip, moving from the mid-30s down to around 20%. This change in market dynamics is a result of the new projects launching on Raydium's LaunchLab and the hype surrounding Bonk, which has brought a lot of attention to the platform.

This transformation highlights the increasing impact of new launchpads and applications within the Solana ecosystem, which are competing with long-established platforms like PumpDotFun. The latest narratives that are gathering momentum and the innovative projects that are in the vanguard of user attention mean that the market dynamics are changing with dizzying speed and that the Solana DEX sector retains a highly competitive and fluid character.