A Review of the DApp Industry Development in 2022

In 2022, affected by the market environment, the DApp industry developed steadily overall. Aside from the Move-to-Earn craze that emerged at the beginning of the year, storage and social media DApps also garnered attention, but these new changes have not yet formed a substantial transformative force. This article will comprehensively analyze the current state of the DApp industry in 2022 from the three dimensions of public chains, application types, and users.

Main Findings

1. The types of DApps on BNB Chain and Ethereum are the most diverse and comprehensive. The NFT collectible applications on Ethereum have surpassed DeFi to become dominant, accounting for about 50% of the total.

2. Based on the estimated average daily active addresses over the last 30 days, the total annual active address count for 4,464 active DApps on 8 public chains is approximately 113 million. BNB Chain users are the most active, followed by Polygon, Ethereum, and Optimism.

3. This year, only the active addresses of top social media applications showed an upward trend, with a cumulative increase of active addresses from January to December reaching 1583.75%. The decline in the other four categories of applications ranged between 50% and 80%.

4. Similarly, the transaction volume of leading social media applications is increasing, with a cumulative growth rate of 715.26% from January to December. The other four categories have all seen varying degrees of decline, with the gaming category down by 17.47%, which is relatively small.

5. The top 20 DApps had an average monthly total revenue of about $152 million, showing a significant downward trend throughout the year. The total revenue in January was $515 million, which dropped to $24 million in December, resulting in an annual decline of 95.34%. The average total revenue for the 20 DApps for the whole year was approximately $8.3 million.

DApp Ecosystem Overview

The main public chains with a large number of active DApps currently are Ethereum, EOS, Tron, Solana, Avalanche, BNB Chain, Polygon, and Optimism, totaling 8. In the last 30 days, there are 4,464 DApps with active addresses on these public chains.

BNB Chain has surpassed Ethereum to become the public chain with the most active DApps, totaling 1,779. Among them, there are 709 in the DeFi category, accounting for about 40%; 456 in the high-risk category, accounting for about 26%; and 346 in the gaming category, accounting for about 20%.

There are 1259 active DApps on Ethereum. Among them, 625 are NFT collectibles, accounting for about 50%; 304 are DeFi, accounting for about 24%; and 160 are games, accounting for about 13%.

Overall, BNB Chain and Ethereum have the richest variety of DApp types, while the ecosystems of the other six public chains mainly focus on 1-2 types, with some types missing. For example, among the 887 active DApps on Polygon, 442 are DeFi, accounting for about 50%; 162 are games, accounting for about 18%. The number of active DApps on Avalanche, Tron, EOS, Optimism, and Solana is relatively low, primarily focusing on DeFi.

According to the estimated annual active address count based on the average daily active address count of each active DApp in the last 30 days, the estimated total number of active addresses for 4,464 active DApps across 8 public chains is approximately 113 million. Among them, users on the BNB Chain are the most active, with an estimated total of 53.02 million active addresses for 1,779 active DApps. Following that is Polygon, with an estimated total of 24.65 million active addresses for 887 active DApps. The estimated total number of active addresses for active DApps on Ethereum and Optimism also exceeds 10 million. The other 4 public chains are less affected by the smaller total number of active DApps, resulting in a lower estimated total number of active addresses.

It is worth noting that due to the recent market downturn, the number of active addresses has decreased in the last 30 days, which may lead to an underestimation of the annual active address count. However, as a unified standard, this does not affect the comparison of activity levels across different public chains.

After removing extreme high values, the single DApp with the highest estimated median annual active addresses is Solana, with about 1782, followed by Optimism, with about 1387. Other public chains have single DApps with an estimated median annual active address count generally around 100-300.

Pay special attention to the top 50 DApps ranked by activity on various public chains. The estimated median number of annual active addresses for these DApps on BNB Chain and Polygon is the highest, approximately 155,100 and 143,600, respectively, followed by Ethereum, with about 65,900. The estimated median number of annual active addresses for single DApps in the top 50 on other public chains is mostly around 5,000 to 7,000.

Head DApp User Analysis

From the perspective of multi-chain layout, 6-7 leading DApps in the trading market and DeFi category have implemented layouts across more than 2 public chains, with 4-5 of them achieving layouts on more than 5 public chains. In the gaming category, 5 DApps have completed layouts on 2 public chains, but only 1-2 DApps in the NFT collectibles and social media categories have achieved multi-chain layouts. Overall, the multi-chain layout of various DApps is a major trend, but there is still room for expansion in various types, including gaming.

The total number of active addresses for the top 50 DApps across 5 major categories is approximately 455 million. Among them, the gaming category ranks the highest with 245 million; followed by DeFi with 114 million; the lowest is the NFT collectibles category, with only 5.67 million.

The gap in active addresses among top NFT collectible applications is not large, and the distribution is relatively concentrated, with the median number of annual active addresses for a single top DApp being only 81,300, and the highest at only 3.2 million. The same is true for social media categories, with a median of about 271,900. In contrast, the top applications in games and DeFi have a larger number of annual active addresses, with medians reaching 9,744,300 and 2,984,300 respectively, and both maximum values exceeding 80 million. There is a significant difference among top trading market applications, with the maximum number of annual active addresses exceeding 36 million, but the median is only 1,446,100.

It is worth noting that this year, only the active addresses of top social media applications showed an upward trend, increasing from a cumulative 400,000 in January to a cumulative 6.68 million in December, with an annual increase of 1583.75%. The active addresses of the other four types of DApps showed a downward trend throughout the year, with a cumulative decline of 50%-80% from January to December.

In terms of transaction volume, the total number of transactions for the top 50 DApps across 5 major categories reached approximately 8.275 billion times throughout the year. The gaming category led with about 7.14 billion transactions, accounting for 86% of the total; followed by the trading market category with approximately 777 million transactions. The NFT collectibles and social media categories were much lower, with only 30.26 million and 56.82 million transactions respectively. This is related to the characteristics of the application types, as games have extremely high-frequency interaction features, whereas NFT collectibles and social media typically require interaction only when minting NFTs, resulting in lower frequency.

Looking at the changes over the year, only social media categories are growing, with the total number of transactions for top DApps rising from 1,554,900 in January to 12,676,300 in December, an increase of 715.26%. The other four categories have all seen varying degrees of decline, with the gaming category declining by 17.47% from January to December, a relatively small drop, while the NFT collectibles category saw the largest decline, exceeding 84%.

In terms of transaction amount, the total transaction amount of the top 50 DApps in 5 categories is approximately $2.21 trillion for the entire year. The DeFi category accounts for about $2.19 trillion, which is 99% of the total. The transaction amounts for other categories are relatively small, with the total transaction amount of the top DApps in the social media category being only about $6 million for the entire year.

Combining the number of transactions, it can be seen that game user behavior is characterized by small amount and ultra-high frequency interactions, DeFi represents ultra-high amount and medium frequency interactions, while NFT collectibles and social media both exhibit ultra-small amount and ultra-low frequency interactions.

Affected by the market environment, the total transaction volume of the five major types of leading DApps showed a significant downward trend throughout the year. The transaction volume of NFTs, games, and trading markets from January to December saw a decline of over 95%. The lowest decline during the same period was in social media, at approximately 20%.

Head DApp Development and Revenue Situation

According to the data, the 15 DApps with the most developers include Chainlink, yearn.Finance, The Graph, MakerDAO, Uniswap, etc. These DApps have an average total of about 437 developers per month, with the total number of developers in the first half of the year being higher than in the second half, showing a downward trend in development activity throughout the year. March, April, and June are periods of higher development activity, with the total number of developers exceeding 480 each month. In contrast, October and December are lower, with the total number of developers below 400 each month.

Looking at a single DApp, the average total number of people per month per DApp for the whole year is about 29. Chainlink is the highest, with an average monthly total of 75 developers. MakerDAO, The Graph, and yearn.Finance are also relatively high, all exceeding 30 people.

In terms of revenue, the 20 DApps with the highest cumulative total revenue include LooksRare, Opensea, dYdX, PancakeSwap, and others. These DApps have an average monthly total revenue of about $15.2 million, showing a significant downward trend throughout the year. Total revenue in January was $515 million, dropping to $24 million in December, representing a year-on-year decline of 95.34%. After June, the total revenue for any single month never exceeded $70 million, indicating that DApp revenue is greatly affected by market conditions.

Looking at individual DApps, LooksRare and Opensea had the highest total annual revenue, reaching $552 million and $450 million respectively. Other DApps had lower total annual revenues, with only dYdX and PancakeSwap exceeding $100 million. The average total annual revenue for the 20 DApps was approximately $83 million, with a median of $35 million. Overall, the revenue performance of the leading DApps was relatively good.