Introduction

Over the years, many web3 startups have struggled to scale and retain a stable user base. Despite the initial hype around decentralisation, the core challenge remains in building sustainable long-term business models across competitive sectors like gaming, entertainment, social media, and DeFi.

Understanding fundamental economics - such as low high / high FDV, market caps will become increasing important.

Unfortunately, many projects continue to prioritize short-term token pumps over sustainable growth. After the cycle peak in 2021, many startups failed to even reach close to their previous ATHs let alone break their ATHs (only $BTC, $BNB have managed to do that in the top tokens), with hardly a handful of them a few managing to even survive from previous cycles of 2017-2018.

One major issue in past Web3 cycles has been the absence of robust business models. While software development cycles typically takes 5-7 years to mature, projects like even Ethereum are still only 8 years in, and others like Solana are hardly 5 years in. It’s just very difficult . As a result, many projects have fallen into the trap of relying on token hype, which generates short-term excitement but really doesn’t offer any strong long-term value beyond governance.

This imbalance between speculation around the token and actually being able to have any value accrual and token utility is one of the major whitespaces in the ecosystem even currently.

I believe the true potential of web3 lies in its intersection with real-world industries like energy, AI, IoT, and supply chain. By focusing on these building applications, web3 can finally deliver on its promise of ownership, transparency, and broader societal impact - moving beyond speculation to create lasting value.

What’s changing?

There’s a clear shift toward creating tokens that are tied to real business models and tangible revenue. Projects should no longer rely on hype and narrative positioning to boost token prices; instead, the focus should be on delivering real value - through mechanisms like voting rights, access to services, or utility that drives long-term engagement to the users and accrues value back the the token via burning, staking.

Both investors and users are now prioritizing projects that offer sustainable benefits. Concepts like staking, token burning, and user rewards are helping to strengthen these projects and ensure their growth. For example, Uniswap recently decided to rewards its users with fees for trading and providing liquidity

This shift points to a future where tokens are not just tools for trading on the secondary but actually become an integral part of the project.

Which sectors are performing well?

So, now let’s try to really understand which are a few sectors or ecosystems that are doing pretty well and able to generate a consistent cash flow and actually usage by the users.

Even though many of the projects are still in the development phase or just launched, most are shifting towards figuring out important business metrics and justifying them like revenue, profits and user-base other than only focusing on volume and no.of txns.

Here are a few industries that have been doing pretty well and are known to be cash-rich sectors which actually have less of a speculative problem but more issues around bootstrapping, distribution in the initial stages, once they are figured out - these turn in cash-cow businesses.

→ DePIN

• It’s been one of the hottest sectors lately, with a lot of attention moving towards it from AI, gaming which did well initially in the year thanks to some real numbers around usage and metrics being brought about by the projects in the space, led by Helium.
• Projects like Helium, a decentralized wireless network, demonstrate the power of real-world utility. Helium’s HNT token is earned by users who set up hotspots to provide wireless coverage, with value driven by IoT device usage, not speculation.
• There are projects like GEOD and Hivemapper which follow a similar model, crowdsourcing physical data such as location and dashcam footage, which can be then monetized.
• All of these projects have really been doing well on the revenue levels and being able to generate some good cashflow and actually being able to translate it back to the token value accrual.

→ Social Platforms

• Web3 social has always been interesting and exciting for everyone. Consumer apps are one of the major ways by which the tech can actually reach to the millions of users around the world. But for a long time, consumer crypto has really struggled to take off.
• Recently, alliance and other firms have really been pushing the narrative strongly and chains like solana / base are becoming more and more consumer friendly, encouraging users to build on top of them.
• Apps like Farcaster, Lens Protocol, Fantasy top are actually tying to change this sentiment around consumer crypto. Some of them have actually been also Abel to generate some meaningful revenues and usage numbers.
• But it’s still too early to tell since it’s a very small user base as compared to the broader web2 world, but it’s a good start.

→ Launchpads

• Projects often struggle the most in their initial phase of launch - they lack the most important thing required for them: relevance and distribution.
• This is where launchpads can really help change the game, they offer a platform and an ecosystem of users / investors / supporters to these projects.
• Launchpads like Pump Fun and Multiplier have been able to genarte millions in revenues as a platform in a very short span of time, thanks to hype and adoption of memecoins as a category.
• Though I personally believe, this is not a very sustainable model in the long run, since it’s only caused more harm than bring about any value to the space, but it’s good to be aware of the different verticals that have managed to do well and actually take inspiration from them to replicate them into building something more long-term in other sectors.

→ DeFi Products

• Defi remains to an evergreen category - and one of the only categories that has consistently been able to bring in a good share of revenues in web3 with leaders like uniswap, aave, maker, curve contributing massive numbers.
• I believe that these are the “boring“ yet sustainable businesses that will seize to exist for the long term and it’ll be interesting to see if apps can be built on leveraging the first principles of defi and combine them with other sectors like prediction markets, gaming to experiment if there’s a new market or angle that can open up.

Web3 vs web2 models

The core difference between Web3 and Web2 companies lies in how they generate revenue and operate. Web2 relies on centralized models like subscriptions, ads, and enterprise sales. In contrast, Web3 leverages decentralized models such as tokenomics, transaction fees, staking, and DeFi yields, creating value for both the platform and its users.

Web2 derives value by:

• Controlling user data
• Monetizing premium content
• Providing platform services

Web3 shifts control to communities through:

• Token ownership
• DAOs and governance
• Voting and participation incentives

While this decentralization offers new opportunities, it also introduces hurdles like complex UX, regulatory challenges, and scalability issues (e.g., blockchain congestion, high gas fees).

Web3 startups benefit from quick product launches using smart contracts but struggle with:

• Lack of onboarding ease
• Limited retention mechanisms
• Product utility beyond speculative value

For long-term success, the focus must shift to building sustainable revenue models and converting them into real token utility rather than relying on hype.

Here are a few different types of models and how they are used across sectors:

• Token-based
  • Tokens drive platform operations, often serving governance roles.
  • As the platform grows, so does token value through mechanisms like burning.
  • Example: MakerDAO burns MKR tokens as debts are repaid, which reduces supply and increases value over time.
• Subscription
  • Web3 platforms, like Audius, offer premium features or content via recurring fees, cutting out intermediaries.
  • Artists and creators earn directly from their audiences, just like in traditional web2 subscriptions.
• Platform fees
  • Platforms like Zora earn revenue by taking a small percentage of each transaction.
  • User activity directly drives revenue growth
• DePIN networks
  • These projects in this sector reward users for contributing real-world resources, like bandwidth or wireless coverage or location data.
  • Helium allows users to earn tokens by providing wireless hotspots that support IoT devices.
• DeXs
  • DeFi platforms generate revenue by charging fees on services like token swaps or lending.
  • Uniswap, for instance, shares swap fees with liquidity providers, ensuring continuous income for both parties.
• Social tokens
  • Creators mint their own tokens for fans to buy or trade.
  • Revenue is driven by token sales and fan engagement.
  • Rally enables creators to build stronger ties with their communities through token ownership.
• Marketplaces
  • Platforms like Blur, opensea, rarible generate revenue by taking a percentage of each NFT/ asset sale.
  • As trading activity grows, so does the platform’s revenue, directly linking profitability to user participation.
• Web3 gaming / entertainment - freemium
  • Revenue in web3 gaming comes from in-game purchases, marketplace fees, or play-to-earn models.
• Decentralised AI
  • Decentralized cloud service providers, like Akash Network, rent out computing power.
  • Users pay for these resources with tokens, competing directly with traditional cloud providers.
  • There are projects solving for decentralised training, workflows, data scrapping/ colleciton as well.
• Launchpads
  • Launchpads like DAO Maker help projects raise funds via token sales, earning a percentage or charging fees.

Projects generating revenue

Projects that have some real-world utility have consistently outperformed those reliant on speculative tokenomics on a long term level.

Revenue-driven models are slowly becoming become the foundation for the most successful web3 ventures, proving their value through sustainable business models that appeal to both users and investors alike.

This chart provides a comprehensive view of top revenue-generating crypto projects.

It’s great to see projects like tether, tron, eth have been dominating the space and are all chains / coins in themselves, which forms the base layer of web3.

When looking at the fastest apps to reach $100M in revenue, we notice a strong connection between real utility and financial performance of the project.

• Projects that focus on real-world applications, like decentralized exchanges and DeFi platforms, tend to grow quicker.
• Their ability to generate steady revenue from transaction fees, staking rewards, % for the reward pool are some of the methods that has helped grow them so fast to doing almost $100m in revenue in such short spans of time

Let’s look at some of the most interesting projects out there currently.

1.Helium

Helium has been one of the top-performing projects in 2024, focusing on mobile carrier services as an alternative to traditional providers. It’s focusing on consumer scale and onboarding, and leverages solana for settlement.

Its token’s value is tied to network usage, not hype.

Since June, the network has attracted 756,000 users, transferring over 19.1 TB of data. The best part is that most users don’t even realize they’re interacting with blockchain. The sign-ups have surged over the past year, reflecting Helium’s solid push towards mainstream adoption.

According to depin.ninja’s stats, helium ranks as the top project in terms of revenue generated in recent times. They’ve been doing some amazing work and with halving in 2025, it’ll be interesting to see how the revenues rise.

2.DeX’s (Uniswap, Jupiter)

Uniswap remains the largest DEX, consistently generating strong trading volumes. However, with the recent surge in Solana’s popularity, Solana-native DEXs like Jupiter have started to take a notable share of the market away from Uniswap.

Overall, the DEX landscape looks promising, with platforms generating fees per transaction and handling large volumes. Across the top five DEXs alone, trading volumes are approaching $45 billion, a figure that’s impressive compared to almost all other sectors.

3.Farcaster

Farcaster is probably the biggest crypto social media platform focused on user-owned content and engagement. Instead of relying on token speculation, users pay for permanent storage of their accounts, which has helped the platform generate some decent revenues.

It has also gained traction thanks to support from the memecoin community and degens joining the app. Although its revenue is lower compared to other sectors, Farcaster stands as the leading protocol in the crypto social space. It will be interesting to see how they scale to reach their goal of 10 million users in the coming years.

4.GEOD

GEODNET is the world’s largest Web3-based RTK network, providing highly accurate location services for AI, IoT, and autonomous systems. By using Real-Time Kinematics (RTK), GEODNET aims to deliver a 100x improvement in position accuracy compared to traditional GPS.

This enhanced precision is crucial for applications that rely on on-device sensors like

• cameras
• LiDAR
• IMUs

Which makes it a key player in powering AI-driven autonomous systems.

• The network has scaled rapidly, with over 9,000 miners deployed globally and consistent 10-15% month-over-month revenue growth since the start of the year.
• GEODNET is on track to achieve $2-3M ARR by year’s end, making it one of the largest high-margin DePIN projects with strong potential for further growth.
• Their tech is not only more accurate but also 90% cheaper than competitors, offering broader global coverage.
• Working with partners like the US Department of Agriculture, GEODNET is proving that long-term, steady growth can yield significant outcomes, with the company already showing 20x revenue growth from $5K to $100K+ monthly.

5.Across Protocol

Across Protocol is a cross-chain bridge that enables seamless asset transfers between different blockchains. It earns revenue by charging fees for these transfers, making its success directly tied to the demand for fast and secure cross-chain liquidity. As more assets move across chains, especially with the increasing adoption of multi-chain ecosystems, Across has positioned itself as a critical player in this space.

Over the past month, Across Protocol has dominated Ethereum chain transactions through JumperExchange, handling over 60% of all bridges from Ethereum. This strong performance shows its growing influence in cross-chain operations. Powered by “intents,” a new approach to cross-chain interoperability, Across is setting the standard for smooth and efficient user experiences when moving assets between blockchains.

As compared to other bridges, it tends to offer an extremely low wait list in seconds as compared to that of minutes by other providers.

It’s also been slowly climbing up in the race of cross-chain transfer provider networks.

6.Kamino Finance

Kamino specialises in optimizing liquidity management and offers users a suite of tools like lending, borrowing, and leverage strategies.

The platform has seen impressive growth, reaching an annual recurring revenue (ARR) of nearly $14 million.

Over the past year, Kamino has generated around $30 million in cumulative interest for its users, highlighting its ability to deliver consistent returns through its DeFi offerings.

7.Stablecoins (Tether & Circle)

Stablecoins have become essential in the Web3 space, with Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC) leading the charge. These two giants dominate the market, serving as the go-to stablecoins for traders, developers, and users alike. Their widespread adoption and liquidity make them the backbone of many decentralized finance (DeFi) platforms.

Tether, in particular, is often compared to major Web2 financial players like JPMorgan, Visa, and Mastercard, due to its rapid rise and dominance in the financial ecosystem. In a short span, it has managed to surpass many traditional giants in market reach and integration within crypto markets.

Both Tether and Circle consistently outperform other stablecoin providers and blockchain-based protocols, commanding the largest market share in web3. Their stability, liquidity, and integration across various chains and dApps set them apart, making them a crucial part of the space.

Takeaway:

• Each of these projects showcase the growing importance of real-world utility in driving crypto revenues.
• Whether through infrastructure, social, gaming or defi ,the future of web3 will be shaped by projects that successfully align their tokenomics with real-world utility and sustainable revenue based dynamics.

What has not worked?

Friend.tech is a good case in how a project can generate buzz and revenue quickly but fail to build long-term sustainability.

A good example of “Why not all revenue-making startups are successful?”

The apps’s rise was driven by users buying ‘keys’ (shares) of others, hoping their value would rise as users gained popularity and more and more users will start joining in over a period of time. However, with no real utility beyond speculative trading, users quickly lost interest once the initial excitement faded. And moreover the initial hype can also be attributed to the fact that the team had teased an airdrop to the early participants - but since the airdrop happened, hardly there’s been any utility and usage of the platform.

Speculation-driven economies are inherently fragile—users seek quick gains but leave when no substantial value is offered. In contrast, platforms like Uniswap and Helium have maintained long-term engagement by offering real-world utility, proving that sustainable success comes from creating lasting value, not hype.

Friend.tech lacked this foundation, and once the speculative buzz wore off, there was little to keep users engaged.

The takeaway is clear: for web3 platforms to thrive, they need to offer something of substance beyond speculation.

Why heavy token reliance projects struggle in long term?

Projects that lean too heavily on token-pumping may achieve rapid success but struggle to maintain that momentum. Token prices in these ecosystems are often driven by hype and speculation, but without a solid foundation of utility, users quickly lose interest. Once the excitement fades and users realize there’s no deeper value, token prices crash, leading to a downward spiral as users exit.

This issue was clear in Axie Infinity, which relied on a dual-token system to support its growing player base. As more users joined, the economy became overinflated, and token rewards could no longer sustain the user growth. Eventually, the entire system collapsed as the token economy couldn’t keep pace with the influx of players.

Axie infinity chart

A similar problem occurred with STEPN, a fitness app that initially attracted users by offering token rewards for physical activity. However, as token supply increased and prices fell, user engagement dropped, revealing a fundamental flaw in relying solely on token incentives to drive long-term participation.

Even though Axie made significant revenue through marketplace fees and in-game purchases, the project’s dependence on token growth and user expansion ultimately failed when the growth rate slowed.

Similarly, STEPN, a fitness app that initially attracted users with token rewards, failed to maintain engagement once token prices fell due to oversupply.

Even though Axie made money through purchases and marketplace fees, its model relied too much on user growth and token rewards, which eventually failed when growth slowed down.

Web3 gaming vs Web2 gaming

The challenges faced by projects like Friend.tech and Axie Infinity highlight a broader issue within the Web3 gaming space. Compared to traditional web2 games, web3 games struggle to generate similar revenue. For example, a recent web2 game made $600 million in its first week alone— web3 games haven’t come close to achieving such numbers. This isn’t because web3 gaming is a bad concept; rather, it’s because the technology isn’t being used to its full potential, leading to missed opportunities.

One major issue is that many web3 games still focus too much on token-based systems, where players are incentivized by financial rewards instead of the actual gaming experience. This over-reliance on tokenomics creates unrealistic expectations, with players left disappointed when the gameplay doesn’t live up to the hype. To truly compete with web2 gaming, web3 projects need to shift their focus to what makes games fun and engaging in the first place. The technology should enhance gameplay, not become the focal point.

To succeed, web3 gaming must pivot towards gameplay-first models. Blockchain technology has the potential to provide innovative experiences, but it should serve as a tool to enhance immersion, not as the driving force behind the entire economy. Web3 games will only reach their potential when the emphasis moves from token economies to creating truly enjoyable and engaging player experiences.

So what should change?

→ Financial metrics for success

• Web3 projects must move beyond focusing solely on token prices. Traditional tech companies track key metrics like revenue, profit margins, and active users, and Web3 projects should do the same by measuring real user activity and value creation happening.
• The focus should be on figuring out and defining the right set of north star metrics that might be suitable for a specific business in a particular sector - this will only happen with more concrete benchmarking against web2 counterparts and also talking to the customers actively.

→ User-centric design

• Another important shift is focusing on UX - easy to use interfaces and interactions with the tech.
• Web3 platforms need intuitive, user-friendly designs to ensure long-term growth. Currently, most of the experiences are complex, with complicated wallet management and steep learning curves, which force new users to drop-off early.
• Simplifying onboarding and improving wallet usability are key steps. Players like privy, dynamic, turnkey are some of the amazing projects who are working towards solving it.
• Long-term engagement is essential too. Platforms must deliver real value that keeps users coming back, not just speculative rewards. Audius, for example, enables artists to connect with fans in meaningful ways, adding value beyond token incentives. This combined with the right set of solutions to use the tech is what is exactly required.

→ Challenges to implementing utility

• One of the biggest challenges is scalability. Blockchains often struggles with handling large transaction volumes at low costs. High gas fees on Ethereum, for example, have discouraged wider adoption, developers are moving to other chains like Sui, solana.
• Interoperability is also an ongoing issue, as many platforms operate in isolation. Crosschain solutions like Polkadot and Cosmos are making progress, but they have not really been able to become market leaders.
• Finally, regulation has always remained a significant challenge. With the ETF approvals this has reduced a bit, but this there alway remains concerns and grey areas that need to be figured and addressed.

Conclusion

Web3 holds immense potential, but lasting success requires moving beyond token speculation. Projects like Friend.tech and Axie Infinity show that while hype can create quick wins, but it doesn’t translate into sustained long-term growth.

To boom, web3 platforms must focus on building real value - that starts with:

• building real utility based products
• tracking meaningful metrics like active users and transaction volumes, not just token prices
• building for the users
• creating seamless and engaging experiences for the users
• not hyping up only on the basis of speculation, but rather utility first.

Simplifying user experience and addressing real-world needs will drive lasting engagement. Overcoming technical challenges like scalability, interoperability, and navigating regulations will be crucial for wider adoption. The future of web3 lies in projects that blend innovative technology with practical, user-focused solutions, creating lasting impact beyond just token economics.

Disclaimer：

1. This article is reprinted from [Blockcrunch], All copyrights belong to the original author [Darshan Gandhi]. If there are objections to this reprint, please contact the Gate Learn team, and they will handle it promptly.
2. Liability Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not constitute any investment advice.
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