AI and social dap will lead growth as crypto markets cool post-Trump elections

In the first quarter of 2025, the DAPP industry maintained its strength despite mild immersion in activity. The crypto market had solid momentum leading up to President Trump’s presidency, but feelings quickly changed afterwards, ultimately causing a drop in asset prices.

Historically, such recessions reduce user engagement with decentralized applications. Still, the daily unique active wallet (DUAW) fell to 24 million, as it had only slipped 3% since the last quarter.

According to the latest report from Dapp Radar, the user base is relatively stable. In this field, AI and Social Dapps have appeared as top performers. The AI ​​category has seen an increase in activity by 2.6 million DUAWs. Social Dup also grew steadily, increasing 10% to 2.8 million dews.

Defi is a struggle, but Solana dominates the top dapp

Defi was hit hardest in the first quarter of 2025, with Dapp Radar recording a 15% drop from the previous quarter due to a decline in trading activity. Despite the set-off, it continues to lead among the DAPP sector, even if its advantage slips by almost 4%. Blockchain games have also decreased slightly.

Among the top-dups ​​by user activity, Layer 1 Network Solana remains dominant while powering three of the top five platforms. Pump.Fun has allowed Token launches at Solana, which has led to an impressive 112% increase in usage this quarter. Spike highlighted the continued hype around meme coins despite wider volatility in the market.

NFT market will be cooled in the first quarter

The NFT market stumbled in early 2025 as trading volume fell to $1.5 billion in the first quarter. This is a 24% drop from the last quarter. Total sales fell by only 10%, indicating a decline in high-value transactions rather than user engagement. The decline in token prices, particularly Ethereum prices, may have driven this shift. The low ratings show continued interest in the NFTS despite the difficult environment, with the overall volume being hit harder than participation.

OKX ranked the highest in NFT trading volume, but Opensea was the most transactional since it was part of the OS2 beta release on February 13th. Blur kept pace in terms of volume, but only saw 7% of Opensea’s sales. Meanwhile, Cryptopunks is still a collection of staple foods, but price increases are out of reach for many average users.