Onchain analytics agency Nansen ranked Solana, BNB Chain, Base, Tron and NEAR Protocol because the busiest blockchains in 2025.
Solana led the pack with 23.01 billion transactions, whereas BNB Chain adopted with 3.89 billion. Coinbase’s Ethereum layer-2 Base dealt with 3.29 billion for third, as Tron trailed with 3.22 billion and NEAR got here in fifth with 1.89 billion.
At the same time as 2025 was marked by institutional adoption, retail-focused use circumstances continued to dominate transaction volumes, notably on blockchains with low charges and excessive throughput.
Prime 5 blockchains by exercise in 2025. Supply: Nansen
Solana’s DEX growth and memecoin craze
Solana’s dominance got here on the again of a buying and selling growth that pushed it to the highest of decentralized alternate (DEX) rankings in early 2025.
CoinGecko reported that Solana DEX buying and selling dominated 40% of the business’s market share by recording $293.7 billion within the first quarter of 2025. It was pushed partially by a memecoin frenzy round movie star and political tokens like $TRUMP, a Solana-based token launched on Jan. 18 tied to US President Donald Trump.
DefiLlama information confirmed that Solana remained among the many prime chains by DEX quantity all year long, with month-to-month volumes round or above the $100 billion mark.
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BNB Chain’s roughly 3.89 billion transactions, per Nansen, coincided with the rise of its personal memecoin scene.
BSC leads blockchain networks | Supply: Cointelegraph
Base ranked third by 2025 transaction rely because it leveraged direct distribution from Coinbase’s person base. A 2026 outlook by Messari researcher AJC stated that Base’s protocol income grew by about 30 occasions in 2025, capturing 62% of whole L2 income. The identical analysis famous that Base’s ecosystem now spans DEXs, AI‑linked apps and prediction platforms.
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Tron and NEAR spherical out the highest 5
Tron’s 3.22 billion transactions mirrored its position as a spine for the stablecoin economic system. In June 2025, TRON DAO stated that greater than half of circulating USDt (USDT) is issued on its blockchain. Its stablecoin provide grew about 40% 12 months‑to‑date with day by day switch volumes within the tens of billions of {dollars}.
NEAR Protocol rounded out the highest 5, with 1.89 billion transactions in 2025 in response to Nansen’s rating.
NEAR reported about 46 million customers in Could, putting it alongside Solana and Tron in exercise metrics. Past numbers, a key a part of NEAR’s 2025 story was its position within the privateness narrative through Zcash (ZEC), whose comeback was pushed partially by the Electrical Coin Firm’s Zashi pockets integrating with NEAR’s Intents system. It allowed customers to maneuver out and in of ZEC’s shielded pool with out going via centralized exchanges.
This integration helped push Zcash’s shielded provide to file ranges and drove a spike in exercise on NEAR Intents, together with a day with over $17 million in Zcash-related quantity.
