In 2015, the Pew Research Center surveyed Americans on their knowledge and use of Bitcoin. At that time, only 1% of adults reported having collected, traded, or used Bitcoin.

The Center did a similar survey in 2021. Last year, 16% of Americans said they personally have invested in, traded, or otherwise used cryptocurrencies. ¹

User adoption of cryptocurrencies has clearly grown since 2015, but how is user growth holding up in the current bear market?

To measure user adoption, I present on-chain data on daily active blockchain users. An active user is defined as a distinct address having initiated a transaction. I group users by chain to measure user growth on Terra, Ethereum and Solana.

Sources:

1. Study: This is how many Americans have traded cryptocurrency

Charting the number of daily active users shows which chain has the most users. Ethereum still dominates but Solana has approximately half as many active users.

By measuring the percentage change in daily active users, we can determine the growth in active users from February 1st to today (March 14).

Solana has achieved a 22% growth in daily active users. Overall, there is a lot of variability in the daily number of active users.

Takeaways

1. Sixteen percent of Americans report having used or invested in cryptocurrencies.
2. Daily active users are highest on Ethereum, with Solana having about half of Ethereum's user base.
3. Since February 1st, Solana has achieved 22% growth in daily active users.
4. During that period, there was no clear trend towards increased user adoption for any of the Layer 1 chains observed.

Technical Notes

Daily Active Users are distinct addresses having initiated a transaction in the ethereum.transactions, terra.transactions or the solana.transactions tables.

Failed transactions are also included in the query. A user is still considered active even if their transaction fails.

Polygon is now widely used, with daily active users comparable to Ethereum mainnet.

Algorand had a surge in activity in mid-February and in early March.

Polygon has achieved more than 20% growth in its user base since February 1st. This growth appears more stable compared to the highly variable activity previously seen on Layer 1 chains.

Algorand has lost a considerable number of active users since February 1st.