LUCKNOW (CoinChapter.com) — The total value of cryptocurrency airdrops in 2023 has reached $4.5 billion. It shows a 60% decrease from the $7.4 billion distributed in 2022. Despite a rebound in crypto prices this year following last year’s bear market, airdrops are still lagging behind previous years.
According to data aggregated by CoinGecko, Web3 projects will distribute $4.56 billion tokens in 2023. This represents a 40% year-over-year drop from the $7.46 billion handed out in 2022. For comparison, $7.43 billion and $7.28 billion worth of crypto was airdropped in 2021 and 2020, respectively, showing that 2023 is on pace to be the lowest year since 2020.
Notably, 13 of the top 50 largest airdrops occurred in 2023.
Top 3 Airdrops Dominance
The biggest airdrop this year was the distribution of the Arbitrum (ARB) token in March 2023. At its peak, the token reached an all-time high of $8.67 shortly after launch, with its airdrop valued at $1.9 billion based on this peak price. However, ARB has since crashed 85% to trade at just $1.36 per token today, with a market capitalization of $1.37 billion.
The second largest 2023 crypto airdrop was Celestia’s distribution of its TIA utility token to community members. Approximately $728 million worth of TIA tokens were distributed earlier this year. Unlike ARB, TIA has gained over 480% from its airdrop price of $2.08. Today, the token is trading at $12.17, boasting a market cap of $1.77 billion.
Coming in third was Blur’s first airdrop in February 2023. It distributed $450 million worth of its native token BLUR, valued at its ATH of $1.24. Tokens were distributed based on user engagement on Blur’s NFT aggregator platform. The second Blur airdrop followed later in the year brought the total combined value to over $600 million. After its second crypto airdrop, BLUR only reached its record-high price of $0.64.
The top 3 airdrops – Arbitrum, Celestia, and Blur – accounted for nearly 70% or $4.56 billion of the total value distributed through crypto airdrops in 2023. The remaining top crypto airdrops ranged from $16 million to $372 million in value at their respective ATHs.
Other Noteworthy Crypto Airdrops in 2023
Other major token distributions in 2023 include scaling solution Jito. It grabbed attention with an airdrop worth $312 million that briefly surpassed the market capitalization of the leading staking platform Lido DAO when it first launched.
The largest airdrop remains the decentralized exchange Uniswap‘s 2020 distribution of $6.4 billion UNI tokens on Sep. 16, 2020 – dwarfing anything seen before or since.
Looking ahead, several projects have recently announced loyalty and points programs that may lead to future airdrops. This includes the non-custodial wallet Rainbow, scaling protocol Jito, and margin trading platform MarginFi. With crypto prices rebounding healthily into 2023, the value of future token distributions could again rival the massive drops seen in previous bull cycle years.
