DeFi Hits New High with 27.3 Million Unique Users in May Alone
Over the past five years, DeFi has steadily moved beyond niche crypto circles into broader financial use, but 2025 gave that trend new momentum. Rising mainstream interest, better user interfaces, Layer 2 adoption, and integrations with traditional fintech platforms have made decentralized finance feel increasingly like regular online banking or investing, attracting more users than ever.
According to data presented by CryptoPresales.com, over 27 million unique wallet addresses interacted with DeFi protocols on-chain in May, the highest number on record, proving that DeFi is becoming more popular than ever.
Monthly Unique Users Quadrupled Year-over-Year
After hitting multi-year lows in 2022 and 2023, the 2024 crypto bull run breathed new life into the DeFi market, attracting a surge of new users. Investors returned to DeFi for staking, lending, and yield farming, fueling further growth. At the same time, technological advancements like Layer 2 solutions made DeFi faster, cheaper, and more accessible to a broader audience. Riding this momentum, decentralized finance became an even more significant part of the crypto space, and this trend only accelerated in 2025.
According to Dune Analytics data, riding the wave of the crypto bull run, the DeFi sector ended 2024 with an impressive 20.8 million monthly unique users, four times more than in December 2023. However, by the end of January 2025, that number slipped to 18.1 million before falling further to 14.4 million in February. Monthly unique DeFi users continued to fluctuate in the following months, recovering to 17.2 million in March and dropping again to 12.8 million in April, the lowest level in seven months.
But what seemed like the start of another downturn led to a historic surge in DeFi activity. In May, the number of unique wallet addresses interacting with DeFi protocols on-chain skyrocketed to 27.3 million, the highest monthly figure the market has ever seen. Furthermore, this represents a massive fourfold increase compared to last May, when around 6.1 million unique addresses were active. The spike in user numbers reflects strong market sentiment and growing trust in DeFi platforms for lending, trading, staking, and yield farming.
Retail Adoption Surges, But TVL Grows Slower
While the DeFi market saw explosive user growth, the total value locked (TVL) in DeFi protocols grew much slower, rising by a more modest 15% year-over-year to $111 billion in June. The gap between user growth and capital inflow suggests that while more people use DeFi, many contribute smaller amounts, either cautiously re-entering during the market recovery or simply exploring the ecosystem.
The DeFi Llama data also shows that Ethereum continues to dominate, holding over 55% of the total TVL, slightly down from 61% last June. Solana saw impressive gains, increasing its market share from 4.4% to 7.4%, making it the second-largest blockchain by TVL. Bitcoin and Binance Smart Chain (BSC) follow with 5.6% and 5.3% shares, respectively. On the other hand, Tron’s market share nearly halved, dropping from 8.2% to 4.2% year-over-year.