Coinbase analysis of Solana network costs: activity tends to be in the western US time slot, and DEX

According to the latest research report released by Coinbase Institutional, the activity of the Solana (SOL) network typically peaks during US time periods, but compared to Bitcoin and Ethereum, Solana's activity seems to be more biased towards time zones on the West Coast of the United States. The report points out that Solana's transaction fee expenditure is consistent with other low-cost networks, with the top 0.13% of users contributing 90% of non voting transaction fees, most of which come from DEX trading activities.

The peak activity is biased towards the West Coast time zone of the United States

The Coinbase report points out that Solana's transaction fee expenses surged during the US session, which is consistent with the pattern they have observed on other exchanges. But Solana's peak activity time tends to be in the Pacific Time Zone of the United States, suggesting that its user base may differ geographically from Bitcoin and Ethereum.

The report also mentioned that Solana's transaction fees peaked during the third quarter of 2024, occurring at 8pm UTC (4pm EST). David Han, a research analyst at Coinbase Institutional, pointed out that this is an interesting peak period because apart from the West Coast of the United States, no other major economic regions will be active in the market during this time.

In contrast, the peak of Base's activity occurs at 10am Eastern Time, similar to Ethereum, while the peak of Arbitrarum and Polygon PoS occurs at 9am Hong Kong Time, demonstrating their influence in the Asian market.

Failed transaction costs decrease

The report also pointed out that in the third quarter of 2024, the fees generated by Solana's "failed transactions" significantly decreased, accounting for about 26% of the total transaction fees, which has fallen sharply from the peak of 55% in March. Although this ratio is still higher than other low-cost chains (such as Coinbase's Base, which averages 14%), Solana's transaction failure rate is gradually approaching the peer range.

The activity is still focused on DEX

In terms of active user concentration, the top 0.13% of Solana accounts contributed 90% of the total non voting fees. The research report shows that 75-90% of Solana's fees are related to DEX transactions, which is higher than the proportion of DEX activities in Ethereum and Base, which are 55-65% and 60-70%, respectively.

Coinbase analysts believe that this phenomenon may be driven by a large number of memes within the Solana ecosystem. However, Solana's rapidly developing gaming and decentralized physical infrastructure network (DePIN) ecosystem is expected to further expand demand sources in the long term, reducing reliance on DEX fees.