Over the past two years, the Base blockchain has been considered the “capital” of SocialFi. While other Layer 2s have focused more on DeFi, Gaming, or NFTs, Base has chosen a different path: decentralized social networks. From the short-lived boom of Friend.tech to the sustainable growth of Farcaster and its surrounding ecosystem, SocialFi is gradually becoming the strongest driver of user adoption for Base.
Why is Base Considered the “Capital” of SocialFi?
The Base ecosystem is one of the largest in the crypto market and holds a rare advantage: inheriting a user base from Coinbase, which provides an extremely strong foundation. Inheriting from Coinbase also means Base integrates most of the tools and utilities that Coinbase has built. The most prominent asymmetric advantage here is the Coinbase Smart Wallet. Using Coinbase’s wallet makes it easy to register, authenticate, and join social applications. The experience is as smooth as Web2, but all data and interactions run on-chain, which is a major plus for SocialFi.
Source: Blockworks
Data from Blockworks shows Base maintains very high daily active users (DAU), consistently around 600,000–800,000 per day, and at times even surpassing Arbitrum and Polygon. Base at its peak had 181 million wallet addresses, and on certain days it executed between 1 million and 2 million transactions, even hitting 3 million on the occasion of Onchain Summer 2025.
Friend.tech: Rise and Fall of a SocialFi Craze
Debuting in 2023, Friend.tech became the first SocialFi application to genuinely go viral. Its straightforward mechanism allowed users to buy and sell “shares” (later renamed “keys”) of individual accounts, thereby converting social relationships into something like a tradable financial asset.
Source: Dune
In a mere 17 days following its launch on August 11, 2023, Friend.tech ascended to a $6.4 million TVL, amassing at times an absolutely bonkers $1.5 million in daily fees, trading $80 million worth of this new asset, and welcoming 125,000 different traders into its fold. Positive news about a Paradigm funding round fueled the hype, and Friend.tech became one of the standout success cases after PEPE.
Source: X
At its peak, Friend.tech recorded more than 500,000 daily transactions on Base and generated millions of dollars in fees. But the excitement didn’t last. Within about 20 days of its peak, transactions dropped 95%, TVL collapsed from millions to nearly zero, and users quickly exited once speculative momentum disappeared. The ecosystem was left with little social value.
Source: Dune
In which, it means SocialFi can’t survive on speculation alone. If it wants to last, it needs to deliver both financial upside and real social value that keeps people coming back.
Farcaster and Warpcast: Building Real Social Infrastructure
Unlike Friend.tech, which spiked in popularity and then quickly fizzled out, Farcaster has been building momentum slowly and steadily, and all signs suggest it’s here for the long run. What is more, it appears increasingly probable that Farcaster will become the key infrastructure of the SocialFi ecosystem on Base.
Source: Dune
Farcaster is a decentralized social protocol that is often described as the “Twitter of Web3.” Its main feature is openness and extensibility; it allows anyone to build applications directly on top of the protocol and its social graph. The most popular client is Warpcast. Farcaster distinguished itself by introducing Frames—on-chain mini-apps that are integrated right into posts. With Frames, an app user can mint an NFT, pay with tokens, join a DAO, or even make a trade—all without leaving the feed, since everything is embedded right there in the app.
Frames turn Farcaster from just another social network into a platform that combines social interaction, finance, and on-chain applications—a sharp contrast to Web2.
DEGEN: From Memecoin to Utility Token
The DEGEN token has played an important role in Warpcast’s growth within Farcaster. Originally just a memecoin, DEGEN was quickly integrated as a tipping reward, letting users tip posts, reward creators, and encourage quality content. This created a strong feedback loop: the more users engaged, the higher the demand for DEGEN.
Source: Coingecko
More importantly, DEGEN didn’t stop at tipping. It became the gas token of Degen Chain, a Layer-3 built on Base specifically for social on-chain activities like Warpcast. Ultra-low costs and high speed made Degen Chain achieve almost 2 million accounts and over 20 million transactions in such a short time, exhibiting strong community traction.
Simultaneously, DEGEN broadened its use with tools such as DegenSwap, grant initiatives, and play-to-earn games, transforming it into something much more than just another memecoin. Through its direct connection to daily user activity on Warpcast, DEGEN demonstrated obvious network worth and emerged as a vital engine of real, sustainable growth, as contrasted with the ephemeral speculative bump engines that SocialFi fads like Friend.tech provide.
For more: Meme Coins on Base: The Case of BRETT, DEGEN, and TOSHI Memecoin
Zora on Base
Zora has also emerged as a notable social platform within the Base ecosystem. After Coinbase rebranded its wallet as “Base App,” Zora quickly drew attention with apps that helped Base surpass Solana in tokens created per day.
Data from Dune Analytics shows daily token issuance on Base jumped from about 6,600 in early July to over 50,000 by the end of the month, with Zora accounting for nearly 45% of that. Zora was minting over 51,000 tokens a day, attracting over 2 million users a month, and gaining 77,000 new users a week.
Source: Dune
With such momentum, the team made a daring decision in April 2025: they launched a native token, ZORA, with a capped supply of 10 billion. The distribution was set as follows: 10% airdrop, 20% community incentives, 5% liquidity, 20% treasury (locked for four years), 18.9% team, and 26.1% strategic contributors. Snapshots were taken from January 2020 to March 2025, with a second round in April 2025.
For more: ZORA Coin 10x Rally in 2025: Hype or Structural Breakthrough?
Before that, Zora had already launched the Zora Network, a standalone Layer 2 built on the OP Stack to optimize NFT minting costs and scalability. On the Zora Network, any content posts, images, or links can be tokenized.
The result is clear: from a traditional NFT platform, Zora has evolved into a content finance protocol, building both cultural and financial infrastructure on-chain.
The Future of SocialFi: A “Killer App” for Base?
The biggest question is whether SocialFi can become the “killer app” that brings Base to the mainstream. Friend.tech proved that SocialFi can grab headlines and spark huge waves of excitement, but Farcaster is showing what real staying power looks like. If platforms like Farcaster keep building out features like Frames, bring in utility tokens, and make the most of Coinbase’s Smart Wallet for smooth onboarding, Base has a real shot at becoming the go-to blockchain for social apps.
What makes SocialFi so powerful is its foundation. Each sector has its own key value. With its abundance of charts and financial jargon, DeFi can be intimidating. We can observe that the gaming industry is almost entirely dependent on studios producing successful games. But SocialFi taps into something simpler and more universal, people’s need to connect and belong. That’s the edge Base holds as it carves out a lead in this next phase of blockchain growth.