Q2 2025 Dapp Market Report: AI Applications Rise Strongly, RWA and Gaming Drive NFT Market Recovery

AI agent applications are rapidly rising, RWA is redefining the value of NFT, DeFi, while attracting capital, is gradually losing momentum, and the $6.3 billion in hacker attack losses in the second quarter exposed the industry's vulnerabilities.

Despite the rebound in cryptocurrency market prices and improved sentiment, the Dapp ecosystem presents a different picture: AI applications are experiencing explosive growth, the value of NFTs is shifting from ostentatiousness to functionality, and DeFi is struggling to move forward between rising TVL and shrinking financing. These data not only demonstrate market activity but also reveal user flow, lagging sectors, and key trends that are reshaping the future of Dapps.

The current market can no longer rely solely on speculation to drive prices. Users are beginning to pursue actual value: AI agents that can complete tasks, NFTs linked to physical assets, and DeFi platforms that offer sustainable returns. However, risks remain high: losses due to exploits are sharply rising, highlighting the fragility of trust, and even minor oversights can be maliciously exploited.

This report delves into the changes in the industry landscape, providing a comprehensive analysis of data dynamics in the fields of DeFi, NFT, gaming, AI, and more. From wallet activity, trading volume to application and fund flow, we track key signals, focusing on the core narratives shaping the crypto industry in the second quarter of 2025.

Key Points:

• In the second quarter of 2025, the average daily active unique wallets for Dapps was 24.3 million, a decrease of 2.5% month-on-month, but still a staggering increase of 247% compared to the beginning of 2024.
• The total locked value in DeFi reached $200 billion, a quarter-on-quarter increase of 28%, primarily benefiting from a 36% rebound in Ethereum. However, the financing amount in the DeFi sector declined by 50% quarter-on-quarter, with only $483 million raised in the second quarter, bringing the total financing amount for the first two quarters of 2025 to $1.4 billion.
• NFT trading volume plummeted by 45% to $867 million, but sales surged by 78% to 14.9 million transactions, reflecting a sharp drop in average market price, while the number of traders increased by 20%.
• RWA NFT trading volume grew by 29%, rising to the second position in the track, with the Courtyard platform becoming the second largest NFT market by trading volume this quarter.
• The trading volume of Guild of Guardians NFT has soared to the first and fourth places, surpassing BAYC and CryptoPunks, marking a pivotal moment for game-related NFTs.
• Web3 has suffered a loss of $6.3 billion due to security incidents, an increase of 215% compared to the previous period. The Mantra vulnerability exploitation case alone resulted in a loss of $5.5 billion, making it the second largest security incident in the crypto industry since the FTX bankruptcy case in 2022 (which resulted in a loss of $8 billion).

1. The number of daily active independent wallets for Dapps remains stable at 24 million, with significant growth in the AI and social sectors.

In this quarter, the active Dapp activity decreased by 2.5%, with an average of 24.3 million daily active unique wallets. Nevertheless, the ecosystem has stabilized at this level, which is both a sign of the industry's increasing maturity and proof that users continue to interact with Dapps across multiple application domains. It is worth noting that many users operate multiple wallets, so there is a discrepancy between the number of daily active unique wallets and the actual number of users. However, this metric remains a strong basis for measuring user engagement. Just a few quarters ago, the number of daily active unique wallets was around 5 million, showing a significant rate of growth.

The number of active wallets in DeFi and GameFi has both declined, with DeFi down 33% and GameFi down 17%. On the other hand, Social and AI-related Dapps have seen growth, which aligns with broader industry trends.

In the Social domain, the rise of InfoFi is noteworthy, with platforms like Kaito and Cookie DAO leading the way. In the AI sector, agent-based Dapps are showing strong momentum, with Virtuals Protocol standing out.

As expected, these changes at the sector level have also affected the distribution of dominance. The decline in activity in the DeFi and Gaming sectors has led to a reduction in their market share, while the AI and Social sectors have seized and expanded more share. Comparing the second quarter of 2025 with the first quarter, it is evident that the AI sector is rapidly rising, with the Social sector following closely behind. By the end of this year, it would be no surprise if AI surpasses either Gaming or DeFi in dominance.

In fact, observing the ranking of independent wallets for this quarter, there is an AI Dapp that ranks first. The remaining spots on this list are occupied by several well-known projects, primarily from the DeFi sector. Given that these projects have maintained long-term stable operations amidst the Meme coin craze and the Agent token frenzy, such a distribution is understandable.

In addition, this quarter we have added the "Dormant Dapp" metric, specifically tracking those decentralized applications that were active in the first quarter of 2025 but completely ceased activity in the second quarter.

We focus on several main categories for analysis: non-active decentralized applications in the DeFi sector increased by 2%, gaming grew by 9%, and NFT applications rose by 10%. This analysis particularly includes high-risk applications, whose inactivity actually decreased significantly by 40%, meaning they are still in continuous use and rarely abandoned. But the most surprising is the artificial intelligence sector, where non-active AI applications surged by 129%. Although this percentage seems astounding, it actually corresponds to only 16 applications. Nevertheless, this phenomenon still prompts important reflections: it highlights that these projects (especially in gaming and AI) are still in their early stages of development, and the difficulty of achieving mainstream applications is significant if they lack sufficient funding support. In the Web3 space, user retention remains the most severe challenge, and this data undoubtedly confirms that.

In the second quarter of 2025, the total locked value in DeFi soared to $200 billion, but the financing amount plummeted by 50%.

This quarter's macroeconomics has been a rollercoaster, and the DeFi sector has not been immune to this turbulence. Nevertheless, the market is showing positive signs: first, the cryptocurrency market prices have rebounded strongly, with Bitcoin up 30% compared to the first quarter of 2025, Ethereum rising 36%, and the total market capitalization of cryptocurrencies growing by 25% quarter-on-quarter. Naturally, the DeFi sector has followed this upward trend, with the total locked value surpassing the $200 billion mark, achieving a quarter-on-quarter increase of 28%.

Observing the total locked value performance of various major blockchains, most chains recorded steady growth, while Tron showed a downward trend with a drop of 8%. In terms of market share, Ethereum still maintains its leading position with an absolute advantage, occupying 62% of the total TVL in the DeFi sector, followed by a certain public chain with a share of 10%.

The most outstanding performer this quarter is Hyperliquid L1, which saw its TVL soar by 547%. This high-performance Layer 1 blockchain is designed for on-chain perpetual contracts and spot trading, utilizing the HyperBFT consensus model inspired by HotStuff.

The DeFi sector has raised a total of $483 million, a decrease of 50% compared to the first quarter. So far in 2025, DeFi projects have secured approximately $1.4 billion in funding. While this figure indicates a slowdown compared to the explosive growth we have seen in past cycles, it still demonstrates a stable interest in funding for the sector and may suggest a more mature direction for capital allocation.

3. NFT sales surged by 78%, but trading volume declined: RWA and gaming lead market shift

This quarter, NFT trading volume plummeted by 45%, but the trading volume grew against the trend by 78%. This confirms the trend we have long observed: NFTs are becoming increasingly affordable, but the market enthusiasm has not faded; rather, it has shifted in nature.

The trading volume of personal avatar NFTs has suffered a heavy blow, plunging by 72%. In contrast, real-world asset (RWA) NFTs have surged to second place in the trading volume rankings with a 29% increase. The trading volume of art NFTs decreased by 51%, but the transaction volume skyrocketed by 400%, indicating that the prices of artworks have dropped significantly, making art NFTs more accessible to regular buyers.

The recent trend of returning is domain NFTs, with both trading volume and sales increasing. This growth is mainly driven by the TON public chain ecosystem, where users of a certain instant messaging platform are rushing to purchase anonymous domain names based on digital numbers. Such domain names can be associated with accounts without the need to bind a SIM card, and this usage scenario that fits specific needs has obviously sparked market enthusiasm.

In this quarter, the average monthly NFT traders reached 668,598, an increase of 20% compared to the previous quarter. Combined with the phenomenon of soaring sales, this indicates that users are slowly but steadily returning to the NFT space, although their motivations may differ from those during past booms.

Despite a significant decline in trading volume, a certain NFT trading platform remains in a leading position. However, its sales volume has risen in sync with the Courtyard platform. The growth of this trading platform is closely related to the news of its upcoming token launch. This airdrop will target both old users and current active users on the updated version of the platform. As a result, many users are actively trading low-priced NFT collectibles to earn points, trying to maximize future reward returns, which is a classic operation often seen in other airdrop activities.

At the same time, the Courtyard platform has quickly risen to the second position in the industry. This clearly indicates that the narrative of RWA is not only heating up in the DeFi space but is also creating waves in the NFT sector. The tokenization process of physical assets is likely to become a key catalyst in pushing NFTs into the mainstream spotlight.

After quite a long time (possibly several years), a game NFT collection has topped the quarterly trading volume rankings for the first time. Guild of Guardians not only made it into the top five but also took two spots, surpassing CryptoPunks.