Perp DEX reshuffle: Hyperliquid loses its top spot, what allows the newcomer Aster to soar?

The perpetual futures DEX is a bit crazy in 2025. Its market share skyrocketed from 5% at the beginning of the year to now 20-26%, with a single quarter trading volume of 1.8 trillion USD in Q3, a year-on-year growth of 87%—this growth rate is faster than anyone expected.

But the most brutal change is the huge upset in the rankings. Hyperliquid once dominated, accounting for 65% of the volume, but this time it was hard-pulled off the throne by the newcomer Aster. Data shows that at the end of October, Aster's weekly volume was directly 3 times that of Hyperliquid, with market share instantly jumping to 40%. Lighter and edgeX are also watching closely, as Hyperliquid has fallen from the top flow in July to only 7.67% now.

The differentiation of tracks is very obvious:

Hyperliquid is still laying the groundwork. With a TVL of 4.78B, it ranks first, but the rise is weak. Its underlying structure is self-built L1 + fully on-chain CLOB, with a high technical ceiling. The Q3 commission reached 300 million USD, with 99% directly used for buyback and burning of $HYPE. This deflationary model indeed performs well in a bull market. However, problems have arisen — on the end of November, 19.83 million SHYPE will be released (5.3% of the circulating supply), and from 2027 to 2028, it will be released linearly every day, with a daily pressure of up to 17 million USD, while the buyback capacity is only 2 million USD per day, which results in an 8.6-fold pressure difference. Additionally, with only 24 validation nodes, the risk of centralization is high.

Aster is the most controversial newcomer. Number of users: 4.6M (Hyperliquid only has 750K), daily trading volume: 27B, but there are big problems – the trading volume/position ratio is an abnormal 27 times, far above a healthy level, and DefiLlama has directly delisted it. Technically, it uses BNB Chain as the mainnet, supports 1001 times leverage, and allows the use of interest-bearing assets (asBNB, USDF) as collateral for borrowing and trading, which is indeed innovative. However, whether it can transform from “false prosperity” to genuine users remains to be seen.

Lighter is playing the zero-commission trick. ZK-Rollup architecture, no fees at all, making money through APIs and spreads. In 3 months, TVL rose from 186M to 1.1B, looking impressive, but the retention rate is extremely low—users come for a wave of airdrops and then leave, with the OI/volume ratio being artificially high, raising questions about real stickiness.

What is the future of the industry competing for?

In the short term, we are still striving for growth data and the intensity of airdrops, but in the long term, the decisive factors are just these points:

1. Technical Architecture Persistence: Fully on-chain CLOB (Hyperliquid style) vs ZK-Rollup (Lighter) vs Hybrid Solutions (Aster), each has its pros and cons, but there is no absolute winner.

2. Token Economic Authenticity: Can traffic be converted into real money, and can a model be designed that can survive based on fundamentals (not airdrops)?

3. Asset Diversity: Hyperliquid's HIP-3 allows permissionless listing of perpetual futures for traditional assets such as stocks and commodities, which is a new story.

4. Regulatory Risk: The EU's MiCA has started to stall, and the US CFTC's attitude has shifted from repression to wait-and-see, but long-term compliance pressure is significant.

The underlying logic is clear - Perp DEX has passed the technical verification period of “whether to use it” and is now entering the ecological war of “which one to use”. Hyperliquid's independent L1 gives it the highest ceiling and strongest independence, but the cost is that it has to maintain the entire network by itself. Aster is rapidly expanding by leveraging the network effects of the BNB ecosystem, but whether this high leverage and high trading ratio growth can sustain until the next bull market cycle is still uncertain.

In a nutshell: The technological dividend has been largely consumed, and now the competition lies in economic models, ecological integration, and regulatory wisdom.