The Battle for 1 Billion Users: Can the TON Ecosystem Overcome the "Traffic Bubble" Trap?

Intermediate6/3/2025, 2:58:47 AM
Can TON break free from the fate of a "short-lived narrative"? After the Tap-to-Earn craze subsides, this long article systematically dissects how TON has undergone a deep transformation from a surge in Telegram traffic to a phase of compliance, infrastructure, and financial consolidation. It covers its globalization strategy, TON Space wallet, the triadic financial structure of DeFi-PayFi-RWA, Layer2 payment networks, BTC cross-chain bridges, and other core layouts, while revealing its challenges and ambitions. This is not only a review of a public chain but also an insightful exploration of the "Web2 → Web3 user conversion path."

Introduction

In the third quarter of 2024, the TON blockchain, leveraging the traffic entry of Telegram, saw a rapid explosion of the Tap-to-Earn mini-games, attracting hundreds of millions of users and creating a miracle of on-chain growth. Meanwhile, the TGE (Token Generation Event) of several TON ecosystem projects also generated a strong wealth effect, making “TON / Telegram” a hot narrative center in Web3. However, following this surge, TON is entering a cooling period that warrants caution. Similar to past Web3 narratives, will the aftermath of the bubble lead to accumulation or a total collapse? Is this a temporary pause in traffic or simply a delay in value conversion? At this juncture, we hope to reassess whether TON has the long-term potential to become a “super entry point on the chain” through comprehensive data, ecological evolution pathways, and technical stack arrangements.

1. After the Tap-to-Earn boom: The heat of TON cools down and data declines

According to the official TON website, TON (The Open Network) is a decentralized open internet designed to bring 500 million people on-chain, built using technology developed by the community of Telegram. Backed by the Web2 social platform Telegram, which has nearly 1 billion users, TON indeed has the potential to achieve its goal of bringing 500 million people into the on-chain world, and has achieved great success in 2024:

· Toncoin (TON Token) has a market capitalization exceeding $25B, ranking it in the Top 10 of crypto assets by market value [1];

· Tap to earn mini-game Hamster Kombat officially disclosed attracting over 300 million users [2];

· The TON Blockchain reached a peak of over 700k new addresses in a single day, with daily active addresses exceeding 1.657M [3];

· The market value of multiple Telegram mini-game assets exceeds $500M, with on-chain DeFi TVL surging by more than 5,500% in 2024 …

The dual miracle of traffic and wealth has made TON one of the absolute focal points of the Web3 narrative in 2024. However, similar to previous Web3 booms, short-term surges are often accompanied by a data pullback. The TON ecosystem is currently experiencing a phase of “narrative cooling”: as shown in Chart 1, both the daily number of new wallets, active addresses, and the TVL and trading volume of core DEXs (Stone.fi and Dedust) have significantly declined from their peak levels. Although there have been some short-term spikes during this period, most are temporary rebounds driven by specific projects; looking at the annual trend, multiple indicators have fallen back to levels seen before the narrative was launched.

However, it’s not entirely pessimistic signals. The number of Jetton Wallets (non-zero balance wallets) is still steadily increasing, indicating that the accumulation of basic users is ongoing, although the growth rate has significantly slowed down. Meanwhile, the number of NFT mintings is also maintaining growth, suggesting that the on-chain application ecosystem is still being continuously promoted.


Figure 1: TON ecosystem data chart, source: Ton Stat, 2025.05.20

On the other hand, from the keyword trends of Google Trends, the overall search popularity of TON is also gradually declining, especially the attention on the ecosystem itself has decreased significantly. In contrast, the market’s focus on the Token price remains stronger.


Chart 2: TON keyword browser search popularity, source: Google Trends, 2025.05.21

However, a decline in data does not necessarily mean the end of the narrative. Similar examples are common: Bitcoin once experienced on-chain overload due to the inscription craze, but ultimately, activity returned to a relatively stable level; Solana and Base, after experiencing a data halving, welcomed a return of users and reached new highs again, accompanied by technical optimizations and ecological advancements.


Chart 3: Data Variation Trends on Solana and Base Chains, Source: Artemis, 2025.05.22

Does TON also have the ability to complete a deep transformation from traffic to value after the surge recedes? Is it a brief dormancy, or will it ultimately become a “narrative relic”? The answer will ultimately be determined by actions. In the following content, we will dissect the changes quietly occurring in TON “after the tide recedes” from the aspects of its organizational strategy, ecological construction, technological upgrades, and narrative transformation.

2. Major Actions Frequent: Team Restructuring, Compliance and New Markets, Infrastructure Development

Since the launch of Binance in August 2024, the narrative of TON has entered a new phase. On the surface, the hype has cooled, but in reality, it is a period of accelerated layout: including team restructuring, exploration of regulatory compliance, deep integration with Telegram, expansion of the tech stack, and incentives and capital injection for developers targeting the global market.

2.1 Leadership Change and Compliance Efforts: TON Accelerates Mainstream Path

At the beginning of 2025, the personnel adjustments at the TON Foundation sent a clear signal: globalization and compliance will become the core strategic directions for the coming years.

On January 15, Manuel Stotz, former board member and founder of Kingsway Capital, was appointed as the new president of the TON Foundation. Kingsway is an established investment firm managing billions of dollars in assets for American investors, and Stotz’s background brings a strong signal of “traditional capital markets” to TON. According to the official announcement, he will work alongside the former president and current board member Steve Yun to promote the international expansion of TON, focusing on the US market — a vibrant yet highly compliant region viewed as a crucial battleground in TON’s strategy.

On April 24, the TON Foundation further appointed MoonPay co-founder Maximilian Crown as CEO. MoonPay is a global leading cryptocurrency payment infrastructure company that has obtained compliance licenses in multiple jurisdictions, including the United States, Australia, and the Netherlands. Crown has extensive global operational experience and compliance handling capabilities, and his appointment is widely seen as a landmark step for TON to officially embrace regulation and move towards global mainstream adoption [4].


Chart 4: Existing core team members of TON, source: RootData

It is worth noting that Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram and an early promoter of the TON blockchain, was briefly detained in August 2024 due to Telegram’s alleged regulatory violations, only returning to the public eye in March 2025. Although there is no conclusion regarding this incident, the timing highly coincides with the strategic adjustments of the TON Foundation, which may indirectly prompt the team to place greater emphasis on regulatory issues, clearing obstacles for subsequent global deployment. Recently, the TON Foundation has been actively communicating with U.S. regulatory authorities. According to the TON ecosystem report, the TON self-custody wallet is scheduled to launch in the U.S. in the second quarter of 2025. In March 2025, the TON Foundation disclosed that U.S. venture capital firms such as Sequoia Capital, Ribbit, and Benchmark hold over 400 million dollars worth of Toncoin. This can also be seen as important evidence of TON’s transformation towards compliance and globalization.

From the global distribution of Telegram users (Chart 5), if TON wishes to convert them into Web3 users, it must meet the regulatory requirements for cryptocurrency assets in various countries. Otherwise, it will not only be difficult to implement applications in key markets, but it may also pose potential legal and business risks to Telegram itself. In fact, the global expansion of the TON wallet has already begun. Starting in November 2023, TON has launched phased promotions in certain African countries, and will subsequently expand to multiple markets in the Middle East, Europe, and Asia-Pacific, paving the way for future global compliance.


Chart 5: Telegram Downloads by Country in 2024, Source: CPA.RIP

2.2 TON × Telegram: Deep integration, binding ecological entry

In January 2025, Telegram officially designated TON as the sole blockchain infrastructure for its continuously evolving mini-app ecosystem, centered around the TON Connect protocol that seamlessly connects Telegram mini-apps with blockchain wallets, thereby simplifying users’ interactions with decentralized applications within the messaging app. This exclusive protocol establishes TON as the actual blockchain layer for Telegram’s nearly 1 billion users. This positions TON to potentially become the “Web3 version of WeChat Pay,” fully leveraging Telegram’s massive network effects.

In the payment system, Telegram promises to exclusively accept Toncoin as a non-statutory payment currency within its ecosystem, applicable to scenarios including Telegram Stars, Premium membership, the advertising system (Telegram Ads), and payment gateway services (Telegram Gateway). Developers and channel operators can directly receive income through Toncoin, initially establishing an internal payment and revenue distribution system based on Toncoin.

At the same time, the payment service provider RedotPay has supported Toncoin and USDt (the USDT version on the TON chain), and integrated with mainstream payment methods such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Alipay, which can be used at over 130 million offline merchants worldwide, further expanding TON’s payment capabilities in the real world.

The TON Space wallet has recently launched the use of Telegram Stars to pay transaction fees, which is essentially a form of crypto “abstraction” solution that allows users to complete transactions without needing to understand complex on-chain operations. This method differs from traditional chain abstraction solutions, as it not only relies on massive entry traffic but also promotes the transformation of on-chain applications towards being more “lifestyle” and “normalized”. According to the official plan, starting from the second quarter of 2025, American users will be able to directly experience TON wallet services within Telegram, further bridging the gap between Web2 consumption scenarios and on-chain asset management.[7].

2.3 Ecosystem: From Mini Game Craze to Diversified Track Expansion

The first wave of the TON ecosystem boom is primarily driven by mini-games. Stimulated by the combination of “airdrop incentives + easy to get started,” users quickly flocked in. For example, the airdrop of “Hamster Kombat” in September 2024 peaked at 300 million monthly active users in July, but by November, only 52 million active users remained, resulting in a user loss of over 86% in just a few months [8]. While simple and replicable game mechanics can create a “growth illusion” in the short term, they struggle to foster long-term user retention, exposing the homogenization issue in the early stages of the ecosystem.

In the face of this situation, TON is focusing on expanding the builder ecosystem while accelerating the layout of infrastructure. In April 2025, TON announced a strategic partnership with Chinese gaming giant KingNet (which has over 100 million users) and held its first large-scale game developer conference in Asia, attracting dozens of studios from the WeChat ecosystem to explore how to build Web3 applications based on Telegram and TON.

With the launch of the Telegram App Center feature, users can directly explore integrated third-party applications within the platform. An increasing number of TON ecosystem applications are making it onto the recommended list, and they are no longer limited to the gaming category but also include various dimensions such as social, payment, DeFi, and NFT, marking the preliminary expansion of its application ecosystem.


Chart 6: Screenshot of the Telegram App Center application interface, source: Screenshot from Telegram product page

According to RootData statistics, among the 187 TON projects recorded, approximately 14% focus on infrastructure. In addition to underlying services such as oracles and wallets, there are also development support platforms like TONXAPI and Play Deck, which lower the technical barriers for new builders and accelerate the sustainable development of the ecosystem.


Chart 7: Basic Projects of the TON Ecosystem (Partial), Source: RootData

In addition to gaming, the TON ecosystem is expanding into multiple new narrative tracks: including PayFi, RWA (which will be detailed below), as well as applications in AI, contract trading (Perp DEX), DePIN, and more. For example:

· Jointly launched the TON perpetual contract DEX incentive activity with GMX;

· Launch bounty program with AI Agent operating system ElizaOS;

· Collaborating with the aggregator protocol Jupiter to promote the development of the TON ecosystem aggregator…

The ecological potential has also attracted positive responses from institutional funds. In September 2024, Foresight Ventures and Bitget invested 30 million USD in TON, and the following month, Gate announced an additional investment of 10 million USD, promoting the development of the Telegram application [9]. In early 2025, former president of the TON Foundation, Steve Yun, launched the venture capital fund TVM Ventures, with an initial scale of 100 million USD, focusing on supporting DeFi, PayFi, and underlying infrastructure projects, further strengthening TON’s appeal to developers and its ecological moat.

2.4 Technical Upgrade: Advancement in Performance and Scalability

According to the roadmap released by TON for the first half of 2025, the core objectives of its technological iteration are to alleviate congestion, enhance scalability, and improve stability. This round of updates covers four major directions, reflecting TON’s evolutionary logic towards a “high-load, high-frequency application-oriented blockchain”:

    1. Accelerator Mainnet Upgrade
      This is the most significant architectural upgrade since the establishment of TON, aimed at achieving the “Infinite Sharding” mechanism and significantly improving the network’s stability and scalability. Core improvements include:
      · Shard chain tracking optimization: Nodes will only need to track the main chain and its associated specific shard chains, rather than tracking all shard chains, which will significantly reduce resource consumption and improve node processing performance.
      · Validator function separation: TON divides the originally unified validator role into “Collator” and “Validator”, improving overall validation efficiency through task parallel processing.
      These improvements will help the TON network maintain a stable block generation speed and transaction processing capacity even under high load, while reducing dependence on hardware.
    1. Layer 2 Payment Network
      TON plans to launch a Layer 2 payment network similar to the Bitcoin Lightning Network, focusing on instant transactions and a very low-cost asset exchange experience. Currently, the network is in the testing phase and will support various token assets, including Jetton, in the future, suitable for high-frequency trading, mini-game payments, and other scenarios. The implementation of this solution is expected to further enhance the practical usage of TON in everyday user payments and the gaming ecosystem.
    1. BTC Teleport Cross-Chain Bridge (Launched)
      BTC Teleport is a mechanism designed to achieve cross-chain asset transfer between the TON and Bitcoin networks. This mechanism simplifies the cross-chain interaction process through a peer-to-peer bridging method, significantly lowering the user entry threshold and costs. This will enhance interoperability between TON and mainstream public chains, paving the way for its expansion in DeFi, asset management, and other scenarios.
    1. Optimization and upgrade of technical tools
      In order to enhance the operational efficiency of validators and the security of the system, TON has introduced features including the MyTonCtrl backup recovery function, a validator Telegram notification bot, and a web dashboard, and plans to strengthen the incentive and penalty mechanisms for validators. For example, nodes that fail to successfully produce blocks within designated rounds will face more severe penalties. At the same time, a new version of TON Proxy is also under development, aimed at enhancing DDoS attack protection capabilities, further ensuring the stability and security of the network. Additionally, TON’s official API will also add features such as operation simulation, querying pending transactions, and domain management.
      The DOGS airdrop event in August 2024 became a “stress test” for the TON technology stack. At that time, the network was interrupted for 3 hours due to overload and loss of validator consensus, exposing architectural bottlenecks under extreme concurrency. The ongoing 2025 roadmap is a direct technical response to this event. A series of initiatives, including mainnet architecture reconstruction (Accelerator), Layer 2 network testing, and cross-chain bridge deployment, mean that TON is transitioning from a “high TPS showcase chain” to a truly scalable and highly resilient general-purpose Layer 1 capable of long-term sustainability.
      The technical direction of TON is not to pursue “the lowest fees” or “the highest single transaction speed,” but rather to support diverse scenarios through a modular structure—especially high-frequency interactions around payments, gaming, social, and lightweight financial applications. In the future, in addition to the payment-focused Layer 2 network, multiple functional dedicated Layer 2s may also emerge in TON, creating exclusive operational channels for different applications, thereby achieving highly adaptable on-chain architecture expansion.

3. Financial Narrative Reconstruction: Extending from DeFi to PayFi and RWA

3.1 From Trading Hype to Asset Depth: TON DeFi’s Ecological Supplement

Despite TON ranking among the top public chains in terms of the number of active addresses on-chain and transaction frequency, the depth of its DeFi ecosystem still falls far short of matching this level of traffic. According to DeFiLlama data, TON’s TVL is currently only about $115 million, placing it 36th among mainstream public chains. This contrast of “high activity - low locking” has also raised some market skepticism: “Is TON just another gathering place for ‘farmers’?”

The emergence of this situation has its objective background: the TON ecosystem has experienced rapid growth, while DeFi, as a type of “slow and meticulous” infrastructure, finds it difficult to quickly complete the product chain and operational loop in a short period of time. On one hand, developers need time to build high-quality contracts and protocols; on the other hand, most of the early TON DeFi applications continued to follow traditional web interaction logic, failing to achieve efficient synergy with the Telegram mini-program ecosystem. As a result, during the initial surge, the ones benefiting the most were the centralized exchanges (CEX), which attracted a large number of new user registrations and trading.

In response to this shortcoming, the TON team has begun to systematically improve the DeFi ecosystem and fully showcased its DeFi module layout at the Hong Kong Web3 event in April 2025.


Chart 8: TON DeFi Ecosystem Status, Source: Youtube

The T1 layer mainly includes core DeFi functions such as cross-chain bridges, collateralized stablecoin CDPs, AMM protocols, lending, and liquid staking LSD. These are the foundation for building more complex financial products. On this basis, TON is promoting the development of more advanced applications, including yield farming, derivatives, options, yield tokenization, vaults, launchpads, etc:

· STON.fi has launched Omniston, a decentralized liquidity aggregation protocol designed to simplify liquidity management within the ecosystem;

· The decentralized perpetual contract trading platform Storm Trade continues to grow in 2025, reaching its highest TVL in February.

· The yield tokenization protocol FIVA reached a TVL of 1 million USD within a few days of its launch and achieved a trading volume of 28 million USD…

In addition to the core DeFi applications mentioned above, TON is also continuously integrating more important DeFi partners, among which the most representative are Tether and Ethena, the two major stablecoin issuers.

USDT issued by Tether was officially deployed on the TON chain in April 2024 and has achieved rapid growth. Within just five months of its launch, the circulating supply of USDT surpassed 1 billion USD. This stablecoin has been integrated into the Telegram app for direct transfers and is widely used in payment scenarios for Telegram mini-apps and Web3 services, including creator rewards, digital service fee settlements, content monetization, and various other uses, further enriching the payment ecosystem of TON.

At the same time, TON is also advancing its collaboration with Ethena to integrate its synthetic dollar asset USDe, which has a TVL of over $6 billion. Through this integration, TON plans to introduce a stable dollar savings and yield acquisition channel for Telegram’s extensive user base, particularly benefiting market users who find it difficult to easily access dollar assets locally. This initiative not only strengthens TON’s strategic position in the stablecoin ecosystem but also injects more long-term valuable financial infrastructure into its DeFi system.

3.2 PayFi and RWA: The Connecting Bridge from On-chain Earnings to Real-world Value

During the TON Day event, the official systematically proposed a “dual-drive” financial application architecture for the first time, showcasing its on-chain financial design built around the Telegram mini-program ecosystem. The overall structure is divided into three layers:

· Core DeFi Layer: Includes various DeFi infrastructures and protocols that have been continuously improved, emphasizing technical performance and compliance framework;

· Real Yield Layer: Provides sustainable yield support for upper-layer applications through stablecoins, RWA returns, staking asset pools, etc.

· Retail TMA Layer: Leveraging the Telegram mini-program ecosystem, it builds user-side products including PayFi wallet, on-chain savings, yield games, Swap aggregator, etc., which is the key path to activating a large number of Web2 users.


Chart 9: Telegram Mini Program Application Layer, Source: Youtube

In this framework, PayFi and RWA have become the two new strategic narrative mainlines of TON. Around them, TON is gradually establishing a multi-layered revenue capture network that covers both on-chain and off-chain.

· Underlying: By connecting off-chain real financial assets through instruments like the Telegram Bond Fund (500 million USD RWA asset pool), it provides a verifiable and quantifiable source of real returns for the entire system. This layer is the key pivot where TON attempts to “chain reform” the logic of traditional financial products.

· Mid-level: By utilizing protocols such as Ethena’s USDe synthetic dollar and Yield Tokenization, these underlying returns can be split, combined, and redistributed to form programmable interest rate anchoring tools. This mechanism not only enhances asset liquidity but also makes the “returns” themselves combinable and usable across protocols, becoming the “interest rate cornerstone” of the TON financial ecosystem.

· Top Layer: Build front-end products based on high-frequency interaction scenarios in Telegram, presenting on-chain financial capabilities to end users in a familiar way. Through interfaces like Wallet Earn and Banking mini-programs, users can directly receive USDT rewards, participate in savings, or make financial arrangements without needing to understand complex concepts like synthetic stablecoins, staking pools, or RWA assets, thus achieving a natural transition from Web2 users to on-chain financial users.

Taking PayFi as an example, it is not only a functional extension of the Telegram wallet but also an interactive hub connecting “everyday payments + on-chain finance.” Users can use the Tap & Pay feature provided by Oobit for real-time payments in USDt at over 100 million retailers worldwide; at the same time, they can also receive USDT rewards in Wallet Earn and participate in yield management. Throughout the process, users do not need to understand terms like smart contracts, asset anchoring, or off-chain mapping to complete the on-chain finance experience. This design of “light experience + high financiality” is naturally converting Telegram users into Web3 financial users.

In the direction of RWA, TON is trying to build the underlying infrastructure for “on-chain brokers” and “on-chain savings banks.” For example, the Telegram Bond Fund launched by Libre in collaboration with the TON Foundation allows users to participate in fixed-income products such as USD bonds on-chain. In the future, it also plans to support the on-chain access of low-value and fragmented assets. At the same time, the synthetic stablecoin USDe launched by Ethena will, in the future, be integrated with debit cards for offline consumption, bringing new consumer finance scenarios to RWA applications.

Essentially, what TON is building is not an isolated financial protocol, but rather an “on-chain yield network” centered around Telegram: Telegram serves as the user entry point and traffic distribution; PayFi is positioned at the front-end interaction layer, connecting on-chain wealth management with everyday payment scenarios; RWA assets act as the underlying value anchor, injecting real yields into the financial system; while stablecoins, including USDe, and yield tokenization protocols undertake the functions of on-chain yield reception and distribution. Through this closed-loop pathway, TON is expected to naturally guide Web2 users into the on-chain financial ecosystem, completing the entire experience from asset access to yield realization without increasing the cognitive threshold.

4. The Future of TON: A Period of Accumulation for the Super Entrance, or a Castle in the Air?

TON’s “Traffic Miracle” stems from the ecological nesting of Telegram and the viral spread mechanism of Tap-to-Earn. However, as the hype fades, user stickiness declines, and on-chain data recedes, a key question arises: Can the TON ecosystem establish a sustainable “Traffic to Value” model?

The answer may be being written by TON’s own strategy. From the development pace, TON is not in a hurry to replicate the high-frequency stimulation operation of Tap to Earn, but has instead entered a deeper phase of infrastructure accumulation. This is similar to Solana’s engineering repair phase after the meme coin frenzy, or the Base ecosystem’s deep cultivation moment after the retreat of Friend.tech. TON’s current development strategy also reveals a similar idea: switching from “blockbuster narratives” to a value path of “high-frequency necessities + long-term accumulation.”

At the core of it all is Telegram—one of the Web2 platforms closest to the “super entrance” standard globally:

· Entry advantages: Social entry with nearly 1 billion users + one-stop wallet (TON Space) + Telegram App Center;

· Dual-driven by payment and finance: PayFi connects offline payments, while RWA builds a new paradigm of “on-chain finance”.

· Protocol-level nesting: The TON Connect and Stars fee mechanism essentially constructs the foundational infrastructure for chain abstraction.

· Technology stack implementation: Accelerator mainnet upgrade + Layer2 payment network + BTC cross-chain bridge, etc., are all strengthening the infrastructure capacity of TON.

From this perspective, the future of TON does not resemble a “castle in the air”; rather, it is like building a new digital economic hub. However, this hub is not being built for DeFi enthusiasts, but for the next batch of Web2 users.

However, the future of TON still faces three major challenges:

  1. The gap between user quality and financial depth: Despite having over 100 million monthly active users and a plethora of mini-games, the question remains whether users truly understand DeFi, engage in on-chain activities, and use Toncoin instead of just “grabbing airdrops.”
  2. The application value is difficult to close the loop on-chain: lightweight and embedded applications (such as mini-games, transfers, advertisements, payments) have a natural traffic advantage, but this “use and go” model also brings challenges: it is hard for user behavior to be consolidated into on-chain assets, identities, data, or long-term retention. Unlike the Ethereum ecosystem where on-chain representations are formed through wallet binding, DeFi participation, and NFT assets, most current TON users are merely “lightweight on-chain copies” of Telegram users, resulting in low activity and interaction depth of on-chain assets.
  3. Uncertainty of the compliance route: Although TON is actively embracing regulation, such as appointing the co-founder of MoonPay as CEO, it remains to be seen whether the combination of Telegram and TON can be sustainable in the face of high regulatory pressure markets like the US and the EU.

In other words, TON is at a critical point of “transitioning from attention to value accumulation.” Whether it will gradually consolidate high-frequency interactions into financial and service entry points like WeChat mini-programs, or become just another fleeting traffic illusion, largely depends on the team’s execution capability, the ecosystem’s self-evolution ability, and the wisdom in responding to the regulatory environment. However, one advantage that TON and Telegram have over WeChat is that they can “cross the river by feeling the stones of WeChat.” I believe that the next 6-12 months will be a key window period for the TON ecosystem to shift from “narrative-driven” to “fundamental value support.”

V. Conclusion

The story of TON is an attempt “from platform traffic to on-chain value.” It is neither built from the developer community like Ethereum to create a financial universe, nor is it driven by technology and meme catalysts like Solana. It is a user-centric, entry-hub-focused, lightweight experience-driven experimental field for Web3 popularization. From Tap-to-Earn to PayFi, from explosive popularity to infrastructure consolidation, the evolution path of TON actually presents an important signal: the next wave of Web3 popularization revolution may not occur within the crypto community, but quietly unfold in the daily lives of hundreds of millions of Web2 users.

Whether TON can truly seize this opportunity to evolve from a “super entry point on the chain” to a “super application platform on the chain” still requires time to verify. But regardless of success or failure, it provides a sample worth observing — one that does not guide users with “DeFi yield”, but instead leads them to gradually touch the chain and use it through familiar interfaces, lightweight payments, mini-games, and social experiences. This is an experiment, and also a gamble. However, in the current unresolved bear market, what TON offers is not a “myth of getting rich quickly”, but rather a Web3 imagination that is more in line with real-use scenarios. It may not be achieved overnight, but through a series of small cuts and real demands, it may be nurturing the possibility of the next round of true Web3 scalable transformation.

Disclosure: The author holds Toncoin and related assets; this report still contains some subjective elements.

Statement:

  1. This article is reprinted from [BLOCKBEATS] The copyright belongs to the original author [Wayne_Zhang]. If there are any objections to the reprinting, please contact.Gate Learn TeamThe team will process it as quickly as possible according to the relevant procedures.
  2. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not constitute any investment advice.
  3. Other language versions of the article are translated by the Gate Learn team, unless otherwise mentioned.GateUnder no circumstances may translated articles be copied, disseminated, or plagiarized.

The Battle for 1 Billion Users: Can the TON Ecosystem Overcome the "Traffic Bubble" Trap?

Intermediate6/3/2025, 2:58:47 AM
Can TON break free from the fate of a "short-lived narrative"? After the Tap-to-Earn craze subsides, this long article systematically dissects how TON has undergone a deep transformation from a surge in Telegram traffic to a phase of compliance, infrastructure, and financial consolidation. It covers its globalization strategy, TON Space wallet, the triadic financial structure of DeFi-PayFi-RWA, Layer2 payment networks, BTC cross-chain bridges, and other core layouts, while revealing its challenges and ambitions. This is not only a review of a public chain but also an insightful exploration of the "Web2 → Web3 user conversion path."

Introduction

In the third quarter of 2024, the TON blockchain, leveraging the traffic entry of Telegram, saw a rapid explosion of the Tap-to-Earn mini-games, attracting hundreds of millions of users and creating a miracle of on-chain growth. Meanwhile, the TGE (Token Generation Event) of several TON ecosystem projects also generated a strong wealth effect, making “TON / Telegram” a hot narrative center in Web3. However, following this surge, TON is entering a cooling period that warrants caution. Similar to past Web3 narratives, will the aftermath of the bubble lead to accumulation or a total collapse? Is this a temporary pause in traffic or simply a delay in value conversion? At this juncture, we hope to reassess whether TON has the long-term potential to become a “super entry point on the chain” through comprehensive data, ecological evolution pathways, and technical stack arrangements.

1. After the Tap-to-Earn boom: The heat of TON cools down and data declines

According to the official TON website, TON (The Open Network) is a decentralized open internet designed to bring 500 million people on-chain, built using technology developed by the community of Telegram. Backed by the Web2 social platform Telegram, which has nearly 1 billion users, TON indeed has the potential to achieve its goal of bringing 500 million people into the on-chain world, and has achieved great success in 2024:

· Toncoin (TON Token) has a market capitalization exceeding $25B, ranking it in the Top 10 of crypto assets by market value [1];

· Tap to earn mini-game Hamster Kombat officially disclosed attracting over 300 million users [2];

· The TON Blockchain reached a peak of over 700k new addresses in a single day, with daily active addresses exceeding 1.657M [3];

· The market value of multiple Telegram mini-game assets exceeds $500M, with on-chain DeFi TVL surging by more than 5,500% in 2024 …

The dual miracle of traffic and wealth has made TON one of the absolute focal points of the Web3 narrative in 2024. However, similar to previous Web3 booms, short-term surges are often accompanied by a data pullback. The TON ecosystem is currently experiencing a phase of “narrative cooling”: as shown in Chart 1, both the daily number of new wallets, active addresses, and the TVL and trading volume of core DEXs (Stone.fi and Dedust) have significantly declined from their peak levels. Although there have been some short-term spikes during this period, most are temporary rebounds driven by specific projects; looking at the annual trend, multiple indicators have fallen back to levels seen before the narrative was launched.

However, it’s not entirely pessimistic signals. The number of Jetton Wallets (non-zero balance wallets) is still steadily increasing, indicating that the accumulation of basic users is ongoing, although the growth rate has significantly slowed down. Meanwhile, the number of NFT mintings is also maintaining growth, suggesting that the on-chain application ecosystem is still being continuously promoted.


Figure 1: TON ecosystem data chart, source: Ton Stat, 2025.05.20

On the other hand, from the keyword trends of Google Trends, the overall search popularity of TON is also gradually declining, especially the attention on the ecosystem itself has decreased significantly. In contrast, the market’s focus on the Token price remains stronger.


Chart 2: TON keyword browser search popularity, source: Google Trends, 2025.05.21

However, a decline in data does not necessarily mean the end of the narrative. Similar examples are common: Bitcoin once experienced on-chain overload due to the inscription craze, but ultimately, activity returned to a relatively stable level; Solana and Base, after experiencing a data halving, welcomed a return of users and reached new highs again, accompanied by technical optimizations and ecological advancements.


Chart 3: Data Variation Trends on Solana and Base Chains, Source: Artemis, 2025.05.22

Does TON also have the ability to complete a deep transformation from traffic to value after the surge recedes? Is it a brief dormancy, or will it ultimately become a “narrative relic”? The answer will ultimately be determined by actions. In the following content, we will dissect the changes quietly occurring in TON “after the tide recedes” from the aspects of its organizational strategy, ecological construction, technological upgrades, and narrative transformation.

2. Major Actions Frequent: Team Restructuring, Compliance and New Markets, Infrastructure Development

Since the launch of Binance in August 2024, the narrative of TON has entered a new phase. On the surface, the hype has cooled, but in reality, it is a period of accelerated layout: including team restructuring, exploration of regulatory compliance, deep integration with Telegram, expansion of the tech stack, and incentives and capital injection for developers targeting the global market.

2.1 Leadership Change and Compliance Efforts: TON Accelerates Mainstream Path

At the beginning of 2025, the personnel adjustments at the TON Foundation sent a clear signal: globalization and compliance will become the core strategic directions for the coming years.

On January 15, Manuel Stotz, former board member and founder of Kingsway Capital, was appointed as the new president of the TON Foundation. Kingsway is an established investment firm managing billions of dollars in assets for American investors, and Stotz’s background brings a strong signal of “traditional capital markets” to TON. According to the official announcement, he will work alongside the former president and current board member Steve Yun to promote the international expansion of TON, focusing on the US market — a vibrant yet highly compliant region viewed as a crucial battleground in TON’s strategy.

On April 24, the TON Foundation further appointed MoonPay co-founder Maximilian Crown as CEO. MoonPay is a global leading cryptocurrency payment infrastructure company that has obtained compliance licenses in multiple jurisdictions, including the United States, Australia, and the Netherlands. Crown has extensive global operational experience and compliance handling capabilities, and his appointment is widely seen as a landmark step for TON to officially embrace regulation and move towards global mainstream adoption [4].


Chart 4: Existing core team members of TON, source: RootData

It is worth noting that Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram and an early promoter of the TON blockchain, was briefly detained in August 2024 due to Telegram’s alleged regulatory violations, only returning to the public eye in March 2025. Although there is no conclusion regarding this incident, the timing highly coincides with the strategic adjustments of the TON Foundation, which may indirectly prompt the team to place greater emphasis on regulatory issues, clearing obstacles for subsequent global deployment. Recently, the TON Foundation has been actively communicating with U.S. regulatory authorities. According to the TON ecosystem report, the TON self-custody wallet is scheduled to launch in the U.S. in the second quarter of 2025. In March 2025, the TON Foundation disclosed that U.S. venture capital firms such as Sequoia Capital, Ribbit, and Benchmark hold over 400 million dollars worth of Toncoin. This can also be seen as important evidence of TON’s transformation towards compliance and globalization.

From the global distribution of Telegram users (Chart 5), if TON wishes to convert them into Web3 users, it must meet the regulatory requirements for cryptocurrency assets in various countries. Otherwise, it will not only be difficult to implement applications in key markets, but it may also pose potential legal and business risks to Telegram itself. In fact, the global expansion of the TON wallet has already begun. Starting in November 2023, TON has launched phased promotions in certain African countries, and will subsequently expand to multiple markets in the Middle East, Europe, and Asia-Pacific, paving the way for future global compliance.


Chart 5: Telegram Downloads by Country in 2024, Source: CPA.RIP

2.2 TON × Telegram: Deep integration, binding ecological entry

In January 2025, Telegram officially designated TON as the sole blockchain infrastructure for its continuously evolving mini-app ecosystem, centered around the TON Connect protocol that seamlessly connects Telegram mini-apps with blockchain wallets, thereby simplifying users’ interactions with decentralized applications within the messaging app. This exclusive protocol establishes TON as the actual blockchain layer for Telegram’s nearly 1 billion users. This positions TON to potentially become the “Web3 version of WeChat Pay,” fully leveraging Telegram’s massive network effects.

In the payment system, Telegram promises to exclusively accept Toncoin as a non-statutory payment currency within its ecosystem, applicable to scenarios including Telegram Stars, Premium membership, the advertising system (Telegram Ads), and payment gateway services (Telegram Gateway). Developers and channel operators can directly receive income through Toncoin, initially establishing an internal payment and revenue distribution system based on Toncoin.

At the same time, the payment service provider RedotPay has supported Toncoin and USDt (the USDT version on the TON chain), and integrated with mainstream payment methods such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Alipay, which can be used at over 130 million offline merchants worldwide, further expanding TON’s payment capabilities in the real world.

The TON Space wallet has recently launched the use of Telegram Stars to pay transaction fees, which is essentially a form of crypto “abstraction” solution that allows users to complete transactions without needing to understand complex on-chain operations. This method differs from traditional chain abstraction solutions, as it not only relies on massive entry traffic but also promotes the transformation of on-chain applications towards being more “lifestyle” and “normalized”. According to the official plan, starting from the second quarter of 2025, American users will be able to directly experience TON wallet services within Telegram, further bridging the gap between Web2 consumption scenarios and on-chain asset management.[7].

2.3 Ecosystem: From Mini Game Craze to Diversified Track Expansion

The first wave of the TON ecosystem boom is primarily driven by mini-games. Stimulated by the combination of “airdrop incentives + easy to get started,” users quickly flocked in. For example, the airdrop of “Hamster Kombat” in September 2024 peaked at 300 million monthly active users in July, but by November, only 52 million active users remained, resulting in a user loss of over 86% in just a few months [8]. While simple and replicable game mechanics can create a “growth illusion” in the short term, they struggle to foster long-term user retention, exposing the homogenization issue in the early stages of the ecosystem.

In the face of this situation, TON is focusing on expanding the builder ecosystem while accelerating the layout of infrastructure. In April 2025, TON announced a strategic partnership with Chinese gaming giant KingNet (which has over 100 million users) and held its first large-scale game developer conference in Asia, attracting dozens of studios from the WeChat ecosystem to explore how to build Web3 applications based on Telegram and TON.

With the launch of the Telegram App Center feature, users can directly explore integrated third-party applications within the platform. An increasing number of TON ecosystem applications are making it onto the recommended list, and they are no longer limited to the gaming category but also include various dimensions such as social, payment, DeFi, and NFT, marking the preliminary expansion of its application ecosystem.


Chart 6: Screenshot of the Telegram App Center application interface, source: Screenshot from Telegram product page

According to RootData statistics, among the 187 TON projects recorded, approximately 14% focus on infrastructure. In addition to underlying services such as oracles and wallets, there are also development support platforms like TONXAPI and Play Deck, which lower the technical barriers for new builders and accelerate the sustainable development of the ecosystem.


Chart 7: Basic Projects of the TON Ecosystem (Partial), Source: RootData

In addition to gaming, the TON ecosystem is expanding into multiple new narrative tracks: including PayFi, RWA (which will be detailed below), as well as applications in AI, contract trading (Perp DEX), DePIN, and more. For example:

· Jointly launched the TON perpetual contract DEX incentive activity with GMX;

· Launch bounty program with AI Agent operating system ElizaOS;

· Collaborating with the aggregator protocol Jupiter to promote the development of the TON ecosystem aggregator…

The ecological potential has also attracted positive responses from institutional funds. In September 2024, Foresight Ventures and Bitget invested 30 million USD in TON, and the following month, Gate announced an additional investment of 10 million USD, promoting the development of the Telegram application [9]. In early 2025, former president of the TON Foundation, Steve Yun, launched the venture capital fund TVM Ventures, with an initial scale of 100 million USD, focusing on supporting DeFi, PayFi, and underlying infrastructure projects, further strengthening TON’s appeal to developers and its ecological moat.

2.4 Technical Upgrade: Advancement in Performance and Scalability

According to the roadmap released by TON for the first half of 2025, the core objectives of its technological iteration are to alleviate congestion, enhance scalability, and improve stability. This round of updates covers four major directions, reflecting TON’s evolutionary logic towards a “high-load, high-frequency application-oriented blockchain”:

    1. Accelerator Mainnet Upgrade
      This is the most significant architectural upgrade since the establishment of TON, aimed at achieving the “Infinite Sharding” mechanism and significantly improving the network’s stability and scalability. Core improvements include:
      · Shard chain tracking optimization: Nodes will only need to track the main chain and its associated specific shard chains, rather than tracking all shard chains, which will significantly reduce resource consumption and improve node processing performance.
      · Validator function separation: TON divides the originally unified validator role into “Collator” and “Validator”, improving overall validation efficiency through task parallel processing.
      These improvements will help the TON network maintain a stable block generation speed and transaction processing capacity even under high load, while reducing dependence on hardware.
    1. Layer 2 Payment Network
      TON plans to launch a Layer 2 payment network similar to the Bitcoin Lightning Network, focusing on instant transactions and a very low-cost asset exchange experience. Currently, the network is in the testing phase and will support various token assets, including Jetton, in the future, suitable for high-frequency trading, mini-game payments, and other scenarios. The implementation of this solution is expected to further enhance the practical usage of TON in everyday user payments and the gaming ecosystem.
    1. BTC Teleport Cross-Chain Bridge (Launched)
      BTC Teleport is a mechanism designed to achieve cross-chain asset transfer between the TON and Bitcoin networks. This mechanism simplifies the cross-chain interaction process through a peer-to-peer bridging method, significantly lowering the user entry threshold and costs. This will enhance interoperability between TON and mainstream public chains, paving the way for its expansion in DeFi, asset management, and other scenarios.
    1. Optimization and upgrade of technical tools
      In order to enhance the operational efficiency of validators and the security of the system, TON has introduced features including the MyTonCtrl backup recovery function, a validator Telegram notification bot, and a web dashboard, and plans to strengthen the incentive and penalty mechanisms for validators. For example, nodes that fail to successfully produce blocks within designated rounds will face more severe penalties. At the same time, a new version of TON Proxy is also under development, aimed at enhancing DDoS attack protection capabilities, further ensuring the stability and security of the network. Additionally, TON’s official API will also add features such as operation simulation, querying pending transactions, and domain management.
      The DOGS airdrop event in August 2024 became a “stress test” for the TON technology stack. At that time, the network was interrupted for 3 hours due to overload and loss of validator consensus, exposing architectural bottlenecks under extreme concurrency. The ongoing 2025 roadmap is a direct technical response to this event. A series of initiatives, including mainnet architecture reconstruction (Accelerator), Layer 2 network testing, and cross-chain bridge deployment, mean that TON is transitioning from a “high TPS showcase chain” to a truly scalable and highly resilient general-purpose Layer 1 capable of long-term sustainability.
      The technical direction of TON is not to pursue “the lowest fees” or “the highest single transaction speed,” but rather to support diverse scenarios through a modular structure—especially high-frequency interactions around payments, gaming, social, and lightweight financial applications. In the future, in addition to the payment-focused Layer 2 network, multiple functional dedicated Layer 2s may also emerge in TON, creating exclusive operational channels for different applications, thereby achieving highly adaptable on-chain architecture expansion.

3. Financial Narrative Reconstruction: Extending from DeFi to PayFi and RWA

3.1 From Trading Hype to Asset Depth: TON DeFi’s Ecological Supplement

Despite TON ranking among the top public chains in terms of the number of active addresses on-chain and transaction frequency, the depth of its DeFi ecosystem still falls far short of matching this level of traffic. According to DeFiLlama data, TON’s TVL is currently only about $115 million, placing it 36th among mainstream public chains. This contrast of “high activity - low locking” has also raised some market skepticism: “Is TON just another gathering place for ‘farmers’?”

The emergence of this situation has its objective background: the TON ecosystem has experienced rapid growth, while DeFi, as a type of “slow and meticulous” infrastructure, finds it difficult to quickly complete the product chain and operational loop in a short period of time. On one hand, developers need time to build high-quality contracts and protocols; on the other hand, most of the early TON DeFi applications continued to follow traditional web interaction logic, failing to achieve efficient synergy with the Telegram mini-program ecosystem. As a result, during the initial surge, the ones benefiting the most were the centralized exchanges (CEX), which attracted a large number of new user registrations and trading.

In response to this shortcoming, the TON team has begun to systematically improve the DeFi ecosystem and fully showcased its DeFi module layout at the Hong Kong Web3 event in April 2025.


Chart 8: TON DeFi Ecosystem Status, Source: Youtube

The T1 layer mainly includes core DeFi functions such as cross-chain bridges, collateralized stablecoin CDPs, AMM protocols, lending, and liquid staking LSD. These are the foundation for building more complex financial products. On this basis, TON is promoting the development of more advanced applications, including yield farming, derivatives, options, yield tokenization, vaults, launchpads, etc:

· STON.fi has launched Omniston, a decentralized liquidity aggregation protocol designed to simplify liquidity management within the ecosystem;

· The decentralized perpetual contract trading platform Storm Trade continues to grow in 2025, reaching its highest TVL in February.

· The yield tokenization protocol FIVA reached a TVL of 1 million USD within a few days of its launch and achieved a trading volume of 28 million USD…

In addition to the core DeFi applications mentioned above, TON is also continuously integrating more important DeFi partners, among which the most representative are Tether and Ethena, the two major stablecoin issuers.

USDT issued by Tether was officially deployed on the TON chain in April 2024 and has achieved rapid growth. Within just five months of its launch, the circulating supply of USDT surpassed 1 billion USD. This stablecoin has been integrated into the Telegram app for direct transfers and is widely used in payment scenarios for Telegram mini-apps and Web3 services, including creator rewards, digital service fee settlements, content monetization, and various other uses, further enriching the payment ecosystem of TON.

At the same time, TON is also advancing its collaboration with Ethena to integrate its synthetic dollar asset USDe, which has a TVL of over $6 billion. Through this integration, TON plans to introduce a stable dollar savings and yield acquisition channel for Telegram’s extensive user base, particularly benefiting market users who find it difficult to easily access dollar assets locally. This initiative not only strengthens TON’s strategic position in the stablecoin ecosystem but also injects more long-term valuable financial infrastructure into its DeFi system.

3.2 PayFi and RWA: The Connecting Bridge from On-chain Earnings to Real-world Value

During the TON Day event, the official systematically proposed a “dual-drive” financial application architecture for the first time, showcasing its on-chain financial design built around the Telegram mini-program ecosystem. The overall structure is divided into three layers:

· Core DeFi Layer: Includes various DeFi infrastructures and protocols that have been continuously improved, emphasizing technical performance and compliance framework;

· Real Yield Layer: Provides sustainable yield support for upper-layer applications through stablecoins, RWA returns, staking asset pools, etc.

· Retail TMA Layer: Leveraging the Telegram mini-program ecosystem, it builds user-side products including PayFi wallet, on-chain savings, yield games, Swap aggregator, etc., which is the key path to activating a large number of Web2 users.


Chart 9: Telegram Mini Program Application Layer, Source: Youtube

In this framework, PayFi and RWA have become the two new strategic narrative mainlines of TON. Around them, TON is gradually establishing a multi-layered revenue capture network that covers both on-chain and off-chain.

· Underlying: By connecting off-chain real financial assets through instruments like the Telegram Bond Fund (500 million USD RWA asset pool), it provides a verifiable and quantifiable source of real returns for the entire system. This layer is the key pivot where TON attempts to “chain reform” the logic of traditional financial products.

· Mid-level: By utilizing protocols such as Ethena’s USDe synthetic dollar and Yield Tokenization, these underlying returns can be split, combined, and redistributed to form programmable interest rate anchoring tools. This mechanism not only enhances asset liquidity but also makes the “returns” themselves combinable and usable across protocols, becoming the “interest rate cornerstone” of the TON financial ecosystem.

· Top Layer: Build front-end products based on high-frequency interaction scenarios in Telegram, presenting on-chain financial capabilities to end users in a familiar way. Through interfaces like Wallet Earn and Banking mini-programs, users can directly receive USDT rewards, participate in savings, or make financial arrangements without needing to understand complex concepts like synthetic stablecoins, staking pools, or RWA assets, thus achieving a natural transition from Web2 users to on-chain financial users.

Taking PayFi as an example, it is not only a functional extension of the Telegram wallet but also an interactive hub connecting “everyday payments + on-chain finance.” Users can use the Tap & Pay feature provided by Oobit for real-time payments in USDt at over 100 million retailers worldwide; at the same time, they can also receive USDT rewards in Wallet Earn and participate in yield management. Throughout the process, users do not need to understand terms like smart contracts, asset anchoring, or off-chain mapping to complete the on-chain finance experience. This design of “light experience + high financiality” is naturally converting Telegram users into Web3 financial users.

In the direction of RWA, TON is trying to build the underlying infrastructure for “on-chain brokers” and “on-chain savings banks.” For example, the Telegram Bond Fund launched by Libre in collaboration with the TON Foundation allows users to participate in fixed-income products such as USD bonds on-chain. In the future, it also plans to support the on-chain access of low-value and fragmented assets. At the same time, the synthetic stablecoin USDe launched by Ethena will, in the future, be integrated with debit cards for offline consumption, bringing new consumer finance scenarios to RWA applications.

Essentially, what TON is building is not an isolated financial protocol, but rather an “on-chain yield network” centered around Telegram: Telegram serves as the user entry point and traffic distribution; PayFi is positioned at the front-end interaction layer, connecting on-chain wealth management with everyday payment scenarios; RWA assets act as the underlying value anchor, injecting real yields into the financial system; while stablecoins, including USDe, and yield tokenization protocols undertake the functions of on-chain yield reception and distribution. Through this closed-loop pathway, TON is expected to naturally guide Web2 users into the on-chain financial ecosystem, completing the entire experience from asset access to yield realization without increasing the cognitive threshold.

4. The Future of TON: A Period of Accumulation for the Super Entrance, or a Castle in the Air?

TON’s “Traffic Miracle” stems from the ecological nesting of Telegram and the viral spread mechanism of Tap-to-Earn. However, as the hype fades, user stickiness declines, and on-chain data recedes, a key question arises: Can the TON ecosystem establish a sustainable “Traffic to Value” model?

The answer may be being written by TON’s own strategy. From the development pace, TON is not in a hurry to replicate the high-frequency stimulation operation of Tap to Earn, but has instead entered a deeper phase of infrastructure accumulation. This is similar to Solana’s engineering repair phase after the meme coin frenzy, or the Base ecosystem’s deep cultivation moment after the retreat of Friend.tech. TON’s current development strategy also reveals a similar idea: switching from “blockbuster narratives” to a value path of “high-frequency necessities + long-term accumulation.”

At the core of it all is Telegram—one of the Web2 platforms closest to the “super entrance” standard globally:

· Entry advantages: Social entry with nearly 1 billion users + one-stop wallet (TON Space) + Telegram App Center;

· Dual-driven by payment and finance: PayFi connects offline payments, while RWA builds a new paradigm of “on-chain finance”.

· Protocol-level nesting: The TON Connect and Stars fee mechanism essentially constructs the foundational infrastructure for chain abstraction.

· Technology stack implementation: Accelerator mainnet upgrade + Layer2 payment network + BTC cross-chain bridge, etc., are all strengthening the infrastructure capacity of TON.

From this perspective, the future of TON does not resemble a “castle in the air”; rather, it is like building a new digital economic hub. However, this hub is not being built for DeFi enthusiasts, but for the next batch of Web2 users.

However, the future of TON still faces three major challenges:

  1. The gap between user quality and financial depth: Despite having over 100 million monthly active users and a plethora of mini-games, the question remains whether users truly understand DeFi, engage in on-chain activities, and use Toncoin instead of just “grabbing airdrops.”
  2. The application value is difficult to close the loop on-chain: lightweight and embedded applications (such as mini-games, transfers, advertisements, payments) have a natural traffic advantage, but this “use and go” model also brings challenges: it is hard for user behavior to be consolidated into on-chain assets, identities, data, or long-term retention. Unlike the Ethereum ecosystem where on-chain representations are formed through wallet binding, DeFi participation, and NFT assets, most current TON users are merely “lightweight on-chain copies” of Telegram users, resulting in low activity and interaction depth of on-chain assets.
  3. Uncertainty of the compliance route: Although TON is actively embracing regulation, such as appointing the co-founder of MoonPay as CEO, it remains to be seen whether the combination of Telegram and TON can be sustainable in the face of high regulatory pressure markets like the US and the EU.

In other words, TON is at a critical point of “transitioning from attention to value accumulation.” Whether it will gradually consolidate high-frequency interactions into financial and service entry points like WeChat mini-programs, or become just another fleeting traffic illusion, largely depends on the team’s execution capability, the ecosystem’s self-evolution ability, and the wisdom in responding to the regulatory environment. However, one advantage that TON and Telegram have over WeChat is that they can “cross the river by feeling the stones of WeChat.” I believe that the next 6-12 months will be a key window period for the TON ecosystem to shift from “narrative-driven” to “fundamental value support.”

V. Conclusion

The story of TON is an attempt “from platform traffic to on-chain value.” It is neither built from the developer community like Ethereum to create a financial universe, nor is it driven by technology and meme catalysts like Solana. It is a user-centric, entry-hub-focused, lightweight experience-driven experimental field for Web3 popularization. From Tap-to-Earn to PayFi, from explosive popularity to infrastructure consolidation, the evolution path of TON actually presents an important signal: the next wave of Web3 popularization revolution may not occur within the crypto community, but quietly unfold in the daily lives of hundreds of millions of Web2 users.

Whether TON can truly seize this opportunity to evolve from a “super entry point on the chain” to a “super application platform on the chain” still requires time to verify. But regardless of success or failure, it provides a sample worth observing — one that does not guide users with “DeFi yield”, but instead leads them to gradually touch the chain and use it through familiar interfaces, lightweight payments, mini-games, and social experiences. This is an experiment, and also a gamble. However, in the current unresolved bear market, what TON offers is not a “myth of getting rich quickly”, but rather a Web3 imagination that is more in line with real-use scenarios. It may not be achieved overnight, but through a series of small cuts and real demands, it may be nurturing the possibility of the next round of true Web3 scalable transformation.

Disclosure: The author holds Toncoin and related assets; this report still contains some subjective elements.

Statement:

  1. This article is reprinted from [BLOCKBEATS] The copyright belongs to the original author [Wayne_Zhang]. If there are any objections to the reprinting, please contact.Gate Learn TeamThe team will process it as quickly as possible according to the relevant procedures.
  2. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not constitute any investment advice.
  3. Other language versions of the article are translated by the Gate Learn team, unless otherwise mentioned.GateUnder no circumstances may translated articles be copied, disseminated, or plagiarized.
Start Now
Sign up and get a
$100
Voucher!