AI Payment Market Structure Reconfiguration: The Competitive Landscape of Solana and Base in the Agent Payment Layer

In April 2026, the cryptocurrency industry is experiencing a silent yet profound structural shift. While most market participants’ attention remains focused on the noise of Meme coins and trading volume competitions, the AI agent economy is quietly taking shape on-chain—and its payment infrastructure competition has already erupted on a protocol network called x402.

A piece of data recently drew significant industry attention: Solana accounts for approximately 70% of AI payment processing volume within the x402 protocol ecosystem. This is not only another functional validation of Solana’s high-throughput capabilities but also signifies that, in the potential trillion-dollar market of AI agent payments—predicted by multiple research institutions—Solana is shifting from a latecomer to a leader.

Competitors are equally formidable. Base, as an Ethereum Layer 2 network incubated by Coinbase, still leads with about 59% of the total proxy-to-proxy transaction volume, but Solana’s rapid catch-up has made the evolution of this competitive landscape less predictable.

According to Gate data, as of April 27, 2026, Solana’s token SOL is priced at approximately $85.67, with a 24-hour trading volume of about $62.54 million, a market cap of roughly $49.31 billion, and a market share of 1.96%.

The Formation of x402 Foundation and Solana’s AI Payment Positioning

On April 2, 2026, the Linux Foundation and Coinbase jointly announced the establishment of the x402 Foundation. This is an open standards organization operating as a nonprofit, aiming to establish standardized payment protocols for AI agents between crypto and fiat infrastructure. The founding members list is impressive: Google, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, American Express, Mastercard, Visa, Cloudflare, Shopify, Stripe, Circle, as well as multiple blockchain organizations including Base, Polygon Labs, and the Solana Foundation.

This list warrants close attention. It includes traditional payment giants (Mastercard, Visa, AmEx), heavyweight internet infrastructure players (Cloudflare, AWS, Google), and native crypto forces (Circle, Base, Solana Foundation). This indicates that x402 is not merely an internal crypto industry experiment but a foundational infrastructure evolution driven by the combined forces of payments, internet, and blockchain.

The Solana Foundation’s involvement is positioned to strengthen SOL’s ecosystem in high-speed payment scenarios. In fact, the x402 protocol architecture explicitly supports Solana’s Proof-of-History mechanism—designed to provide higher throughput and lower latency, especially suited for AI proxy needs to perform automatic payments without human intervention.

From HTTP 402 to On-Chain Machine Economy

Understanding the x402 protocol requires revisiting a core piece of internet infrastructure code that has been dormant for over twenty years.

The HTTP 402 “Payment Required” status code has existed in the HTTP specification since 1997 but has remained largely inactive for nearly three decades. In May 2025, Coinbase brought this dormant code to the forefront—thus, the x402 protocol was born.

The core logic of the protocol is simple yet foundational: when an AI proxy, application, or client requests a paid resource from a server, instead of returning a username/password or API key verification page, the server responds directly with an HTTP 402 status code containing payment information—including token type, amount, recipient address, and settlement chain. The client performs an on-chain payment and attaches a payment proof, then re-requests the resource. The server verifies the on-chain settlement status and grants access. The entire process takes about two seconds on average, without requiring account registration, API key management, or traditional payment processor involvement.

Key milestones in the development of the x402 protocol include:

This timeline reveals a clear trend: the pace of x402’s development is accelerating, with each key upgrade involving deeper ecosystem participation. Solana’s role has evolved from merely being compatible with the protocol to becoming a primary infrastructure builder within the ecosystem.

How Did 70% Come About, and What Does It Signify?

The figure “Solana handles 70% of AI payments”—this data point requires precise statistical context.

According to Dune Analytics, the weekly transaction volume of the x402 protocol peaked at about 13.7 million in November 2025, then declined to a range between 20,000 and 1.1 million in 2026. This sharp fluctuation must be understood within the cyclical crypto market rhythm and the maturity of AI proxy technology.

On-chain distribution shows that, as of March 2026, the x402 protocol has processed over 119 million transactions on Base, about 35 million on Solana, with an annualized transaction value of roughly $600 million. The protocol itself charges no fees. Base still leads with approximately 59% of total transactions, Solana accounts for about 38%, and the remaining networks combined account for roughly 3%.

However, focusing on proxy-executed transactions—autonomous, robot-initiated on-chain activities—Solana’s share jumps to about 70%, corresponding to approximately $560 billion in transaction volume. This structural difference is key to understanding the current competitive landscape. While Base holds a dominant share in the broader x402 transaction volume due to its early advantage as Coinbase’s native network and deep ecosystem integration, when narrowing the scope to high-frequency, low-value, autonomous “pure machine” transactions, Solana’s high throughput and low latency features align more closely with these use cases.

From a macro perspective, data from Circle in March 2026 shows that over the past nine months, AI proxies have completed 140 million payments, totaling about $43 million in transaction volume. There are over 400k AI proxies with purchasing power, with an average transaction of only about $0.31. The characteristics of high-frequency, small-value, large-scale concurrent payments are defining the underlying demand profile of the AI proxy economy—and this profile aligns strongly with Solana’s technical positioning.

Optimistic Narratives and Bubble Anxiety Coexist

Discussions around the x402 ecosystem and Solana’s expansion in the AI payment track show a clear polarization within the crypto community. Here are three main viewpoints:

Optimistic Narrative: Underlying Transformation of Internet Payment Paradigm

Optimists believe that x402’s significance extends beyond mere technical upgrades. Noted crypto investor Ryan Sean Adams points out that the rise of x402 marks a shift in internet business models—from “attention monetization in social internet” to “microtransaction monetization in AI internet.” AI agents will autonomously purchase services through native micro-payment systems, heralding the true de-intermediation of the web economy.

Several key opinion leaders in crypto echo this view from different angles. Some emphasize that x402 enables the internet to realize “payment as the underlying language” for interaction, fostering the emergence of a machine economy; others highlight that x402 achieves “paying for services with services”—where API calls, previously reliant on manual settlement or centralized billing platforms, can now be automatically paid by machines, completing a closed-loop Web3 business model.

Cautious Perspective: Technical Direction Does Not Guarantee Short-Term Adoption

Cautious analysts believe that, while x402’s technical direction has long-term value, the sharp decline from the peak of about 13.7 million weekly transactions indicates that the adoption pace is not linear. Some suggest that current AI proxy payments mainly involve trading bots and quantitative strategies, still distant from a full proxy economy where AI agents autonomously purchase computing power, subscribe to data, and pay APIs. The large amplitude between peak and trough signals the need for ongoing observation.

Bubble Anxiety: Disparity Between Narrative Hype and Actual Implementation

Skeptics worry about the sharp price swings of some tokens within the x402 ecosystem. For example, PayAI Network’s token once surged approximately 1,900% in a short period. Even among bubble skeptics, there is a cautious distinction: “99.9% of the crypto industry is full of scams, but x402 is an exception—this is the most authentic and practically valuable technology we’ve seen so far.”

Overall, mainstream opinions on x402 are not entirely positive or negative but seek a balance between technological potential and short-term performance uncertainties.

Three Aspects Confirming AI Payment Prosperity

In the face of market hype, it’s necessary to conduct a calm cross-validation of the prosperity of AI payments.

Transaction Structure: About 70% of AI proxy transactions are robot-driven, providing empirical evidence of the “machine economy” and raising an unavoidable question: To what extent do current AI proxy payments reflect genuine economic demand versus arbitrage by traders? In the short term, both factors coexist, and key indicators will be the diversification of transaction scenarios.

Ecosystem Concentration: Base and Solana together account for roughly 97% of proxy-to-proxy transaction volume. This indicates that competition in AI payments is essentially a duel between two giants. However, such high concentration also poses a structural risk—the prosperity of the x402 ecosystem heavily depends on continued investment from a few chains, including Base and Solana. The foundation’s move to include multiple large enterprises as founding members can be seen as a strategy to reduce concentration risk and promote standard diversification.

Institutional Participation: Institutional involvement adds credibility. For example, SBI Holdings’ B2C2 platform has chosen Solana as its primary stablecoin network for institutional clients, injecting a degree of institutional trust into AI payments. Additionally, Circle plans to integrate its Gateway product with the x402 protocol, further advancing the micro-payment infrastructure for machine-to-machine transactions. Compared to speculative flows, institutional capital usually indicates more stable demand structures and longer-term ecosystem development perspectives.

Industry Impact Analysis—Three Layers of Disruption from AI Payment Dominance on Public Blockchains

The current competition between Solana and Base in AI payments extends beyond payments themselves, impacting the broader blockchain ecosystem in three dimensions.

First Layer: Payment Narrative Reshapes Blockchain Value Anchors

Traditionally, blockchain value narratives focus on “smart contract platforms” and “DeFi infrastructure.” The rise of AI proxy payments is opening a third value channel. Solana gaining real market share in this new arena means its narrative is no longer limited to transaction speed and Meme coin ecosystems but extends toward “AI economy settlement layer on blockchain.” The proxy payment gateway launched by the Solana Foundation, based on x402, aims to lower merchant onboarding barriers for crypto payments and promote stablecoin adoption in real-world commerce. This expands the payment narrative from on-chain transactions to real economic activities.

Second Layer: Underlying Restructuring of the AI Proxy Economy

The core innovation of x402 is enabling AI proxies to “pay.” This capability is transformative: proxies are no longer just “thinking” and “executing” tools but possess the economic agency to independently conduct value exchanges. When AI proxies can autonomously purchase API calls, computing resources, and data access, the internet service economy will shift from subscription and prepayment models toward usage-based streaming settlements. This transformation imposes new demands on payment infrastructure in throughput, latency, scalability, and decentralization—areas where Solana demonstrates competitive advantages.

Third Layer: Fierce Cross-Chain Payment Standard Competition

x402 is not the only AI payment standard. In March 2026, Stripe and Tempo announced the Machine Payments Protocol, and Visa launched command-line payment tools for robots. This indicates that “AI payment standards” are becoming a competitive domain. Solana, through deep technical integration with x402 (including Proof-of-History compatibility) and early ecosystem deployment (proxy gateways, hackathons), has gained a first-mover advantage. However, members of the x402 alliance also include Base and Polygon Labs, and the protocol itself is not exclusive to any single chain. How cross-chain compatibility will influence ecosystem value distribution remains an open strategic question.

Conclusion

Solana handling 70% of AI payments is not just a testament to its technical edge but also a snapshot of the crypto industry’s shift from “asset trading infrastructure” toward “economic activity settlement layer.”

AI proxy economy is still in its early stages, with development pace depending on technological maturity, regulatory environment, and business model evolution. But a directional trend is already validated by data: AI proxies require native payment capabilities, and the large-scale deployment of this capability is reshaping the public blockchain landscape. The battle for AI payment dominance between Solana and Base may become an important window into the evolving dynamics of competition in the proxy economy era.