Recently, I’ve been pondering a question: why do some people make hundreds of thousands of dollars from airdrops, while others walk away empty-handed? I’ve found that the key isn’t luck, but understanding the track and execution ability.

Honestly, participating in airdrops is really a good entry point for ordinary people. You don’t need much capital to get involved and understand the core logic of Web3. I’ve seen people earn $100k from Arbitrum’s airdrop, and others make millions from Blur’s trading rewards. This zero-cost, high-reward potential model indeed attracts many newcomers.

But there’s a lot to learn here. First, understand why project teams do airdrops—in essence, they’re using tokens to exchange for user attention. Arbitrum issued $1.9 billion, STRK allowed 1.3 million addresses to share $1.4 billion. Behind these big moves is the project’s desire to quickly build ecosystem activity. Your participation in airdrops is actually a way to learn how to interact with these protocols, familiarizing yourself with wallets, DApps, cross-chain concepts, etc. This is especially helpful for future investment decisions.

The current question is: how to find truly valuable airdrops among many projects? My experience is to look at several dimensions: First, institutional backing is very important. Projects backed by top investors like Paradigm or a16z usually have larger airdrops. Second, focus on hot sectors—DeFi, Layer 2, NFT projects often have more imagination. Third, use on-chain data to speak—monitor whale addresses’ behavior with tools to spot early airdrop signals. Fourth, choose chains with low Gas fees; for example, operations on Polygon cost much less than on Ethereum mainnet.

Avoid the pitfalls too. Phishing scams are the most common. Remember one rule: airdrop tasks only require your wallet address; never provide private keys or authorize unknown contracts. Also, verify the project’s authenticity—check the official website, team background, community activity. If social media followers are low or the code isn’t open source, be cautious. Additionally, diversify participation across multiple projects—don’t put all your chips into one airdrop, as some projects may end up worthless.

In practice, I recommend using multi-chain wallets like MetaMask, isolating each airdrop project with separate accounts to reduce risk. To improve efficiency, you can use fingerprint browsers with dedicated proxy IPs to manage multiple accounts. Source of information is crucial—follow some airdrop influencers on Twitter, join Telegram groups—these can help you spot opportunities earlier than others.

For task execution, social tasks are easier to start with—registering accounts, following, sharing, etc. For on-chain interactions, practice on testnets first—use faucets to get test tokens, familiarize yourself with the process before going live on mainnet. On chains with low Gas fees, do more swaps, staking, and similar operations to build on-chain activity, which helps boost airdrop weight.

I’ve noticed a pattern: the rewards from airdrops are often positively correlated with Gas consumption. High-frequency interactions on Polygon or large transactions and cross-chain operations on Ethereum mainnet can increase airdrop weight. That’s why some people earn millions, while others only get small amounts—the difference lies in execution and strategy.

Long-term, participating in airdrops shouldn’t be the end goal, but a starting point. After accumulating some capital, consider shifting to more stable income methods—staking and liquidity mining in protocols like Lido, Aave, or positioning in early-stage projects with high funding but not yet valued. This way, you can create a “snowball” effect.

To put it simply, airdrops are essentially a form of cognition monetization. Through scientific filtering, efficient execution, and strict risk control, ordinary people can fully achieve their first big gains in this process. The new cycle is just beginning, and opportunities do exist. The key is to take action—don’t just watch and leave it at that.