Web3 application explosion: Consumer Summer will appear in 2025

In addition to micro-research projects and participating in transactions, we also need to pay attention to the macro changes and phased progress of the entire industry.

From DeFi Summer to Consumer Summer, the shift from financial applications to broader consumer applications represents the maturity and further popularization of the Web3 industry. Our industry is about to enter a new stage.

1. Review of DeFi Summer

DeFi Summer took place in 2020, driven mainly by the maturity of decentralized finance (DeFi) applications.

Curve, Compound, Uniswap, AAVE and other protocols are technically mature enough to support large-scale user participation, which is the internal driving force of the industry.

The more critical external driving force is the global low interest rate environment and the desire for high returns.

The liquidity in the market is very sufficient, and there is a need for higher returns, so liquidity has poured into the DeFi system.

DeFi Summer provides ordinary users with a new way to participate in financial activities, and at the same time, by adding leverage, it further amplifies liquidity.

Thus, DeFi Summer emerged, a summer of liquidity explosion.

2. What is Consumer Summer?

Consumer Summer has already shown signs, and the long-awaited explosion of Web3 applications in our industry is about to appear.

We will see more decentralized applications for ordinary consumers, such as decentralized social networking (users can control their own data and privacy), Web3 games (truly enabling players to own game assets), decentralized payments (platforms that provide transparency and reduce transaction fees), and so on.

These applications are nothing new. We have seen or heard of them before, but why do we need to bring them up again now?

Many applications did not take off in the last round or earlier. One of the key factors is that the blockchain infrastructure is immature and cannot support applications with high-frequency usage scenarios, such as the decentralized content platform "Bihu".

Ethereum founder Vitalik has made relevant remarks on this: Many interesting projects have started since 2015 and 2016, but by 2020, their development is still limited. A large part of the reason is the issue of transaction fees. If these projects want to truly develop and become mainstream applications, they must have the required TPS.

You can imagine that if you are an ordinary social media user and find that there is a novel social media application, but you need to pay $1, $5, and sometimes even $15 for every post or anything you do, then this is completely unfeasible.

But for financial applications, this is not a problem. So it's a pity that many decentralized social and other projects did not survive the DeFi Summer period.

Now, with the improvement of market demand, technological maturity, user experience and other dimensions, we have now reached the critical node for the outbreak of consumer-level applications.

During DeFi Summer, various DeFi protocols focused on TVL (Total Value Locked), while various consumer applications in Consumer Summer focused on the growth of the user base.

Just as the complex interactions and synergies between different projects during DeFi Summer, Consumer Summer can also see the further development of the ecosystem of Web3 applications, forming a more complex application network and promoting mutual growth.

3. The infrastructure layer is getting ready

Currently, preparations are being made for Consumer Summer in three dimensions:

(1) Public chain layer: The public chain is the soil for the emergence of applications

Ethereum Layer2 has improved the performance of Ethereum in disguise. Today, Layer2 can be said to be numerous.

But the Ethereum Layer2 Morph, which Bitget focuses on supporting, is the first public chain that clearly claims to serve consumers, and its focus is also mainly on the application layer.

Morph adopts a three-layer growth strategy:

The first layer: transforming DeFi projects, making traditional DeFi projects easier for ordinary users to access, and lowering the entry threshold for new users.

The second layer: on-chain application scenarios, focusing on how to bring everyday users to the chain.

Third layer: payment solutions. Morph will launch Morph Pay, which supports legal currency and crypto payments, simplifies transaction processes, and helps users use blockchain services more easily.

Let's continue to observe what will eventually grow on a consumer-grade public chain like Morph.

(2) Middle layer: various technical middlewares provide common services between applications and blockchains

In the middleware layer, the most noteworthy narrative is chain abstraction, and the leader of chain abstraction is Particle Network.

Particle Network has been deepening the chain abstraction narrative, providing chain abstraction middleware, and has launched chain abstraction benchmark products such as UniversalX.

When using blockchain applications, the three most painful problems encountered by users are: different chains require different wallets, different Gas tokens on each chain, and how to cross-chain assets.

Chain abstraction is to extract the common and essential parts from different chains, so that users do not need to understand the characteristics of the underlying different chains, or even perceive the existence of various chains. They only need to use the product to complete their own intentions.

Looking at the development history of Particle Network, from wallet abstraction to account abstraction to chain abstraction, its product development is very focused, and it has developed vertically in-depth in wallet technology services.

The overall process is to iterate step by step on the basis of existing users and products, solve problems at different stages respectively, and integrate many cutting-edge narratives in the Web3 industry.

Today, Particle Network has expanded to the decentralized exchange business. UniversalX is actually an exchange form and integrates various wallet capabilities.

（3）Development layer: Implementation at the specific application development level

OKX OS is a complete Web3 development solution provided by OKX. The access of public chains and protocols has been standardized, greatly reducing the development cycle and cost. It includes four major scenarios: wallet, DEX, Marketplace, and DeFi.

OKX OS has the most powerful data query capabilities, deeply analyzing data such as assets, transaction history, and project information. It supports more than 60 networks, including popular networks such as EVM, UTXO, Solana, TON, TRON, and also supports cutting-edge ecosystems such as Inscription.

What many people don't know is that many well-known Web3 projects are built using OKX OS-related interfaces.

The most direct feeling of ordinary C-end users is that the user experience of the OKX wallet is very smooth, but this is the final effect, and a lot of infrastructure is needed to support it.

OKX has been recognized and successful in the C-end market. In the process of serving C-end users, OKX has accumulated a lot of technical capabilities, especially in processing large-scale data, optimizing transaction processes and providing reliable online services. It has significant advantages.

Now OKX has opened up its underlying capabilities for the industry to use. OKX's success in the C-end market has helped it build trust in the B-end market. Corporate customers believe that OKX can provide stable and reliable services.

OKX has not only become a landmark product on the C-end user side, but also an important industry infrastructure on the B-end customer side.

4. To summarize

There are three core elements for the timing of Consumer Summer: technology maturity, market demand, and user awareness.

Our industry has been doing infrastructure construction in the past few years, and has made a lot of preparations in these three dimensions.

We can be ready to welcome Consumer Summer in 2025. The explosion of the application layer will bring many opportunities to ordinary users. Please participate in this new flow.