Whether you want to understand the new ecosystem or ambush potential airdrops, now is a good time to interact with the Aptos ecosystem.
On July 25th, the highly anticipated new generation Layer1 project Aptos announced the completion of a new round of financing of $150 million. This round of financing was led by FTX Ventures and Jump Crypto, with other investors including GriffinGamingPartners, FranklinTempleton, CircleVentures, and Superscrypt.
Including the previous $200 million financing led by a16z in mid-March, Aptos' total funding has reached $350 million. From the perspective of capital support alone, this Layer1 project, which inherits the "will" of Diem, has become the most anticipated player in the new round of public chain competition.
Even compared with the "old" generation Layer1 projects that emerged in the previous bull market, Aptos is also very competitive. In addition to the collective endorsement of top VCs, Austin, the former marketing director of Solana, has publicly announced that he will join Aptos as the director of the ecosystem. More developers from existing Layer1 ecosystems are also flocking to Aptos.
Odaily Planet Daily Note: It is rumored that the hourly wage of Move (the programming language used by Aptos) developers can reach $1200.
On August 1st, the Aptos official website announced that the third round of incentive testnet activities (the last testnet before the mainnet goes live) will open for registration on August 19th and officially launch on August 30th. For users who have the conditions to independently operate nodes, the best way to catch up with the Aptos express is undoubtedly to directly participate in the incentive testnet (the mainnet will give token rewards). However, considering that this activity has certain technical and financial thresholds, trying out specific Aptos ecosystem projects may be a more suitable way for ordinary users to "ride", which is also the focus of this article.
Although it will take some time for the mainnet to go live, there are already many projects being developed based on Aptos. From infrastructure services such as wallets and oracles to functional applications such as DeFi, NFT, and domain names, many projects have launched test versions. Whether you want to understand the new ecosystem or ambush potential airdrops, now is a good time to interact with the Aptos ecosystem.
Next, we will comprehensively review the Aptos ecosystem in the order of "Wallets", "DeFi", "NFT", and "Others", and focus on introducing specific interaction methods for interactive projects. For other projects that have not yet launched test products or are not directly targeted at users (such as oracles and development tools), we will also mention them to facilitate a more comprehensive understanding of the current status of the Aptos ecosystem.
Wallet Projects
In terms of wallets, the projects currently announced to be built in the Aptos ecosystem include Martina, Fewcha, ONTO, Volt, Blocto, Hive, Multimask, and more. Among them, Martina and Fewcha are dedicated wallets for the Aptos ecosystem that have been launched as test versions. ONTO, Volt, and Blocto are multi-chain wallet service providers intending to expand into the Aptos ecosystem. Hive is relatively early-stage and has not yet released a usable product. Multimask is a wallet developed by Aptos ecosystem OG project Pontem, which is almost a complete replica of MetaMask. It is currently only available for testing Pontem's other projects (mentioned later in the Liquidswap section).
As the first step in interacting with the Aptos ecosystem, it is recommended to install the browser extension of Martina (official website: https://martianwallet.xyz/) or Fewcha (official website: https://fewcha.app/). It is worth mentioning that since Aptos currently does not have any wallet service providers that can occupy the majority of the market share like MetaMask, different Dapps are expected to prioritize different wallets. For the convenience of future interactions, it is recommended to install both (for now, Martina is enough).
Taking Martina as an example, after installation, follow the instructions to set a password and save the mnemonic phrase to obtain an Aptos testnet address starting with 0x. Then click on the airdrop in the wallet to receive 5000 test tokens APT (can be claimed repeatedly), which can be used as "funds" for interacting with other projects.
The installation process for Fewcha is similar (the usual wallet setup), but the address for receiving test tokens will be in the top left corner at the Devnet faucet.
DeFi Projects
DeFi is currently the most important application category in the Aptos ecosystem, and it can be further divided into stablecoins, DEX, aggregators, IDO, lending, asset management, derivatives, and liquidity staking.
Odaily Planet Daily Note: Many projects on Aptos (such as 1KX Protocol, Mariana Exchange) span multiple categories. When counting, we will classify them according to their main business direction.
Sub-category 1: Stablecoins
In terms of stablecoins, Thala Labs is currently the most watched stablecoin project in the entire Aptos ecosystem. The project plans to issue over-collateralized stablecoin AST on the Aptos network in the future, but it has not yet launched a test product.
Sub-category 2: Lending
In the lending field, projects currently being built in the Aptos ecosystem include Vial Protocol, Mobius, Njord Finance, Aptoslend, Ultima protocol, and more. Among them, Vial Protocol (official website: https://www.vial.fi/app) and Mobius (official website: https://mobius.market/app) have launched test products. The interaction with Vial Protocol is relatively simple and similar to Compound, Aave, and other platforms. The wallet can directly use Martina, and users can deposit and borrow test tokens such as APT, BTC, and USDC on the platform. APT can be claimed directly in Martina, while BTC and USDC can be claimed at the faucet on the main interface.
It should be noted that due to the early stage of the product, I often encountered error prompts when using Vial Protocol. If this happens, try again a few times.
The interaction with Mobius is similar, and the related test tokens can be claimed at the faucet on the homepage of the official website.
Sub-category 3: DEX
In terms of DEX, projects currently being built in the Aptos ecosystem include Liquidswap (developed by Pontem, similar to Multimask), 1KX Protocol, Saber, Econia, AptoSwap, Empo Finance, Hanson, Laminar Market, Mariana Exchange, and more. Among them, Liquidswap is a DEX that has been cultivating in the Aptos ecosystem for a while and has already launched a test product. 1KX Protocol and Saber were previously from the Ethereum and Solana ecosystems, respectively, and do not currently support Aptos. The other five projects are relatively early in the development cycle and have not yet launched a testnet.
Liquidswap (https://liquidswap.com/#/) is an automated market maker (AMM) DEX. Currently, it can only be accessed through the Multimask wallet. The installation method of Multimask can be found in the official Github tutorial (https://github.com/pontem-network/aptos-chrome-extension/releases/tag/v1.2.1). The specific steps are as follows:
-
Download the zip installation package for different browsers, and then follow the usual wallet setup process.
-
After that, follow the usual wallet creation process to set a password and save the mnemonic phrase to complete the wallet creation.
-
Go back to the Liquidswap main interface, connect Multimask, and complete a transaction using the test tokens we just received.
Sub-category 4: Aggregators
Currently, there is only one aggregator project on Aptos, which is Hippo. The product has not been launched yet.
Sub-category 5: IDO
There are several IDO projects on Aptos, including DaoStarter, Orion, and more. However, none of them have launched products based on Aptos yet.
Sub-category 6: Derivatives
In the derivatives field, projects currently being built in the Aptos ecosystem include Tsunami Finance, Aries Markets, Clone Protocol, and more. None of these projects have launched test products based on Aptos yet.
Sub-category 7: Asset Management
The asset management projects in the current Aptos ecosystem include Seam Money and Solrise. Both projects were originally from Celo and Solana ecosystems, respectively, and do not currently support Aptos.
Sub-category 8: Liquidity Staking
The liquidity staking protocol serving Aptos is Zaptos, which has not yet released a product.
NFT Projects
Due to the limited number of samples, NFT projects on Aptos can be further divided into platform projects for issuance, trading, lending, etc., collectible projects mainly focusing on pfp, and domain name services.
Sub-category 1: Platform Projects
NFT platform projects currently being built in the Aptos ecosystem include Topaz, Souffl3, Wav3, and more. Among them, the trading market Topaz has launched a test product, and another trading market Souffl3 is expected to go live this week. The service platform Wav3 has not yet launched a product.
The interaction with Topaz (https://www.topaz.so/) is similar to OpenSea. After connecting with Martina, you can buy NFTs listed on the market. Taking the ANS Collection (Aptos ecosystem's ENS, mentioned later) as an example, we can randomly choose a durant.aptos to purchase. Confirm the transaction in the wallet, and you can also list it for sale on the market.
It is worth mentioning that the NFTs listed on Topaz are often priced high, although the test tokens are not real money, it still takes some time to claim so many tokens.
Sub-category 2: Collectible Projects
Currently, there are many collectible NFT projects in the Aptos ecosystem, such as WitchVerseLabs, Aptos Toad Overload, TokenMasksLabs, Aptos Monkeys, The Uglies NFT, Aptos Girls, and more. Most of these projects will be released when the Aptos mainnet goes live.
Considering that the NFT market is currently mixed, and the value of such projects requires a large-scale community support, I personally do not recommend rushing into these projects in the early stages of the ecosystem.
Sub-category 3: Domain Name Services
There is currently only one project focusing on domain name services in the Aptos ecosystem, which is Aptos Name Service.
Aptos Name Service (https://www.aptosnames.com/) can be understood as the ENS of the Aptos ecosystem. The interaction method is to first connect the wallet (Martina is fine) and then enter the desired domain name in the search box.
As shown in the figure below, if the domain name has not been registered by another address, the page will display "Available". Click "Buy" to purchase it. If it shows "Not available", it means that the domain name has been registered by another address, and you need to choose another domain name.
After registration, the domain name will exist in the registered wallet as an NFT, and users can use the domain name instead of the address for transfers within Martina. You can also register multiple domain names and try to list them for sale on Topaz.
Other Projects
In addition to the above three categories, there are many other projects in the Aptos ecosystem that have completely different business directions. These include oracle project Switchboard, messaging services Dialect and Notifi, indexer Aptosphere, DAO treasury tool Paymagic, data analysis platform Dapptos View, infrastructure projects Nutrios and StreamingFast, and more.
Considering that most of these projects are not directly targeted at ordinary users and many of them have not yet launched specific test products, for now, we will categorize these projects as "Others". If these projects make significant progress in the future, Odaily Planet Daily will continue to track and report on them.
Personal Interaction Experience
Overall, although the Aptos ecosystem has reached a certain scale and is still expanding rapidly, the number of projects that have released usable products on the testnet is actually limited. There are only a few projects available for testing, such as Martina, Fewcha, Multimask, Liquidswap, Vial Protocol, Mobius, Topaz, Aptos Name Service, and a few more.
In terms of actual experience, the available content of these projects is not extensive at the moment, and they generally follow the same pattern as the "old" ecosystem. Users can hardly perceive the differences in experience brought by different languages and development environments. Overall, there won't be much unfamiliarity in the interaction.