Ethereum Has Most Developers, But These Newer Chains Are Growing Fast

The year of the Merge saw the number of Ethereum developers jump to 5,000, a 400% rise compared to 2018

article-image

Source: Shutterstock / Maurice Norbert, modified by Blockworks

share

Crypto-focused early-stage VC firm Electric Capital has found that while Ethereum has the most developers in total, a majority of monthly active developers are working on other ecosystems.

Despite a bear crypto market in 2022, developers continued to create and progress towards mass adoption of decentralized applications (dApps). The crypto industry added 5% more developers in 2022 year-on-year, despite a 70% plunge in cryptoasset prices, the report released on Tuesday showed.  

The year was a rocky one for cryptoassets, given the tightening monetary policy and a string of bankruptcies, stirring fears of liquidity due to contagion. Yet, the industry captured over 61,000 first-time developers — an all-time high. Since the creation of Bitcoin in 2009, there are now more than 23,000 developers in the industry.

Total monthly active developers based on crypto ecosystems GitHub; Source: Electric Capital

Core blockchain developers focus on designing the front-end and back-end of a proposed blockchain network, which will then be used as a foundation by others. Even after a blockchain is built, they continue to develop new features and technology to improvise or activate upgrades for better functionality.

Electric Capital found that developer activity in 2022 was far busier than the previous crypto winter of 2018, when bitcoin plunged 65% 

Since 2018, the number of monthly active developers rose nearly 300% for Bitcoin. For Ethereum, developer count quintupled from 1,084 to 5,819 in that time period.

Some devs opt for emerging blockchains

The year of the Merge was significant for Ethereum, and its share of new developers for the stands at 16%.

But developers working on the Solana, NEAR and Polygon protocols rose 40% year-on-year, and added more than 500 total monthly active developers combined.

Loading Tweet..

Sui, Aptos, Starknet, Mina, Osmosis, Hedera, Optimism and Arbitrum were other blockchains that absorbed developer activity.

Those working on software for non-fungible tokens saw a 300% jump since 2021.

Developer engagement is an “early and leading indicator of value creation,” according to the VC firm. “Developers build killer applications that deliver value to end users, which attracts more customers, which then draws more developers,” it added.

And what about Bitcoin, recently? Although developers working on the OG crypto tripled from 372 to 946 since 2018, year-over-year, the total has flat lined.


Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily, with Byron Gilliam.

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

recent research

Unlocked by Template (10).png

Research

Innovations on Aptos’ technical design through Raptr, Shardines, and Zaptos approach near-optimal latency and throughput by unlocking 100% utilization of network resources, with the capacity to settle 260k transactions per second with latencies less than 800ms. The original Move language was revamped with the launch of Move 2, supporting more expressivity in smart contract logic and a scalable ability to interact with high volume datasets. The ecosystem has benefitted from strong asset inflows, now hosting over $1.3B in stablecoins, $450M in bridged BTC, and $530M in RWAs. Activity in the Aptos ecosystem has grown notably over the past year, with monthly application revenue reaching ~$835k and monthly DEX volumes growing to over $5B, both at new all time highs.

article-image

Also, only three tokens have outperformed bitcoin so far this year: XMR, HYPE and SKY

article-image

The fund group has submitted proposals in recent months for other funds that would hold litecoin, solana, XRP, HBAR, Sui and others

article-image

Momentum’s back — BTC leads, risk assets follow

article-image

Ondo Finance’s acquisition of blockchain development company Strangelove follows its buy of Oasis Pro

article-image

Cryptocurrency and stock traders alike had a lot to unpack Wednesday

article-image

The government says Storm was a money-hungry aid to criminals; the defense says it’s not his fault that people used his code for illicit activities.