Solana, the L1 of the NFT world, is quickly gaining traction as a DeFi hub as well. Beaten by the FTX collapse early this year, $SOL price took a massive dump from bull market highs of $245 per $SOL to bear market lows of $9.60 in December 2022. At the time of this article, $SOL price stood at $77, recovering over 3x since the beginning of 2023.

However, we are not here to talk about $SOL price. We are here to talk about the emerging Solana ecosystem and the airdrop opportunities it presents.

It is also noteworthy that Solana airdrops are not a thing of smoke and mirrors.

There were three recent airdrops in Solana which have all performed extremely well and made 5–6 figures for a lot of people.

Pyth Network airdropped their $PYTH token to DeFi users across Ethereum, Solana, and Cosmos. The token launched at $0.2 and is currently trading at $0.46 — people who held on to their 10,000 allowances are happy campers now.

The airdrop that followed was from Jupiter Exchange. A tier allocation based on DeFi usage and longevity in the ecosystem were factors for the airdrop. Tier 1 users received 100,000 $JUP tokens. It started trading at $0.5 per token, which is a cool $50,000 for tier 1 users.

$JITO airdrop is another recent success story in the Solana ecosystem. Jito is a liquid staking protocol. Their airdrop was anywhere from 1,000 to 25,000 tokens and on rare occasions even more. $JITO launched at $2 and currently trades at $4.1 — you do the math.

So, Solana airdrops are certainly a hot thing in crypto right now and you are not too late to catch some future airdrops. Let’s dive in.

(0) Phantom wallet

So, this one is a curve ball. There is no airdrop announced at the moment. But it is similar to the elusive MetaMask airdrop. So many rumors and much hype. Also, Phantom Wallet is your entry to the Solana ecosystem. So, get it here, install it, and deposit some $SOL to begin interacting with the protocols below.

(1) Wormhole Bridge

This is not a Solana-native bridge, but you can use this to transfer funds from any other chain to Solana, if your funds are outside of Solana. But the good news is that, there are rumors of a $HOLE airdrop (much like the LayerZero airdrop). To use Wormhole bridge, use the Portal Bridge, connect the wallet you have funds in, connect your Phantom wallet, and do the fund transfer. Or you can mint an NFT at L2Marathon.com and transfer it to another chain which will pass through Wormhole bridge.

(2) Jupiter Exchange

Jupiter Exchange is one of the biggest exchanges on Solana. Their token $JUP was launched and first wave of airdrop has already happened. But there are three more airdrop rounds and likely similar eligibility criteria will be used for qualification.

• Visit — https://jup.ag/
• Connect your Phantom wallet
• Swap assets
• Go to — https://jup.ag/limit/USDC-SOL and place limit orders
• Go to — https://jup.ag/dca/USDC-SOL and place DCA orders (at least 1 order)
• Go to — https://jup.ag/perps/long/SOL-SOL and do some perpetual trading (warning: perpetual trading involves high risk as you use leverage and guesstimate the price trends. Only do this if you understand the risks).

Use it frequently and across a few months. We have no clue when the next airdrop snapshots will take place.

(3) Zeta Markets

Zeta Markets is a perpetual trading platform on Solana. I have been using this protocol for a couple of days now and it is silky smooth. However, like I mentioned earlier, only play with money you can afford to lose.

Zeta Markets has introduced a Z-score system to accumulate points based on your trading activity.

According to Zeta docs, Z-score is your gateway to $ZETA airdrop. The higher the points, the higher your airdrop will be.

There are two main ways to increase your Z-score.

1. by actively doing trades on the platform and build volume
2. by becoming a profitable trader.

The volume will give you Z-score points and profit will give you point multipliers.

• Visit — https://dex.zeta.markets/trade/SOL-PERP
• Trade available assets

RISK WARNING — only play with money you can afford to lose. Use margin trading only if you are comfortable with the risk you are taking.

(4) Marinade Finance

Marinae Finance to Solana is what Lido is to Ethereum. They provide non-custodial Solana liquid staking. Meaning you can lock up your $SOL with Marinade Finance and receive an equivalent token that you can use elsewhere. For Marinade, this token is called $mSOL.

For this one, there is no confirmed airdrop right now. Any airdrop will be subject to DAO voting. Considering how the Solana ecosystem is flourishing due to airdrops, they might consider doing more.

Also, if you stake $SOL with them now, you are eligible to earn $MNDE governance token right now (only until December 31, 2023).

• Vitis — https://marinade.finance/app?ref=5aa3xtz2 (referral link)
• Select any amount of $SOL you wish to stake with them
• Select ‘Liquid’ option at the bottom to receive $mSOL

• Click ‘Stake’ button

Now, you should receive an equivalent amount of your staked $SOL in the form of $mSOL in your wallet. This is important for the next step.

(5) Kamino Finance

Deemed to be the liquidity hub on Solana. You can borrow, lend, provide liquidity, and engage in perpetual trading to earn Kamino points.

These points could be a factor for their airdrop which has been teased by the team.

• Visit — https://app.kamino.finance/ and lend any of the tokens available
• Lend the $mSOL you received from the previous step.
• Usually, borrowing accumulates more points, as borrow interest rates are higher and generate revenue for the protocol. Borrow assets as your risk tolerance.
• Visit — https://app.kamino.finance/liquidity and deposit liquidity to any pair
• Visit — https://app.kamino.finance/lending/multiply to deposit some assets and boost your yield (and possibly points, too)
• Visit — https://app.kamino.finance/lending/leverage to engage in perpetual trading. Remember the risks involved with this. Only participate if you understand what you are getting into.

(6) Solend

Another large liquidity hub on Solana primarily focusing on lending, borrowing, and liquidity pools.

There is no airdrop per se with Solend, but all the trades you perform, and some other activities earn you points. These points are convertible to $SLND tokens at the end of each season. Season 1 has concluded and the next one will begin shortly.

• Visit — https://solend.fi/dashboard and lend assets
• Borrow assets against the assets you lend
• Click on the points counter at the top right of the screen and do the cookie clicker daily to gain additional points at no $ cost.

(7) MarginFi

MarginFi is another popular liquidity hub on Solana, primarily focusing on lending and borrowing. It also allows token swaps powered by Jupiter Exchange, which we covered earlier.

MarginFi has launched a points system as well. Although no airdrop is confirmed, points usually mean some form of rewarding mechanism.

• Visit — https://www.mfi.gg/refer/5dfb043a-3992-49de-91e8-2c7e04667b69 (referral link)
• Lend any assets you have. You can lend liquid staked assets such as $mSOL from the previous steps.

(8) Meteora

Yet another lending/borrowing platform on Solana with a confirmed airdrop. Their documents talk of a $MET token and its distribution to “stakeholders of all our Mercurial token holders.”

• Visit — https://app.meteora.ag/
• Deposit funds to a pool created by Meteora such as https://app.meteora.ag/pools/DvWpLaNUPqoCGn4foM6hekAPKqMtADJJbJWhwuMiT6vK or https://app.meteora.ag/pools/ERgpKaq59Nnfm9YRVAAhnq16cZhHxGcDoDWCzXbhiaNw
• Visit — https://app.meteora.ag/vaults and deposit tokens to any vault
• Visit — https://app.meteora.ag/farms choose a farm of your liking and deposit assets

(9) Drift

Drift is a decentralized exchange on Solana that has been growing in popularity on airdrop hopium recently.

There is a traffic jam to create a new account on Drift that costs you 1.5 $SOL. You can reclaim this after deleting your account. So, if you have the funds for lockup;

• Visit — https://app.drift.trade/SOL-PERP and perform perpetual trades (only if you understand the risks)
• Visit — https://app.drift.trade/SOL for spot trades
• Visit — https://app.drift.trade/swap to perform token swaps
• Visit — https://app.drift.trade/earn/lend-borrow/deposits to lend and borrow money
• Visit — https://app.drift.trade/earn/stake to deposit your assets and earn a high APR from protocol fees
• Click on ‘Enter Draw’ on the top right-hand side of the screen to see your chance to win $5,000 based on the volume of your trades.

(10) Tensor Trade

Tensor Trade is a premier NFT marketplace on Solana. It is similar to Blur on Ethereum which did a massive airdrop based on its Blur points system. And guess what, not only Tensor looks like Blur, it also has a points system.

There are many ways to earn points — all having to do with NFTs and referring friends to the platform.

Tensorians NFTs seem to be the gateway to the platform rewards but you can buy, sell, and list other NFTs to accumulate reward points.

• Visit — https://www.tensor.trade/ and engage in NFT trade as you normally do
• Visit — https://www.tensor.trade/shipyard if you acquire a Tensorian NFT to stake it and earn even more points.

And this concludes our Solana airdrop guide for you. It is advisable to mark your footprint in all or most of these platforms to increase your chances of airdrops. However, don’t break your bank in chasing airdrops. Use DeFi as it is intended and you will qualify for most.

It is also very important to remember that none of the airdrops are guaranteed and you can lose all of the funds you deposit into these protocols. The airdrops you receive might not be worth anything at all depending on many conditions. Airdrop chasing is high risk and sometimes high reward. So place your bets according to your risk tolerance.