Base is a fast-growing Layer 2 (L2) network that serves as an Ethereum scaling solution. Launched in 2023 and incubated by Coinbase, it has quickly become one of the most talked-about L2 networks, experiencing explosive user adoption, transaction volume, and ecosystem development.

As with other L2s, Base enhances Ethereum's scalability and reduces transaction costs while receiving much of Ethereum’s security benefits. In its first year since mainnet launch, Base has processed millions of transactions and seen its user base in terms of active addresses surge from under 3 million at the start of 2024 to over 22 million by July. More than just an extension of Ethereum, Base has managed to nurture its own unique community by focusing on user-friendly experiences and builder-led innovation.

What is Base?

As an Ethereum L2, Base uses the Optimism OP Stack as the foundation of its network. This makes it part of the Optimism Superchain ecosystem, bringing advantages of cross-compatibility with existing networks.  

Base uses Optimistic Rollups to interact with Ethereum mainnet, allowing it to process transactions off-chain to increase throughput and scale to its billion-user goal, and then batches transactions to be settled to Ethereum. Using OP Stack rather than building a new network from scratch ensures Base has a robust foundation to fuel its growth.

"We’re building a global economy, one that increases innovation, creativity and freedom" - Jesse Pollak, Base

While improving scalability is important for any L2, improving the onchain user experience has been an even bigger focus for Base, aggressively reducing gas costs so that onchain activities avoid the friction and cost of Ethereum and even competing L2s. Coupled with strong incentives for builders, Base has established a comprehensive ecosystem that caters to both experienced crypto enthusiasts ("degens") and retail users new to the world of Web3. 

The explosive growth of Base

Base's growth is quite remarkable. With the amount of new onchain addresses accelerating and total value bridged over to Base exploding, let's break down the key factors contributing to Base's meteoric rise. 

• Gas efficiency and scalability: At the heart of Base's growth is its gas efficiency, which saw some congestion issues due to unprecedented adoption, but these were resolved largely thanks to the Ethereum 4844 upgrade (also known as Proto-Danksharding). This upgrade has helped position Base as one of the cheaper chains in the market, with the Base team making additional efforts to finetune efficiency in the weeks that followed. Base has become an attractive solution for users seeking low-cost transactions without sacrificing speed or security. The aftermath of the Ethereum Dencun upgrade saw Base experience a staggering 3,200% increase in daily new users. So far, Base has been able to achieve 100x reduction in fees.
• Memecoin mania: A surge in memecoin activity on Base has attracted significant onchain activity and liquidity, and established an onchain culture specific to Base that has further fueled its popularity.
• Innovative products: The ecosystem has seen an influx of developers creating new and exciting products. Most prominent is Base’s dominance on Farcaster and its related projects, such as Degen token, a memecoin which has become the social network’s unofficial currency, even leading to a  layer-3 network with settlement on Base.
• Coinbase Smart Wallet: Coinbase’s drive to develop a smart wallet that doesn't require seed phrases or private keys was likely accelerated by Base as it has made it easy to onboard Coinbase's vast and not-so-crypto-native users to Base, where they can experience onchain without leaving Coinbase’s ecosystem.
• The Airdrop Factor: Airdrop speculation has contributed to some of the growth and hype around Base, it's important to note that a $BASE token airdrop has not been promised. As a regulated company, Coinbase and by extension Base, may not pursue this route. Statements from the founder have indicated a stance against airdrops.

Coinbase Smart Wallet

Coinbase Smart Wallet launched on June 5th, 2024, as part of the company’s mission to simplify onchain experiences. The setup process takes 10 seconds and does not require any extensions or seed phrases. Enhanced security is provided through the use of passkeys instead, allowing them to be stored on your device or manufacturer’s cloud keychain.

"Someone who never interacted with crypto can do a meaningful thing onchain in less than 60 seconds." - Jesse Pollak, Base

The Coinbase Smart Wallet also introduces gas sponsorships, quite similar to Matcha’s gasless swaps, and easy integration with Coinbase exchange. Being browser-based, it eliminates the need for third-party extensions, and developers can easily integrate it to their apps with a simple SDK.

Interestingly, Base founder Jesse Pollak expressed a personal preference for trading on Matcha. In the video interview with Matcha, Pollak explains how Coinbase and its smart wallet is the way they aim to bring the next billion users onchain, with a seamless connection between Coinbase, the smart wallet, and the onchain world, letting users trade on Matcha directly from a Coinbase onramp. 

Trade on Base with Matcha 

Are you eager to explore trading opportunities on Base? While there are several native decentralized exchanges (DEXs) open to users, Matcha aggregates all the largest DEXs to stand out as a premier solution for traders looking for the best experience and deepest liquidity. Here's why Matcha is the go-to platform for trading on Base, and how you can get started.

"Matcha has become kind of my default trading interface onchain." - Jesse Pollak, Base

Why choose Matcha for trading on Base?

• Unrivaled liquidity: We aggregate liquidity from multiple sources, providing users access to the deepest pools available. Matcha integrates 97% of all liquidity on Base, ensuring you get the best prices and minimal slippage.
• User-friendly interface: Whether you're a heavy trader or new to using crypto onchain, Matcha's intuitive interface makes trading fast and efficient.
• Advanced features: We also offer features like cross-chain swaps for quick and cheap bridging to Base, and gasless swaps so you don’t need ETH to trade. Smart routing is key to getting you the absolute best price on any token by reducing price impact on any individual liquidity source, all powered by our next-generation routing engine 0x V2. 
• Cross-Chain Capabilities: With cross-chain swaps, you can easily move tokens between Base and other supported networks through bridge aggregation, removing the need for cumbersome bridges. 
• Wide Token Selection: From more established assets to the latest memecoins, we provide access to virtually any token on Base, within 15 minutes of its launch!

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Start trading on Base:

1. Visit Matcha and connect your wallet.
2. Select Base as your network from the dropdown menu.
3. Choose the tokens you want to trade from the extensive list available.
4. Enter the amount you want to swap and Review the transaction details.
5. Confirm the transaction in your wallet, and you're done!

For more, read our Base network launch blog, trading tokens on Base with Matcha. 

Trading with Coinbase Smart Wallet

Matcha offers seamless integration with Coinbase Smart Wallet directly on the Matcha site, making your trading experience even more convenient:

1. Visit Matcha. 
2. Click Create Wallet to Set up Coinbase Smart Wallet. 
3. Search for a token and start trading! 

Coinbase Smart Wallet's user-friendly design and Matcha's powerful trading features create a smooth, efficient, and complete onchain trading experience on Base. Whether you're looking to swap the latest memecoin or execute a large trade with minimal slippage, Matcha provides the tools and liquidity you need to trade confidently!

Memecoins on Base

The surge of memecoins launched on Base has been a significant trend in the ecosystem's growth, driven by several factors. Base's low transaction fees, high scalability, growing user base of over 7 million wallets, and developer-friendly environment make it an attractive platform for memecoin creators and traders. 

The memecoin market on Base has reached impressive proportions, with a combined market cap of $1.87 billion and a 24-hour trading volume exceeding $168 million. This shows the big role memecoins play on Base, though it is still overshadowed by Solana, where the top memecoin by volume has around 5x the monthly volume of the top memecoin by volume on Base.

Trading memecoins on Base with Matcha

For degens and traders looking to jump into the next hot memecoin on Base, Matcha is a great option. With Matcha's extensive token list and search functionality, finding and trading the latest memecoins is as easy as a regular search engine. In addition, the new 0X V2 Argon Router finds the best price across liquidity sources and lets you visualize and choose the ideal trading route. This will show you exactly what liquidity sources are being used, as well as intermediate tokens, to get the best final executed price possible. 

What was Base created?

Base wasn't meant to be just another L2 solution; it was created with a focused mission to "bring the next billion users onchain." While it’s an ambitious statement that we repeatedly hear from multiple projects, no one has been as capable of making it come to fruition as the Base network team. Part of their advantage is catering to the needs of a non-crypto native audience, and this focus on user experience manifests in several ways:

1. Simplified onboarding: Base aims to streamline the process of getting started with Web3, reducing the technical knowledge required to participate through its exchange and integrated smart wallet. Leveraging Coinbase's reputation and user base to provide newcomers a sense of familiarity and trust.
2. Intuitive interfaces: By creating and encouraging the development of user-friendly interfaces, Base seeks to make blockchain interactions feel more intuitive. 
3. Reduced friction: Lower transaction costs and faster confirmation times remove two of the biggest pain points for user.

With Base, Coinbase has not just nurtured another blockchain network; it's made a strategic move to position itself at the forefront of the next wave of crypto adoption. Base represents a vision of a more accessible, user-friendly blockchain ecosystem that can appeal to the masses while offering the advanced features that crypto enthusiasts demand.

When did Base launch?

Base's journey from concept to fully operational network unfolded over several key milestones in 2023:

• February 23, 2023: Base launches in beta, generating immediate excitement in the crypto community. The potential for onboarding Coinbase's massive user base into Web3 becomes a major talking point.
• July 13, 2023: Base launches its mainnet version "for builders." This phase allows developers to create and deploy applications, but the network isn't yet open for general users.
• August 9, 2023: Base officially opens to all users, marking its full public launch. Matcha followed shortly after as one of the first aggregators to integrate with Base, enabling easy and efficient trading. 

Onchain Summer: igniting creativity and growth

Onchain Summer is an innovative annual online event hosted by Coinbase which runs throughout the summer, designed to fuel the growth and development of the Base ecosystem. Drawing inspiration from the DeFi boom of 2020 (often referred to as DeFi Summer), this initiative aims to recreate that explosive growth and creativity on the Base network.

What is Onchain Summer?

At its core, Onchain Summer is a multi-faceted campaign with a singular goal: to onboard more users to Web3 through the Base network. It's a celebration of blockchain technology encompassing art, music, gaming, and development. While open to all participants, this year's event strongly emphasizes developers and creators. A pool of approximately $2 million in rewards is available to incentivize development and creativity on Base. The event includes hackathons, grants, bounties, and other programs to engage developers across various sectors.

Key Programs and Rewards:

• Dynamic Bounties: Up to $5K for projects built on Base with Dynamic.
• Onchain Buildathon: A month-long hackathon with 200 ETH in rewards.
• Builder Grants: Up to 5 ETH for early-stage projects.
• Round Grants: Weekly 2 ETH rewards via Farcaster.
• Gas Credits: Gasless experiences through the Coinbase Developer Platform.
• Optimism Retro Funding: Additional funding opportunities through the OP stack.

Onchain Summer also tackles broader issues in the digital space. The "Mr. Miggles" initiative highlights the problem of digital content creators losing control and revenue of their viral creations. Base highlights NFTs as a solution to protect and monetize digital intellectual property.

Onchain Summer is more than just development, it's a holistic strategic approach to growing the Base ecosystem, addressing real-world problems, and pushing the boundaries of what's possible in Web3. For developers, creators, and users alike, it presents an unprecedented opportunity to be part of the next wave of innovation.

What’s Coinbase’s role in Base?

Coinbase played a crucial role in the creation and development of Base, incubating it as a 'startup within Coinbase.' This unique relationship has allowed Base to leverage Coinbase's resources and expertise while maintaining a healthy degree of autonomy in its operations and development. 

What’s Base’s role in the Farcaster ecosystem?

Base has been actively pushing to integrate with and support Farcaster, a decentralized social media ecosystem, which has seen notable adoption. Farcaster's popularity is partly attributed to its innovative feature called Frames. These Frames are essentially applets embedded in Warpcast, a social platform built on the Farcaster protocol, designed to make the on-chain internet more accessible by bringing on-chain applications directly into social posts. 

The launch of frames on Farcaster was a significant event for Base. Within 8 weeks of frames launching, Base's market share of Farcaster user transactions increased from about 15% to 60%. Base now supports frame development, has a grants program, developer tooling, and sponsoring hackathons worldwide to encourage building frames on Base. The strong interest in Farcaster aligns with the vision of Web3 for non-crypto natives, as Farcaster is considered one of the more user-friendly decentralized applications. 

What’s next for Base?

Base and its ecosystem is undoubtedly heading in the right direction. With most metrics positive, strong adoption from crypto and non-crypto natives alike, and great Web3 innovation taking place, they have been successful in igniting their own DeFi summer. Their plans to double down on Web3 user-friendliness might spark new waves of interest for Web3. Coinbase’s unique position and involvement will also contribute as thousands of users who use Coinbase haven’t traded onchain before. In any case, Matcha is here to support Base throughout its growth and ensure you can trade all the tokens on Base as seamlessly and easily as possible.