Table of Contents
Researcher
Key Takeaways
Killer applications, not raw throughput or low fees, determine whether a blockchain evolves into indispensable infrastructure; a platform without a flagship app is the on-chain equivalent of a game console with no titles.
New chains face two strategic routes: (1) deliver a 10× technical leap (now exceedingly rare) or (2) launch a breakout application first, then convert that product’s infrastructure into a dedicated chain; current market dynamics overwhelmingly favor the second.
Hyperliquid and Abstract validate the app-first flywheel: obsessive app → captive users → tailored chain → liquidity & builder inflow → widening moat.
The next generation of blockchains will debut as must-use games, financial tools, or social networks; teams that prove product-market fit before protocol-market fit will dominate, as a live killer app is stronger evidence than any whitepaper.
1. The Dilemma
In tech history, great platforms never thrive in a vacuum. They’re propelled by killer applications. Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer famously noted that “Platforms need apps...You will get stuck in the mud if you’re just a platform.” On Windows, Microsoft built Office as the flagship app; on Exchange server, Outlook was the must-have tool. Owning a top-tier first-party application can make your platform indispensable.
Applied to crypto, this insight challenges the traditional blockchain strategy. Many blockchain projects focus on building a general-purpose chain and outsourced 100% of app development to the community. This would have worked 10, or even 5 years ago, but in an age where countless blockchains tout high throughput and low fees, a blockchain without a killer app is like a gaming console with no games.
2. Two Paths to Blockchain Success
Hasu succinctly outlined two paths for new chains today.
Path 1: Be 10x better than everyone else in a broad sense. This could mean a technological breakthrough or a novel architecture so superior that developers and users flock to it. True 10× innovations in core blockchain tech are increasingly rare.
Path 2: Build a highly successful application first, then platformize it into a chain. In this model, a team starts by delivering a product people want (a game, an exchange, a social network, etc.) and only later transforms the underlying infrastructure into a dedicated chain. This app-first approach leverages an existing user base and domain expertise, sidestepping the chicken-and-egg problem of attracting users to a blank-slate platform. Hasu argues that Path 2 is not only easier, but in many ways strictly dominant.
Given how saturated general-purpose blockchain development has become, the app-first strategy is emerging as the smarter play. Why spend years begging third-party developers to build on your chain when you can kick-start growth by being your own best developer?
3. Apps Drive Platforms
A blockchain is essentially a network-effects business. Its value is a function of how many users and applications it connects. A new blockchain with no apps faces a cold-start problem; users won’t come without applications, and developers won’t build without users. A killer app jump-starts the flywheel by bringing its own gravitational pull of users, liquidity, and attention.
Building an app internally also provides focus. Instead of a generalized ‘build it and they will come’ approach, the chain’s design can be optimized for a specific problem. We’ve seen this in Web2 as well: Amazon started with books before becoming the everything store. Facebook was a college networking site before evolving into a broad platform.
Blockchains should stop building abstractions for each other and start building real products for real people. A shiny new chain isn’t a product, it’s the apps that solve real user needs (finance, gaming, social) that give the chain purpose. Focusing on those needs forces teams to achieve product-market fit instead of just protocol-market fit.
There’s also the co-location effect: when your flagship app runs on your own chain, other complementary apps have a strong reason to join that ecosystem. They benefit from close integration, liquidity sharing, and a ready user base. If you succeed with one DeFi app, for example, other financial apps will prefer deploying on your chain to tap into your liquidity and users.
Moreover, by building the app first, teams demonstrate leadership and commitment. Instead of just tossing grants at random developers, the chain team leads by example, setting a quality bar with their first-party product. This can inspire confidence in other builders: “If they can get millions of users trading/playing on their chain, maybe I should bring my app there too.”
4. The App-First Advantage in Practice
The app-first strategy is already playing out in the market.
Hyperliquid is a prime example of a team building the product and the platform in tandem. It’s a high-performance on-chain exchange that runs on its own custom L1, purpose-built for lightning-fast orderbook trading. By integrating the exchange and chain, Hyperliquid delivers an experience closer to a centralized exchange while keeping it non-custodial.
Since launch, Hyperliquid has quietly clawed away a double-digit slice of the perp market: daily volume now equals 11.2% of Binance, 24.1% of Bybit, and 22.1% of OKX. Open interest (OI) tells the same story; 21.7%, 29.0%, and 47.8% of those venues, respectively. Behind the ticker tape sit 481k unique traders, $1.59T lifetime volume, $415M in the HLP vault, and $1.57B TVL (currently #9 across all L1s). The exchange is the showcase, the chain is the moat, and every new wallet, API bot, or liquidity program deepens the trench.
In consumer crypto, Abstract follows a similar pattern. The Abstract Portal has amassed more than 2.01M users, 76.4M on-chain transactions, $85M total value secured, and 33 shipped games. Its early catalogue of luck-driven mini-games is dangerously and deliciously **sticky, proof that gambling mechanics and play are two sides of the same dopamine coin. Crucially, the frictionless Abstract Global Wallet (AGW) hides crypto’s UX nightmares: players onboard with email, social, or passkey; gas is abstracted away; and one sign-in traverses every game, marketplace, and quest hub on-chain in the Portal app.
5. The New Crypto Playbook
The next wave of successful blockchains may not start as blockchains at all. They will start as addictive games, must-use financial tools, or vibrant social networks, then gradually morph into full-fledged ecosystems. L1, L2 teams shouldn’t be afraid to get their hands dirty building at the application layer. Because sooner or later, killer apps won’t just ride on the next great blockchain, they will be the blockchain.
So if you truly have insights into building the ideal platform for a certain category of apps, your advantage is best demonstrated by building one of those apps and dominating that category first. It’s a strategy that plays to human nature. We flock to things that work and create value. A killer app on a blockchain is tangible proof of value that far outweighs any whitepaper promises.
6. Others’ Opinion
@100y_eth “Killer Stack is the New Black”
Lately, the crypto community has been showing signs of fatigue with infrastructure-heavy projects like complex consensus protocols, zero-knowledge proofs, and modular blockchains. And honestly, it makes sense. For years, the ecosystem has been almost entirely shaped by infrastructure. Most of the activity, conversation, and capital has revolved around it.
Ethereum L2 networks have only been live for less than four years. Data availability layers like Celestia, Avail, and EigenDA just started gaining traction within the past year. And ZK technology, despite years of hype, still hasn't seen mainstream adoption. Simply put, blockchain infrastructure still falls short when it comes to powering real-world applications.
But here’s the good news. We're finally starting to see applications that offer real utility to users. This shift is largely thanks to recent breakthroughs in blockchain optimization. It’s only now that the tech stack is mature enough to support truly useful apps.
It’s a pattern we’ve seen before. Before Microsoft and Apple entered the scene, the industry was deep in the weeds of infrastructure—microprocessors, memory, storage, displays, operating systems. The rise of those companies and their killer apps was only possible because the infrastructure was already in place.
Today, saying “the infrastructure isn’t ready yet” in crypto sounds more like an excuse. We’ve got modular stacks, high-performance monolithic chains, and everything builders need to launch. Now is the time for the Microsoft and Apple of Web3 to emerge. The next standard in this space will be projects that bring both infrastructure and killer apps to the table.
Still, let’s be clear. The debate over what comes first, apps or infra, isn’t going away anytime soon. Just like in Web2, infrastructure kept evolving alongside applications. Advances in networking, hardware, and AI constantly opened doors to new products. Blockchain will follow the same path. Better infrastructure will unlock better apps, and the demands of those apps will, in turn, push the infrastructure forward.
