January DEX Activity Sets New Record Despite Price Downtrend in 2026

Source: CryptoNewsNet Original Title: January DEX activity sets new record despite price downtrend in 2026 Original Link:

DEX Market Activity Surge

DEX activity remains elevated in January, boosted by some of the most widely used chains. Despite the weak start to 2026, decentralized exchanges on multiple chains continued to show significant demand.

In early 2026, DEX activity for January has already broken above its level in 2022, with over $278B traded to date. DEX trading started recovering from its local lows, breaking the slide that started in October. Volumes reached $15.74B in 24 hours, led by major DEX platforms.

DEX activity makes up around 18% of centralized volumes, preserving its usual ratio. For now, DEX activity is still below the peak in 2022. However, this time, transactions and trades are more rarely tied to point farming or yields, and instead track real attempts at trading.

Competitive Landscape Evolution

DEX activity is not only rising in general, but it also reflects several trends in the crypto space. The low Ethereum gas fees brought a period of renewed activity. Decentralized markets are also focused on specific meta-narratives and show spikes of activity on other networks.

BNB Chain remains one of the major venues in the DEX ecosystem. Solana activity also has peak periods, usually linked to one or several trending meme tokens. Meme activity, new launches and secondary market trading are the main drivers of Solana DEX reawakening. Solana also benefits from increased activity, adding over $22B to overall volumes in the past 30 days.

Layer 2 Networks Lead Growth

Base was one of the chains to show a recent spike in volumes. The L2 platform remains one of the most active in the Ethereum ecosystem. In the past few days, Base activity spiked to $3.39B per day, with a regular baseline of $2.5B.

Major DEX platforms drive over 86% of the activity, as Base increased its DEX volumes up to 10X since the beginning of 2026. Base also saw $163M in net inflows in January, though the inflows did not match the increase in DEX activity.

DEX activity on Base is currently cheap and accessible, attempting a revival of retail trading mostly through new token mints and early price discovery. A bigger DEX recovery may come only after the chains show an increase in value locked and more significant value inflows.

For now, DEXs are reflecting the emergence of new meta-narratives and new token classes, but traders are more cautious about liquidity compared to previous trading cycles. Base became an anomaly in early January, beating both Ethereum and BNB Chain in weekly volumes, possibly linked to new tokens. Despite this, Base fees remained relatively low, as traders were more cautious and tested the market with smaller orders.