XRPL loses momentum in May as total transactions and trading volumes dip

XRP Ledger saw an 8.5% decline in monthly transactions for May, with the network recording 50.1 million transactions during the month, slightly below its 54.8 million transactions for April. The decline happened despite the increase in the adoption of the smart contract network.

According to the report of XRPL monthly activity from XPMarket, the network still managed to pull more unique active wallets for May despite the lower activity. During the month, 278,362 wallets executed transactions instead of the 252,000 in April.

Most of the transactions were related to payments, showing that this has been the network’s primary use case. However, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and Automated Market Maker (AMM) activity increased, with NFT mints rising to 2.56 million from 1.76 million.

XRPL transaction type for May 2025 (Source: XPMarket)

Most of the NFT mints and trades happened on XRP Cafe, while other dApps on the network, such as XPMarket and Bidd, also saw some activity.

Interestingly, the surge in mints was not an indicator of increased NFT transactions on XRPL because it was matched with increased burns and cancellations, while trading also declined by 8.4%. This shows that users are still experimenting with XRPL’s NFT capabilities by creating and dropping assets.

The data also showed an increase in the network AMM activity, with both deposits and withdrawals growing during the month, further confirming that most network users are still testing out its features.

10% of active wallets interacted with dApps in May

While the transaction volume for XRPL fell in May and was significantly lower compared to other major smart contract networks such as Ethereum and Solana , the biggest sore point for the network was the interaction with decentralized applications (dApps).

According to the report, over 28,000 wallets interacted with any known dApp on the network during the month. This is around 10% of all the unique active wallets for the month and underscores XRPL’s struggles with user adoption.

Interestingly, a breakdown of the data further shows the dearth of substantial user engagement on the network. Of the around 28,000 wallets, 23,606 interacted with only one dApp.

3,782 users engaged with two dApps, while 968 wallets interacted with three decentralized platforms. The ultra users engaged with more than three dApps, with 293 users during the month.

Despite being only 0.11% of all unique active wallets, ultra users for May were more than those in April, when only 150 wallets interacted with more than three dApps. As the report observed, the low engagement rate represents a challenge for XRPL, and the network must find a way to “keep users interested and active across the ecosystem.”

Unsurprisingly, the struggle to see mass adoption by users is reflected in the total value locked (TVL) on the network. According to Defillama , XRPL only has $58.76 million in TVL, which is low enough to rank outside the top 50 blockchain networks for DeFi value.

Institutional adoption soars for XRPL

While user engagement remains a sticky point for XRPL, the network has seen increased institutional adoption in the past few months, mostly due to Ripple Payments.

Since Ripple got regulatory approval to offer its payment services in the United Arab Emirates, at least two companies have been onboarded to the service, which means they are using XRPL.

The Dubai Land Department also recently announced that it chose XRPL for its real estate tokenization project pilot, which is another evidence of institutional use, especially in the Middle East and Asia.

Nevertheless, its failure to see mass adoption after 13 years has not stopped many from being bullish on the XRP token. Sustainable energy company Vivo Power recently announced a $100 million XRP treasury, joining the millions of retail users who hold the token.

XRP has been up 3% in the last 24 hours and trades at $2.207, even though it remains down 4.95% year to date.

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