Key Points
- Ethereum has emerged as the blockchain with the highest earnings, collecting $2.7 billion in fee revenue in the past year.
- Ethereum’s fees are directly correlated with the price of ETH, with the highest fees occurring during periods of high ETH prices.
Despite the increasing competition in the blockchain space, Ethereum has taken the lead as the highest-earning blockchain.
The network collected a staggering $2.7 billion in fee revenue over the last 12 months, surpassing Bitcoin, which earned $1.43 billion in the same period.
Ethereum’s Dominance
Ethereum’s dominance in fee earnings indicates its continued popularity as the preferred smart contract network in 2024.
Its early mover advantage in this area has helped it remain the preferred network for most decentralized applications (dapps) and users.
This could also suggest that layer 2 networks have been effectively addressing the mainnet’s shortcomings.
What’s Driving Up Ethereum Fees?
A review of the Ethereum daily fees chart over the past year reveals a direct correlation between Ethereum fees and the price of ETH.
For instance, the network earned its highest single-day fee of $38.42 million on March 5, amid a strong bullish trend for Ethereum.
This trend aligns with observations that demand for ETH within its ecosystem increases during a bull market, indicating robust utility.
The second highest spike in Ethereum fees occurred during the recent market crash, with fees peaking at $15.97 million on August 5.
The lowest fee recorded on a single day was $1.19 million on July 7.
The highest daily number of transactions on the Ethereum network in the last 12 months peaked at 1.96 million on June 14, while the lowest figure was slightly over 863,000 on September 23.
Interestingly, unlike the correlation with its price, there wasn’t much correlation between the transactions and fees.
This is largely because the highest fees were observed on days when ETH prices were high.
