Overview

pump.fun (commonly referred to as Pump) is a cryptocurrency launchpad for the Solana blockchain that enables users to create tokens and trade them immediately on the platform, as well as to launch them onto decentralized exchanges, a process known as "graduation". The platform was launched on January 19, 2024, by Noah Tweedale, Alon Cohen and Dylan Kerler.

As of January 2025, over 6 million meme coins had been launched on the platform according to Wired and it is one of the fastest-growing crypto applications ever according to some metrics by Ars Technica. Bloomberg reported in June 2025 that pump.fun is "one of the biggest drivers of the explosive growth in memecoins and the attendant burst in activity on the Solana blockchain in the past year." In Q1 2026, pump.fun's decentralized exchange volume exceeded $2 billion, signaling a continued surge in Solana meme coin activity.

The site has been described as the "ground zero" for launching meme coins, with users able to instantly create coins for free. While any type of token can be created, the majority of tokens are classified as meme coins due to their lack of functionality outside of trading. Created tokens face a high failure rate, with the vast majority of tokens failing to achieve the necessary traction and market capitalization to be listed on DeFi platforms such as Raydium.

History

The domain name was first registered on September 19, 2023, with the platform launching four months later on January 19, 2024. The website was started by an anonymous developer known as Alon, tweeting that he wanted to make it "the most fun place on the internet". It was later revealed from public documents associated with the website that the owners were a trio of English entrepreneurs named Noah Tweedale, Alon Cohen and Dylan Kerler, who say they started the site due to their frustrations with trading memecoins and the risks of getting rug pulled.

Pump.fun was estimated to have generated $60 million in transaction fees (a 1% cut of trades on the platform) in the first half of 2024, with over a million tokens having been created by July 2024.

The site launched a livestreaming feature in 2024 that allowed token developers to advertise their tokens to other users. Livestreams were used as a marketing tool for newly released tokens to stand out on the platform, as the constant influx of token creations on the platform can quickly make new coins become irrelevant. The feature became controversial not long after release, as a number of token creators began to partake in increasingly extreme actions to attract potential investors to their product.

Some streamers claimed to be live from within U.S. prisons, ran live sex shows or played games of Russian roulette. One streamer threatened to waterboard another person.

Functionality

The site allows instant creation of memecoins by uploading an image along with picking a ticker and a name for less than $2 in fees. Pump earns a 1% "swap fee" on all tokens traded and 1.5 Solana tokens when a coin created on the site is listed, or "graduates", after hitting a market cap of $90,000.

According to Bloomberg, "new tokens on Pump.fun are created through a so-called fair launch method, where all tokens are minted at once without presales, often at a fraction of a cent." However, the app remains susceptible to "soft rug pulls [sic]". Its creators have stated that soft rugpulls are difficult to prevent through technical means; and that they instead give users access to information about a coin's legitimacy, including the percentage of a token owned by the largest holders, to assess risk.

Notable tokens launched on Pump

Pump has functioned as the launchpad for many notable meme coins. Fartcoin, which briefly hit a $1 billion valuation as part of a sudden rise in meme coins due to the recent $Trump meme coin launch (which was released on the Solana blockchain, but was not launched through Pump), is a popular token created on the platform. Celebrities including Iggy Azalea, Caitlyn Jenner and Jason Derulo have released authorized meme coins on the platform.