Chiara Bianchi
After years of development, the Monad mainnet officially launched on Monday, marking a major milestone for the high-throughput blockchain. The launch follows several weeks of MON token distribution, aimed at encouraging ecosystem participation and co-ownership.
The public sale concluded on Sunday, generating significant attention as it neared closure. Using Coinbaseโs new ICO platform, Monad raised around $269 million from 85,820 participants. The sale offered 7.5% of the total MON supply, while the project also reserved over 3.3 billion tokens for community airdrops, approximately 3.3% of the 100 billion token cap.
Monadโs tokenomics outline a strategic allocation: 50.6% of MON tokens are initially locked, including nearly 26.9 billion for the team, 19.6 billion for investors, and 3.9 billion for the Monad treasury. Tokens will gradually unlock starting in the second half of 2026 and continue quarterly until the end of 2029.
Roughly 38.5 billion tokens are immediately available for ecosystem growth. The Monad Foundation noted that less than 2% of tokens set aside for development are already committed, while the majority will be gradually deployed over several years.
Speed, Security, and Usability
At launch, the Monad mainnet supports a range of established crypto projects, including MetaMask and Phantom wallets, Curve and Uniswap decentralized exchanges, and stablecoins such as USDC, USDT0, and AUSD. The network is EVM bytecode-compatible, allowing developers to deploy Ethereum-based applications seamlessly.
โDevelopers shouldnโt have to compromise on speed, security, or usability,โ said Monad co-founder Keone Hon. โMonad enables all three, letting builders continue using familiar tools and languages while powering a new wave of blockchain applications for mainstream and institutional adoption.โ
Advanced Technology and Performance
Development began in 2022 to address the blockchain trilemma of scalability, security, and decentralization. Monad uses optimistic parallel execution, a specialized RaptorCast validator communication protocol, and a custom MonadDb to achieve transaction finality in about 400 milliseconds.
The projectโs testnet reached over 10,000 transactions per second, highlighting its high-speed capabilities. Monad open-sourced its client in September under a GPL-3.0 license.
Funding and Strategic Backers
Monad, formerly known as Category Labs, has secured at least $225 million from prominent venture capital firms, including Coinbase Ventures, Dragonfly Capital, Electric Capital, Greenoaks, and Paradigm.
