From "On-Chain Applications" to "Financial Infrastructure": The Generational Development and Transition of Perp DEX

Author: Max.s

The past 2025 years have often been regarded as the “Great Screening Era” for the derivatives track. Standing at the current power map of Perp DEX, we can clearly see: the vast majority of once-glorious fork projects have fallen silent, while the survivors are reshaping the financial order with a brand-new posture.

The survival of Perp DEX does not stem from it being faster or cheaper than centralized exchanges (CEX), but because it solves the most core cost in the financial system—trust. After experiencing several second-tier exchange liquidation black box crises (the Double Ten Crash, which painfully affected all market makers!), the market has reached a consensus: transparency is not optional but the underlying logic of infrastructure.

Early Perp DEXs were often seen as “low-end versions” of CEXs, but with the popularization of full-chain abstraction technology, by 2026, users can achieve seamless cross-chain interactions. User assets are no longer held by intermediaries but are locked in smart contracts. This return to “asset sovereignty” is the confidence for Perp DEX to carve out a share from the CEX market.

Currently, on-chain derivatives trading volume has stabilized to account for over 25% of the entire network. This is not just a numerical increase but a migration of user behavior patterns. When liquidation logic, funding rates, and order matching are recorded on an immutable ledger, Perp DEX has evolved from an experimental DApp to an essential infrastructure in the crypto market.

The demise of most Perp DEXs: mediocrity is the original sin. Behind prosperity lies a brutal elimination race. Over the past two years, more than 90% of Perp DEXs have fallen silent. The “causes of death” among these failures are highly consistent: product homogenization, reliance on liquidity subsidies, and lack of technical depth.

From the “Points” wave, many projects attracted users through artificially inflated liquidity mining. However, once points are redeemed and airdrops land, these platforms fall into a death spiral of “liquidity zero.” This mode of relying on rented liquidity will gradually disappear from the professional market by 2026.

Note: Liquidity leasing refers to the mode where DEXs incentivize users to provide funds for trading depth through issuing points or token subsidies. Simply put, the protocol does not truly “own” this liquidity but temporarily rents users’ funds by paying high “rent” (tokens or point rewards).

Another reason for DEX “failure” is the skyrocketing customer acquisition costs. Without an independent ecosystem, merely changing a UI or forking GMX’s code is no longer viable in this highly competitive market. Projects lacking a core order matching engine advantage or strong ecosystem backing are essentially expensive liquidity pools rather than genuine exchanges.

The four existing DEX models are worth learning from for future entrants:

Hyperliquid Model: Vertical Integration of Technological Dominance

Among all surviving DEXs, Hyperliquid is an unmissable milestone. It proves that if a general-purpose public chain cannot support high-frequency trading, the best solution is to build a dedicated chain.

Hyperliquid attracts a large amount of quantitative capital because it solves order book latency issues through L1 bottom-layer optimization. It no longer relies on Arbitrum or other Layer 2 solutions but has built a consensus mechanism specifically designed for derivatives. This “vertical integration” grants it near CEX-level matching performance while maintaining on-chain transparency.

More importantly, Hyperliquid has successfully built a “quant-friendly” ecosystem. When third-party market makers find the API latency extremely low and slippage controllable, endogenous liquidity begins to grow organically. This performance barrier built on technological strength allows it to handle competition from generic DEXs lacking distinctive features with ease.

Aster Model: Ecosystem Premium and Asset Management Layer

If Hyperliquid relies on technical hardcore, then Aster and its backing Binance ecosystem represent another survival logic: extreme resource efficiency and asset gains—clinging to a strong “big leg.”

Aster is not just a trading venue; it is more like a “leveraged layer with interest-bearing assets.” By deeply integrating with the Binance ecosystem, it introduces collateral like asBNB or USDF, allowing users to earn staking or re-staking yields while holding positions. This capital efficiency optimization is difficult for standalone DEXs to match.

For large capital users, capital cost is a core consideration. When users open a position on Aster, their margin still generates annualized returns. This “asset tokenization” logic makes Aster a highly sticky financial gateway rather than just a speculative tool.

Lighter Model: ZK-Driven Verifiable Financial Infrastructure

Lighter mode represents the pinnacle of “financial infrastructure.” It does not aim to be a traffic portal but provides institutional-grade, mathematically guaranteed trading infrastructure through self-built application-specific ZK-Rollups.

Lighter’s uniqueness lies in solving the “mathematical honesty” problem. It encodes order matching and clearing logic into “ZK circuits.” This means each trade’s matching and settlement no longer depend on node “credibility” but rely on verifiable mathematical proofs. This is extremely attractive to institutional investors who dislike “black box” settlements.

Additionally, Lighter’s ZK-Orderbook design inherently resists MEV, protecting high-frequency traders’ strategy privacy. The combination of “verifiability + privacy + ultra-low latency” makes it a standard interface linking real-world assets (RWA) with on-chain derivatives, creating a high compliance and technological moat.

Decibel Model: The Unity of Extreme Performance and Full-Chain Composability

In the 2026 market, Decibel represents the third evolution pattern of the new generation of Perp DEXs: the “high-performance engine” combined with “full-chain composability” LEGO-style. As a cross-chain trading engine rising in the Aptos ecosystem, Decibel has completely ended the fate of “speed and decentralization being mutually exclusive.”

Decibel’s core competitiveness lies in its deeply optimized trading virtual machine (Trading VM). Relying on Aptos’s Block-STM parallel execution architecture, it is moving toward sub-20 ms block times and over 1 million orders processed per second. This makes on-chain order matching no longer a “fantasy” but a reality capable of competing with top CEXs.

Unlike traditional isolated DEXs, Decibel offers a highly programmable financial platform. It unifies spot, perpetual contracts, margin, and vaults. This “full-stack” design allows users to use a single cross-chain margin account to collateralize multiple assets like APT, USDC, BTC, ETH, greatly enhancing capital efficiency.

Decibel’s “X-Chain Accounts” technology further breaks down inter-chain barriers. Users can directly fund their accounts using Ethereum or Solana wallets (like MetaMask or Phantom) without configuring complex cross-chain bridges. This “seamless access” capability, combined with 100% on-chain matching logic, may make Decibel the new favorite for on-chain high-frequency traders and institutions in 2026.

New Directions After 2026: Intent, AI, and Dynamic Pricing

From an industry perspective, the future evolution of Perp DEX will focus on three dimensions:

Intent-centric trading experience. Future users will no longer need to manually adjust funding rates or slippage but will express an intent. The system will analyze (Solver) to find the optimal execution path across the entire chain. This mode will greatly lower the entry barrier for retail investors into complex derivatives.

Explosion of AI Agents. As on-chain automation tools mature, DEXs will embed AI strategy engines. A large portion of future positions will be driven by AI. This means DEXs need to provide stronger computing power and lower data latency to accommodate high-frequency bot trading.

Evolution of Pricing Models. Current AMMs or simple order books remain fragile under extreme market conditions. We are seeing more projects introduce complex dynamic risk engines, using more scientific formulas:

Real-time adjustment of system parameters. This automated adjustment based on real-time volatility and position deviation will make Perp DEX systems truly more robust than traditional centralized institutions.

The second half of Perp DEX is a survival race about “efficiency.” Projects attempting to sustain through mediocre subsidies have already faded away. Future winners will either have impeccable technical foundations like Hyperliquid, possess irreplaceable ecological resources like Aster, or find the perfect balance between performance limits and full-chain composability like Decibel.

In this field, the only reason to survive is: whether you provide a set of execution efficiencies that capital and strategies cannot refuse.