More than half of Solana's decentralized exchange trading volume comes from bots and circular trades, a new analysis shows. This raises doubts about real liquidity and whether headline numbers reflect what users and investors actually get.
Solana's decentralized exchange (DEX) scene is facing tough questions. A forensic review of trading shows that much of the reported volume comes from automated bots and circular trades, not from real users looking for genuine market liquidity. These findings call into question how deep and accessible Solana's DEX markets really are for everyday traders.
Automated activity dominates
Bitquery, a blockchain data provider, looked at $201.4 billion in Solana DEX trades over 30 days ending September 22. It flagged $117.7 billion-58.4% of the total-as circular or bot-driven. Most of these trades involved buying and selling the same token in the same pool, all within a single transaction. This does not show real market demand. On September 14, for example, two wallets worked together to buy and sell a token called Claude in a PumpSwap pool. They generated $2,000 in volume in one transaction, but the pool later had no real liquidity. Bitquery also found groups of wallets with nearly identical trading patterns. Two such groups made up $26.3 billion of the flagged activity.
Bitquery detected 123.6 million dust-sized trades across six chains, with 87% of these micro-trades occurring on Solana and 90% under $5 in value, highlighting the scale of bot-driven activity.
Volume metrics under scrutiny
This analysis shows a big problem with using total DEX trading volume as a stand-in for user demand or market health. DefiLlama's Solana DEX dashboard showed $75.9 billion in rolling 30-day volume as of September 24. But Bitquery's flagged activity suggests that much of this volume may not be available to independent traders at fair prices. Bitquery's approach looks at transaction patterns and wallet behavior, not just pool balances or unique addresses. This shows how headline numbers can be skewed by repeated, non-economic trades. Some pools that look busy on turnover tables are actually dominated by a few wallets trading the same assets back and forth, leaving little real liquidity for outsiders.
Liquidity and execution risks
For users, this means that reported DEX volume on Solana can give a false sense of how much real liquidity is there for meaningful trades. Neither Bitquery's nor DefiLlama's dashboards show how much an independent trader could actually buy or sell without moving the price a lot. Pools with big historical volumes can be empty when a new user shows up, as seen in the Claude/SOL pool case. To know the real liquidity, you'd need detailed data on past reserves, trading routes, and actual fills-data that volume totals alone don't provide.
Comparisons and limitations
Bitquery's analysis only covers pools and assets it can index, and its checks on Solana are less complete than on some other blockchains. DefiLlama and Bitquery use different methods and cover different pools, so their numbers can't be directly compared. The $83.7 billion in Solana trades that Bitquery did not flag as circular or botlike is still unclassified. It's not clear how much of that comes from independent users. This makes it hard to judge Solana's real standing among DEX platforms. The problem of misleading volume is not just a Solana issue. Other markets have faced similar questions, as shown in EgonCoin's earlier reporting on Hyperliquid.
Solana DEX weekly activity reached approximately 208 million spot trades for the week ending September 13, 2026, a figure that rivals traditional exchanges like the New York Stock Exchange in trade count, though not in dollar volume. This highlights the importance of distinguishing between transaction count and substantive liquidity when evaluating on-chain activity.
Bitquery says that from August 24 through September 22, it analyzed $201.4 billion in Solana DEX trades and flagged $117.7 billion as circular or botlike. DefiLlama's dashboard showed $75.9 billion in rolling 30-day volume as of September 24, but the two use different methods and pool lists, so the numbers don't match up. In one flagged case, a single transaction created $2,000 in volume in a pool that later had no real liquidity. This shows how headline numbers can mislead users about actual trading chances.
Circular trading and bot-driven volume are ongoing problems for decentralized exchanges. On-chain data can show trading patterns, but it doesn't always separate real user activity from automated strategies that pump up metrics or chase incentives. For traders and investors, high reported volume does not mean deep or accessible liquidity. To judge a DEX's real usability, you have to look past the surface numbers and ask who is trading, how trades are done, and whether liquidity is actually there when needed. As DEX platforms fight for users and capital, being open about these issues will be key to building trust and lasting growth.
