Ethereum hits 1.3M daily transfers; staking at 31.2%

On a single day in April 2026, the Ethereum network carried more than 1.3 million transactions, driven by ETH transfers, USDT payments and several high-gas smart contracts, according to CryptoQuant data.

On-chain measures showed increased activity in decentralized finance contracts and Layer-2 blob usage, lifting baseline traffic above recent norms. Exchange data from Gate indicated extreme fear in market sentiment even as on-chain metrics rose.

Transaction costs remained low. Routine ETH transfers typically cost under $0.01, while decentralized exchange swaps and lending operations averaged about $0.11. Analysts tracing on-chain flows identified some contracts that appear to originate from addresses seeding traffic, taking advantage of the cheaper execution environment.

Price action stayed relatively stable. ETH traded above $2,200 during the period, and liquidations in DeFi were limited. Weekly token issuance exceeded 19,000 ETH, producing an annualized inflation rate near 0.83%, meaning the network was not in a deflationary state.

Staking activity reached a record level in April 2026, with 31.2% of the total ETH supply staked. The annualized reward rate for validators on the beacon chain was about 2.9%. Several notable entities moved treasury holdings into staking, including Bitmine, the Ethereum Foundation, Grayscale and Gate.

More than 2.9 million ETH remained in the validator queue, with an average activation wait time of about 51 days. On-chain traffic and staking metrics increased while transaction fees stayed low, maintaining higher-than-normal baseline network usage.