Solana Hit 25 Billion Q1 Transactions Before the $270M Hack

Solana closed Q1 with a throughput milestone unmatched on any public chain — and a major DeFi exploit that sent the security narrative back to square one.

The Solana Foundation’s Q1 network report logged roughly 25.3 billion non-vote transactions, an average of 3,300 TPS, with peaks above 7,200 TPS during a late-February meme cycle. With Firedancer validator share above 18%, median slot times tightened to 360ms and finality stayed under two seconds for the quarter.

The shadow on the quarter was a late-March exploit of a major Solana DeFi protocol — roughly $270M drained through a signature-verification flaw inherited from a common SDK template. The protocol paused, socialized losses where possible, and began a compensated restart. Top-ten Solana protocol TVL dipped 14% in 72 hours.

The response has been unusually fast. Anza and several audit shops have launched the Gauntlet initiative — formally verified contract templates, a canonical signature library, and a bounty pool. Major Solana wallets shipped pre-broadcast simulation warnings the same week.