Airdrop

An airdrop sends tokens to many wallets at once, usually at no cost to the recipients. Projects use airdrops to reward early users, to spread ownership of a new governance token, or to attract attention. Uniswap's September 2020 airdrop gave at least 400 UNI to every address that had used the exchange, which at the time was worth over 1,000 US dollars per wallet.

Most airdrops are based on a snapshot of past activity. A project records which addresses used its product before a certain date and allocates tokens based on volume, duration, or number of interactions. This has created a practice called airdrop farming, where users interact with new protocols specifically in the hope of qualifying.

Airdrops are also a common attack vector. Scammers send worthless tokens with names that point to fake claim websites, where connecting a wallet and signing a transaction can drain the real assets. Unsolicited tokens that appear in a wallet are best left untouched. Airdrops may also be taxable income in many countries at the value on the day received.