Depth comparison of the 8 major mainstream Launchpads, who will be the king of versions in 2025?

As the crypto market enters 2025, the Web3 Launchpad ecosystem has evolved into a diverse landscape, with various platforms developing differentiated layouts around different types of projects, users, and funding models. From centralized exchange-supported issuance platforms to decentralized IDO mechanisms, and new solutions like LBP (Liquidity Bootstrapping Auction), Launchpad has become the core vehicle for early investment and project initiation in the crypto world. This article provides an in-depth comparison of the eight major Launchpad platforms, including Binance Launchpad, DAO Maker, ChainGPT Pad, Virtuals, CoinTerminal, Fjord Foundry, CoinList, and Seedify, covering their project overviews, issuance mechanisms, return performance, track positioning, and unique innovations.

DAO Maker: A Launchpad Balancing Retail Friendliness and VC-Style Screening

Platform Positioning and Vision

DAO Maker connects retail users with a VC-like project selection system through its innovative "Strong Holder Offering" (SHO) mechanism. Users need to stake $DAO tokens and have a long-term holding record to qualify for allocations, emphasizing the concept of "loyalty staking," which aligns the long-term interests of investors and projects. Since 2019, DAO Maker has facilitated over 179 token offerings, raising approximately $107 million, with representative projects including My Neighbor Alice and XCAD. The platform has gradually expanded from one-time sales to an "accelerator ecosystem," with new features like DAO Farms and Vaults allowing users to continuously earn token rewards during the staking period (with annualized returns of up to 300--1500%), thus extending the community's fund lock-up time. Its core vision is to create a retail-friendly Web3 launch platform with VC-level selection and continuous incentive mechanisms.

2025 Representative Projects

DAO Maker has recently focused on projects with clear narratives and diverse types, including:

• SpeedThrone: An AAA racing project that integrates AI elements, supporting 6 to 12 months of staking mining.
• 0xFútbol: A blockchain fantasy sports platform themed around soccer, combining collectibles and prediction gameplay, closely aligned with World Cup trends.
• Kayen Protocol: Provides DeFi data verification and modular security services, suitable for re-staking and DePIN systems.
• Fusio: An enterprise-level DePIN platform equipped with AI monitoring mechanisms, designed for enterprise validator operational scenarios.

These cases show that DAO Maker is compatible with sports/fan economy and AI/infrastructure projects, covering a wide range of themes.

Investment Return Performance

In the first half of 2025, the overall returns of the DAO Maker project were mediocre, with the average current ROI approximately 0.14× of the IDO price, and the highest historical ROI average being 3.65×. Most projects experienced a rapid price drop after listing, although there were still a few breakthrough achievements. The platform alleviated the losses from price declines through a staking mining mechanism, allowing token holders to continue earning returns even when prices fell. The SHO mechanism has somewhat suppressed selling behavior, but it is still difficult to completely hedge against the overall market weakness. It is worth noting that DAO Maker had better returns in the past (for example, Orion Protocol achieved several times growth), and the current low ROI is more a reflection of the overall market environment rather than a flaw in the platform mechanism itself.

Mechanism Innovation Highlights

• Strong Holder Offering (SHO): Obtain allocation rights by staking $DAO tokens, rewarding long-term holders.
• Yield Mining/Vaults: New projects often come with several months of mining activities, distributing the tokens sold as rewards to DAO stakers or liquidity providers. This "staking to earn" model creates demand and liquidity after the IDO.
• DAO Token Binding: Participants of DAO Maker must hold $DAO to participate, thereby fostering loyalty. The "DAO Power" system records user holding points to prevent quick sell-offs.

These mechanisms enhance the sustainability of the post-IDO phase while maintaining market enthusiasm, and reflect DAO Maker's dual positioning that combines the breadth of retail investors with the depth of project review.

Track Focus and Strategic Positioning

DAO Maker focuses on emerging narratives and practical projects, with its 2025 project layout covering 2.0 (SpeedThrone), sports/fan interaction (0xFútbol), DeFi infrastructure (Kayen), and AI/business services (Fusio). Compared to chasing trends with "Meme-type platforms," DAO Maker is more inclined to build a project ecosystem that possesses real value and return mechanisms. Its strategy is to create a "community-driven accelerator" that attracts entrepreneurs who hope to balance retail traffic and long-term healthy development.

Seedify: Community-Driven Next Generation Launchpad

Platform Positioning and Vision

Since 2021, Seedify ($SFUND) has been committed to promoting the incubation of high-quality projects in the fields of NFT, gaming, AI, and DeFi through a community consensus mechanism. As of now, Seedify has facilitated the issuance of over 100 tokens, raising approximately $40 million to $55 million in total. The platform combines the advantages of CEX and DeFi, adopting a layered mechanism for $SFUND staking to ensure user allocation rights, and introducing community reviews to replace closed private placement screening. In 2025, Seedify continued its technological innovation by launching a permissionless bond curve issuance platform, a decentralized curatorial DAO, and an on-chain social distribution mechanism, becoming one of the most cutting-edge Launchpads in the tech stack.

2025 Representative Project

• Stable Jack (JACK): A fixed/leverage yield protocol deployed on Avalanche, completing its IDO in April 2025, with an FDV valuation of $20 million, raising approximately $300,000. The token is fully unlocked after TGE, but the market response has been relatively weak.
• Aiki (AIKI): An AI×game prediction platform on the Solana chain, set to launch in May 2025, utilizing the $SFUND+ public offering dual-channel model, raising approximately $175,000, with high early user participation, but the token price performance is average.
• P33L (P33L): An AI satire meme project, issued through a bond curve method in April 2025, with a total valuation of $250,000, selling 28% of the supply and raising approximately $70,000, reflecting Seedify's strategy of supporting cultural innovation projects.

Investment Return Performance

Despite the overall cooling of the market, Seedify project's historical average highest ROI remains around 8×. Several projects are expected to have considerable hype at the beginning of their listing in 2025, but generally experience price corrections afterwards. This phenomenon has become the current norm for IDOs. Seedify aims to avoid severe sell pressure and promote long-term value by introducing a bond curve and flexible unlocking mechanisms.

Mechanism Innovation Highlights

• Smart Joint Curve Issuance: The token price dynamically rises with purchasing demand, automatically generating the $SFUND -- project token LP pool once sold out, ensuring liquidity upon launch and incorporating safeguards against "Rug Pull" and "Sniping": a 24-hour refund window and progressive pricing to prevent bots from sniping tokens and protecting buyers' rights.
• Layered Access Mechanism (Staking + Social): In the early stages, access is prioritized for $SFUND stakers and users with high "social scores" (obtained through referrals, interactions similar to Kaito, and community activities). Later, it will be opened to the public, forming a gamified entrance logic that encourages active contributors. This "social distribution layer" rewards community builders, not just whales.
• Investor-friendly unlocking/refund mechanism: Each project can choose a flexible vesting schedule, and Seedify offers immediate unlocking or short-term linear unlocking (1-4 weeks) to balance trust and sales pressure. Additionally, each token issuance has a 24-hour refund window, allowing buyers to opt for a refund in cases of uncertainty. This mechanism is similar to the down risk protection of the CoinTerminal model, providing users with an additional layer of confidence.
• Decentralized Curator Program: A network of curators composed of KOLs, VCs, guilds, and DAOs selects projects for the platform and can earn revenue sharing, allocation quotas, and community whitelist.
• $SFUND Incentive Flywheel: Every issuance event injects new use cases for $SFUND. Staking Level → Token Distribution → Token Issuance → Liquidity Creation → Buying Pressure and Token Burn. As the issuance quantity increases, the intrinsic demand for $SFUND tokens also grows. Seedify's design ensures that its native token benefits from the ecosystem it drives.

Track Focus and Strategic Positioning

Seedify, with games and culture as its core starting point, is gradually expanding into the fields of AI and DeFi. Its recent project line (Stable Jack, Aiki, P33L) covers multiple sectors including DeFi yields, AI games, and Meme culture. The platform prides itself on being a leader in the "Web3 culture and gaming" space and is progressively embracing cutting-edge trends like on-chain AI and DePIN protocols. Seedify positions itself as a community-first alternative: more open than Binance, more engaging than CoinList, and more orderly than Virtuals. By integrating a joint curve and refund mechanism, it aims to provide potential upside for new projects while increasing investor protection.

Unique Strategy Summary

Seedify integrates multiple mechanisms to create an "open yet protected" issuance model. Its permissionless bond curve platform, set to launch by the end of 2025, allows any team to issue tokens autonomously, combining automatic liquidity with anti-sniping mechanisms, similar to the openness of CoinTerminal but with additional protections. The curatorial DAO absorbs the "review spirit" of DAO Maker and enhances user engagement through social incentive mechanisms (like Kaito or Ethos points), ultimately forming a synthesis of CoinTerminal's openness, Fjord's fairness mechanism, DAO Maker's interest binding, and community-oriented culture, signaling the emergence of a new generation of Launchpads.

ChainGPT Pad: A Launchpad Focused on Artificial Intelligence

Platform Positioning and Vision

ChainGPT Pad is the preferred launchpad for AI-first Web3 startups. It is part of the ChainGPT ecosystem, which is known for its AI chatbot and developer tools, and undergoes in-depth incubation through technical support (smart contract auditing, AI analysis) before project launch. Participation requires holding or staking $CGPT tokens, which are supported by the fees from the platform's AI products (a portion of user fees will be burned). The vision of ChainGPT Pad is to become the primary DEAI (Decentralized AI) issuance tool: any project launched on it can receive customized guidance for AI, while stakers of $CGPT can gain participation rights in token sales.

2025 Representative Project

The ChainGPT Pad's 2025 project portfolio integrates AI infrastructure and some:

• Omnia Protocol (OMNIA): A privacy-focused blockchain access provider (RPC relay), crucial for AI data feeding. ATH ROI is approximately 5 times.
• Arcade (ARC): An interoperable, NFT-based competitive gaming platform that heralds a new trend.
• Flash Protocol (FLASH): A DeFi utility token for ultra-fast DEX trading, featuring AI predictive analytics.
• NextGem AI (GEMAI): An AI-driven crypto content discovery platform (an "alpha feed" platform). It will be issued in April 2025 through a whitelist.
• AdixAI (ADIX): An AI advertising optimization network. Uniquely, ADIX is distributed to eligible $CGPT stakers through a "Launchdrop" airdrop (rather than a sale) in May 2025.
• Matchain (MAT) \u0026 Blink Game AI (BLINK): Two Launchdrops in May 2025------one zk-rollup chain (MAT) and a