Tap-to-earn (T2E) games are leading the charge, revolutionizing how users interact with cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. Notcoin, TapSwap, Catizen, and Hamster Kombat have emerged as frontrunners, each attracting millions of players through innovative reward systems and simple, engaging gameplay. Such games are taking advantage of platforms such as Telegram and BNB Chain. Players are rewarded with crypto tokens for nothing more than tapping their screens to help creatures complete simple tasks. The rapid adoption represents a huge cultural change to the world of crypto. We’ve made it more engaging and interactive to reach an even broader audience.
The Rise of Tap-to-Earn Games
The tap-to-earn gaming model became large overnight, mainly because people responded to its straightforward mechanics and accessibility. T2E games are an easy on-ramp for players. Unlike other blockchain games, they don’t need you to be an expert in cryptocurrency or have complicated gameplay. It’s easy to earn tokens. Users can roll right into start earning tokens within minutes, just by tapping on their screens. This user-friendliness has attracted an eclectic mix of users. It’s even, dare I say, exciting to the eyes of those who were previously intimidated by the arcane nature of crypto space.
Notcoin, one of the first and most successful to take advantage of this model, showed just how lucrative this approach could be. It gained more than 35 million players and peaked at six million daily active users. Notcoin launched its incredibly successful airdrop of over 80 billion tokens to its millions of players. This accomplishment demonstrates the power of T2E as an impactful method of crypto distribution and engagement. The game’s extraordinary success introduced the Telegram platform to mainstream audiences and created an expectation for every single subsequent tap-to-earn game. Even by 2025, the Notcoin bot is still running, providing new layers of user complexity and engagement for users to discover in perpetuity.
Included in that success, though, is their exceptional ability to exploit our social networks and community-encouraged virality. Most T2E games have fun mechanics, too, such as leaderboards and daily quests. These are all mechanics that get players excited to heroically recruit their friends and try to crush them. This phenomenon puts the pedal to the metal on user acquisition while accelerating a player community’s engagement around the game, resulting in that viral effect. T2E games operate on a very attractive synergy between basic game play and crypto incentives. Even better, this winning formula promotes deep and exciting social play between players.
Key Players in the Tap-to-Earn Arena
Many games are leading the charge on T2E development, but each has taken a different approach with different focuses. TapSwap, released in February 2024, scaled rapidly to what would eventually be over 50-65 million players globally by late 2024. TapSwap was initially going to launch on TON blockchain. They quickly redirected to the BNB Chain and plan to release their $TAPS token in early 2025. The $TAPS token generation event happened on Valentine’s Day 2025. This event was a big day for the platform and even more so for its growing community. TapSwap incentivizes playing with TAPS tokens. Most importantly, it reserves 50% of TAPS’ overall supply to the community, increasing participation and community buy-in exponentially.
Catizens, a cat-themed Web3 game on TON/Telegram, has attracted a lot of interest. The growth of the registered players reached an all-time high of nearly 49 million. To mid-2025, the active user base settled at just over a million per month. In September 2024, Catizen released its native token, CATI, in an innovative and exhilarating community airdrop. 150 million CATI have been provided, or 15% of their total supply of 1 billion, to players during Season 1. Players can earn 60% of All Stars game’s tokens through playing the game. This game-changing move is an eagerly awaited precursor to what Concord claims will be the largest airdrop in crypto history.
Big Fun’s Hamster Kombat, which is releasing in March 2024, is another strong contender in the T2E space. The game has come a long way, building on that initial engagement and excitement. It brings in millions of players thanks to its exciting combat and gratifying loop. These games frequently use game mechanics like competitive leaderboards, daily quests, and progress boosts. These features help improve earning potential, keeping players focused and more importantly, engaged and motivated.
Innovations and Future Trends
The tap-to-earn gaming model as a whole is changing every day. Maybe, for one, that developers are always introducing exciting new features and innovations to maximize player experience, retention, and enjoyment. Perhaps the most significant trend is incorporating decentralized finance (DeFi) elements into T2E games. Through play and other activities, players can earn tokens and stake, trade, and utilize them in a robust game ecosystem. This generates even more utility, and therefore value for their tokens.
A related trend is the integration of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) into T2E games. NFTs can represent in-game assets, characters, or virtual land, providing players with unique ownership and the ability to trade these assets on secondary markets. This makes things more exciting and creates new ways for players to make money. Not just for the players, but unlocking new streams of revenues for video game developers.
Looking ahead, T2E games will incorporate increasingly complex and engaging gameplay mechanics. Look for even more integration with blockchain technology and more focus on development driven by community needs. Now, more than ever, the crypto space is proving to be a rapidly maturing space. T2E games will be critical in terms of bringing people on board and captivating newcomers to the crypto space. TapX, an interactive climate change game, includes daily challenges and a leaderboard. It incentivizes players for referring friends, exemplifying the sector’s ongoing creativity.
