Solana decentralized exchange Raydium has deployed its native token launchpad, which is designed to rival the popular Pump.fun. This comes almost a month after Pump.fun deployed its own decentralized exchange, cutting ties with Raydium in the process.
LaunchLab by Raydium offers a more sophisticated token creation process, compared to Pump.fun’s simplistic approach. The new launchpad allows for deployers to toy with the token supply, how many tokens will be sold on the bonding curve, and how much SOL needs to be raised before migrating liquidity to Raydium’s automated market maker. On top of this, LaunchLab offers token vesting and migration fee sharing options.
By comparison, Pump.fun only allows users to make aesthetic changes, and does not allow any tokenomic or bonding curve adaptations. That simplicity may have helped fuel Pump.fun’s surge over the course of 2024 and into early 2025, though token creators who want more flexibility may be drawn to Raydium’s rival launchpad instead.
Tom, the pseudonymous team lead at Raydium, has made it clear that the launchpad is just the first product in a broader LaunchLab suite. He previously said that the launchpad would be released by April 2, but told Decrypt that it was held it back to ensure it had support from Raydium’s trading partners, the likes of BullX and Jupiter.
Equally, the Raydium team is offering its launchpad infrastructure to third-party developers that can design their own bonding curve and distribution models. Pseudonymous core contributor Stendhal told Decrypt that Raydium is currently working with approximately 10 external groups building their own apps using LaunchLab’s token creation infrastructure.
“LaunchLab’s goal is to fix a broken token model, reliant on [centralized exchanges] and market makers,” Tom told Decrypt. “We believe asset issuance will continue to accelerate, and we want that to happen on-chain, on Solana.”
In response to the news, Raydium’s RAY token has climbed nearly 9% over the last day to a market cap of $661 million, according to CoinGecko, making it the 108th largest cryptocurrency overall by that metric.
RAY has fallen 42% since rumors first broke in February that Pump.fun planned to cut ties from the decentralized exchange and launch its own DEX. In the past, when Pump.fun tokens graduated, they would become tradable on Raydium. But as of March 20, Pump.fun tokens now graduate to its own PumpSwap decentralized exchange.
Now both Raydium and Pump.fun offer token launchpad and decentralized exchange solutions, facing off on two fronts with different approaches and philosophies.
Edited by Andrew Hayward
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