Failed Blockchain Startups
159 venture-backed blockchain startups have shut down after raising $5.1B combined — about 7% of the entire graveyard. The biggest cohort last raised in 2022, and the most common final round was Seed.
The blockchain graveyard is what a completed hype cycle looks like. Infrastructure built for demand that never arrived, tokens that were the product, and business models that only worked while prices went up.
The Damage, by the Numbers
$3.4M
Median raised before shutdown
$31.9M
Average raised — the big flameouts drag it up
8
Died holding $100M+ in funding
1
Raised $1B+ and still closed
Class of the crash
Closed blockchain startups by year of their final funding round
26
81
39
12
2021
$195.9M
2022
$4.3B
2023
$495.6M
2024
$43.9M
How far they got
Last round raised before shutting down
Pre-Seed
36
Seed
72
Series A
16
Series B
3
Series C+
1
Debt & Notes
5
Other
26
Based on the last five years of fundraising data tracked in the VCbacked database.
The Graveyard
Showing 100 of 159 closed startups
Company | Raised | Last Round | What They Did | Location | Founders | Site | Contact |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
BlockFi | $1.4B | Debt | BlockFi develops a blockchain-driven wealth management platform for crypto investors. | Jersey City, New Jersey, United States | Flori Marquez | Reveal | |
Celsius Network | $903.8M | Corporate | Celsius Network is a blockchain-based lending platform that is accessible through a free mobile app. | London, England, United Kingdom | Alex Mashinsky | Reveal | |
GRIID | $525.0M | Seed | GRIID is a vertically-integrated bitcoin self-mining company that owns and operates a growing portfolio of bitcoin mining facilities. | Cincinnati, Ohio, United States | Trey Kelly | Reveal | |
 Compute North | $451.1M | Debt | Compute North delivers cryptocurrency mining and infrastructure solutions to customers around the globe. | Eden Prairie, Minnesota, United States | Dave Perrill | Reveal | |
Prime Trust | $176.0M | Series C | Prime Trust powers innovation in the digital economy by providing fintech and digital asset innovators with financial infrastructure. | Las Vegas, Nevada, United States | Jon Jiles | Reveal | |
tZERO | $159.0M | Series B | tZERO is a financial technology company providing transformative market-based solutions for companies, retail, and investors. | Salt Lake City, Utah, United States | Patrick M. Byrne | Reveal | |
Naetion | $150.7M | Seed | Marketplace, Digital Workplace, Mobile App, Web3 | Copenhagen, Hovedstaden, Denmark | Buddhika Perera | Reveal | |
Babel Finance | $120.0M | Series B | Babel Finance is a global cryptocurrency financial service provider serving institutional and HNW investors. | Hong Kong, Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong | Del Wang | Reveal | |
Blockmetrix | $89.9M | Debt | Blockmetrix is a Bitcoin mining company that offers a peer-to-peer payment network that helps validate crypto transactions. | Dallas, Texas, United States | David Kiger | Reveal | |
Coin Metrics | $66.1M | Venture | Coin Metrics is a provider of crypto financial intelligence providing network data, market data, index, and network risk solutions. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Aleksei Nokhrin, Alexander Bich, Jacob Franek, Nic Carter, Timothy Rice | Reveal | |
Golden | $59.5M | Series B | Golden is a developer of a self-constructing knowledge database used to accelerate discovery and education. | Claymont, Delaware, United States | Jude Gomila | Reveal | |
RECUR | $55.0M | Series A | RECUR designs and develops on-chain branded experiences for fans to buy, collect, and re-sell NFTs. | Miami, Florida, United States | Max Bruch | Reveal | |
0xBoost Finance | $53.0M | Series A | 0xBoost Finance is a decentralized staking and revenue aggregator. | Southbank, Victoria, Australia | — | Reveal | |
GRN GRID | $50.0M | Venture | GRN GRID is an environmentally friendly, scalable and stable layer-1 blockchain with novel decentralized finance features. | Zug, Zug, Switzerland | — | Reveal | |
Nuri | $49.2M | PE | Nuri empowers people to manage and grow their wealth through innovative technologies. | Berlin, Berlin, Germany | Benjamin Jones | Reveal | |
ErisX | $47.5M | Venture | ErisX specializes in digital asset space that offers both spot and futures contracts on one platform. | Chicago, Illinois, United States | Joe Lubin | Reveal | |
Tessera | $43.9M | Series A | Tessera is where you go to own, govern, and experience extraordinary things through NFTs, together. | New York, New York, United States | Andy Chorlian | Reveal | |
MakersPlace | $32.0M | Series A | MakersPlace is an authentic and unique digital creation platform powered by blockchain technology for digital creators. | San Francisco, California, United States | Yash Nelapati | Reveal | |
Entropy | $26.9M | Seed | Entropy provides crypto custody services to keep private keys secure and make assets available on demand. | New York, New York, United States | Tux Pacific | Reveal | |
Fortress Blockchain Technologies | $22.5M | Seed | Financial, regulatory and technology infrastructure for NFT and crypto innovators | Las Vegas, Nevada, United States | Aydin Kilic | Reveal | |
Metatime | $21.0M | Seed | Metatime is a fintech firm that offers a single distributed blockchain ecosystem that enables a user to manage all from a single screen. | Istanbul, Istanbul, Turkey | Yusuf Sevim | Reveal | |
nameless | $15.0M | Seed | Nameless sets new industry standards for rich Web3 experiences. | Sheridan, Wyoming, United States | Jim McNelis | Reveal | |
DataTrails | $13.5M | Series A | DataTrails provides provenance and transparency services to support trustworthy data distribution & resolve contested multi-party scenarios. | Santa Clara, California, United States | Jonathan Geater | Reveal | |
Atani | $12.9M | Seed | Atani is the one-stop crypto trading platform: trading on 20+ exchanges, integrates technical analysis tools and automates tax reporting. | Madrid, Madrid, Spain | Haydee Barroso Bañales, Paul Barroso | Reveal | |
AIKON | $12.6M | Series A | AIKON makes blockchain technology simple. We build cross-chain identity and wallet solutions - ORE ID and ORE Vault. | San Francisco, California, United States | Annabel Antunes | Reveal | |
Coinfirm | $12.5M | Series A | Coinfirm is a blockchain analytics and investigations solutions. | London, England, United Kingdom | Grant Blaisdell | Reveal | |
Slide | $12.3M | Seed | Slide enables apps to serve Web3 experiences to everyday users. | New York, New York, United States | Teymour S. Farman-Farmaian | Reveal | |
SPICYEST | $12.1M | Seed | SPICYEST is a consulting and financial services firm specialized in digital assets | New York, New York, United States | David Liao | Reveal | |
InfinityStakeChain | $12.0M | Series A | InfinityStakeChain - Unique Multichain Staking Platform | Melbourne, Victoria, Australia | — | Reveal | |
Banger | $11.6M | Venture | Banger is a blockchain-powered gaming platform that provides its users with an array of earning possibilities. | Madrid, Madrid, Spain | Borja Villalobos | Reveal | |
Jet Protocol Holdings | $11.6M | Seed | Jet Protocol Holdings is an operator of a lending platform. | Greenwich, Connecticut, United States | James Moreau | Reveal | |
RateS | $11.5M | Series A | Rate is a social commerce startup focused on Tier-2/3 cities in rural Indonesia. | Singapore, Central Region, Singapore | Davis Gay | Reveal | |
Superdao | $11.5M | Seed | Wallet analytics platform built for Web3 growth teams | San Francisco, California, United States | Yury Lifshits | Reveal | |
Yoello | $11.3M | Series A | Yoello is a payments platform building infrastructure that connects banks and payment networks to merchants consumers. | Cardiff, Cardiff, United Kingdom | Anton Manley | Reveal | |
Kryptomon | $11.1M | Series A | Kryptomon is an NFT Game where Pokémon meets Cryptokitties and Tamagotchi Telegram official channel: http://t.me/Kryptomon | Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, The Netherlands | Bartolomeo De Vitis | Reveal | |
Ardana | $10.8M | ICO | Ardana is a decentralized stablecoin and DEX liquidity pool built on Cardano | London, England, United Kingdom | Ryan Matovu | Reveal | |
Lemox | $10.1M | Series A | Lemox is a real estate investment firm that bridges the gap between traditional markets and the decentralized economy. | Long Beach, California, United States | Peter Aman | Reveal | |
Bumper | $10.0M | Venture | BUMPER is a DeFi price protection protocol that protects the value of crypto assets. | London, England, United Kingdom | Go Wo | Reveal | |
Aladdin Tech | $10.0M | PE | Aladdin Tech is a Fintech platform that builds cutting-edge digital infrastructure for the financial service sector. | London, England, United Kingdom | David Aldridge | Reveal | |
Fando | $10.0M | Seed | Fando Network is a developer of a tokenization platform for sports, esports creators, and fans. | Singapore, Central Region, Singapore | Manit Parikh | Reveal | |
BIKA | $10.0M | Series A | BIKA is a blockchain contract exchange. | Singapore, Central Region, Singapore | — | Reveal | |
Cega | $9.3M | Seed | Cega is a software development company that provides a platform for decentralized financial products. | Singapore, Central Region, Singapore | Arisa Toyosaki, Victor Zhang, Winston Zhang | Reveal | |
Xchaincoin | $8.6M | Seed | Xchaincoin is a community network that allows individuals as well as organizations to monetize their idle computing resources. | Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States | — | Reveal | |
Verida | $8.5M | Seed | Verida features a data platform, wallet, and identity services to enable users to securely manage their personal data and credentials. | Sydney, New South Wales, Australia | Chris Were, Ryan Kris | Reveal | |
Trident Digital | $8.0M | Seed | Trident Digital is restoring market liquidity by providing the next-generation digital asset platform that addresses issues. | Stamford, Connecticut, United States | — | Reveal | |
Niftify | $7.9M | Seed | Niftify is a platform where users can create, sell, buy, and swap NFTs. | Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, United States | Emil Sterndorff | Reveal | |
Mercury | $7.5M | Seed | Mercury provides end-to-end NFT and fan engagement solutions for brands and IP holders. | Boston, Massachusetts, United States | Andrew Katz | Reveal | |
WAGMI United | $7.3M | Seed | WAGMI United is linked to blockchain and sports management, owning Crawley Town FC. | Santa Monica, California, United States | Sean Gearin | Reveal | |
Silks | $7.0M | Seed | Silks is a play-to-earn platform leveraging blockchain-enabled metaverse to parallel the real world of thoroughbred horse racing. | Boca Raton, Florida, United States | Benjamin Plotkin | Reveal | |
KurateDAO | $6.8M | Seed | KurateDAO provides an infrastructure for content curation. | New York, New York, United States | Michael Fischer | Reveal | |
Godmode | $6.7M | Venture | Godmode is a software company that offers AI-native sales enablement tools to help users find leads customer profile and signals on the web. | Bury Saint Edmunds, Suffolk, United Kingdom | Mert Deveci | Reveal | |
Flip | $6.5M | Seed | Flip is a developer of an online platform to provide insights from blockchain data to help investors make better decisions. | Austin, Texas, United States | Brian Krogsgard | Reveal | |
GameOn | $6.3M | Grant | GameOn creates games that utilize NFTs, predictive gaming, and fantasy elements, all crafted to optimize fan involvement. | Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada | Matt Bailey | Reveal | |
Joystream | $5.8M | Seed | JoyStream is a blockchain powered decentralized media distribution, curation, discovery, and monetization platform. | Oslo, Oslo, Norway | — | Reveal | |
Wincast | $5.7M | Seed | Wincast provides SaaS and AdTech solutions for interactive sports media experiences. | New York, New York, United States | Noah Diskin Kline | Reveal | |
evaluate.xyz | $5.6M | Seed | Trade NFTs on Flow. Search for trading partners, swap NFTs, and shop across marketplaces. | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States | Alex Ramirez | Reveal | |
Friktion Labs | $5.5M | Venture | Solana’s largest portfolio and risk manager for individuals, DAOs, and Institutional Asset Managers | Austin, Texas, United States | Uwe Cerron | Reveal | |
Emergent Games | $5.4M | Seed | Emergent Games is a metaverse and blockchain games studio. | London, England, United Kingdom | — | Reveal | |
Stakes | $5.3M | Seed | Stakes is a social wagering platform for NFTs that transforms sports betting into a more social activity | New York, New York, United States | Kevin W. | Reveal | |
Jupiter Exchange | $5.0M | Seed | Jupiter Exchange was a NYC-based alternative asset exchange using fractional NFT technology. (NOT Jupiter exchange aka "Jupiter Swap") | New York, New York, United States | Brad Parkes | Reveal | |
Alluo | $5.0M | Pre-Seed | A non-custodial mobile wallet that brings DeFi yields to the neo-bank user powered by a liquidity direction protocol and DAO | Alloa, Clackmannanshire, United Kingdom | Rémi Tuyaerts | Reveal | |
LifeForce Games | $5.0M | Seed | LifeForce Games is a blockchain video game development studio. | San Diego, California, United States | Catherine Carroll | Reveal | |
Tulip Protocol | $5.0M | ICO | Tulip Protocol is an aggregation platform that is built on solana with auto-compounding vault strategies. | San Francisco, California, United States | — | Reveal | |
Overeality | $5.0M | Undisclosed | Overeality is a metaverse community to bring people together and give everyone a voice. | Palo Alto, California, United States | — | Reveal | |
Kosen Labs | $5.0M | Seed | Kosen Labs is a software company that develops artificial intelligence-powered tools and applications to provide liquidity management. | Lisbon, Lisboa, Portugal | — | Reveal | |
TokenWin | $5.0M | Angel | TokenWin is a leading crypto casino & sports betting platform offering 12,000+ games and 30,000 monthly live events. | Las Vegas, Nevada, United States | — | Reveal | |
Mecha Morphing | $4.9M | ICO | Mecha Morphing is a aesthetic blockchain game platform. | Santa Clara, California, United States | Jack Pan | Reveal | |
Arise Travel | $4.7M | Seed | Arise Travel is a Modern infrastructure for the travel industry. | San Francisco, California, United States | Alex Lamb | Reveal | |
Nexis Network | $4.5M | Seed | A public layer-1 blockchain foundation for the decentralization of an Artificial Intelligence ecosystem. | Miami, Florida, United States | Stefan Creadore | Reveal | |
Mint Songs | $4.3M | Seed | Mint Songs is the largest music NFT marketplace helping music artists build web3 communities | Washington, District of Columbia, United States | Dwight Torculas | Reveal | |
Blocktorch | $4.2M | Seed | Blocktorch is a multi-chain observability platform that empowers web3 developers to scale every decentralized component globally. | Dover, Delaware, United States | Amine Afia, Gerald Pollak | Reveal | |
Property Source USA, Inc | $4.2M | Seed | Property Source is a MLS style real estate marketplace and transaction engine platform for ON, OFF-market and Block-chain properties. | Sarasota, Florida, United States | Abul Hasem, Diane Kole, Mark Kole | Reveal | |
Cabital | $4.0M | Seed | Payment on-and-off ramp solution enabling users to buy and sell cryptocurrencies. | Singapore, Central Region, Singapore | Gene Wu | Reveal | |
Boto | $3.8M | Seed | Boto is a no-code automation platform where developers and non-developers can create and share their automation. | Delaware City, Delaware, United States | Breno Araujo | Reveal | |
MetaBlaze | $3.7M | Venture | MetaBlaze is a blockchain-based gaming startup gaming platform to earn crypto metaverse. | Tórtola, Castilla-La Mancha, Spain | — | Reveal | |
Fire | $3.5M | Venture | Fire is a free browser plugin that simulates web3 transactions. | Miami, Florida, United States | — | Reveal | |
Fitchin | $3.5M | Seed | Fitchin is a fully integrated gaming community playground that connects esports teams, content creators. | Tórtola, Castilla-La Mancha, Spain | — | Reveal | |
Swoops | $3.5M | Seed | Swoops develops and creates a basketball simulation game with the help of blockchain technology. | Remote, Oregon, United States | — | Reveal | |
Vantient | $3.5M | Seed | Vantient is a Web3 customer relationship management service provider | Singapore, Central Region, Singapore | — | Reveal | |
Housecat | $3.4M | Pre-Seed | Housecat is democratizing crypto investment strategies for users, empowering individuals to become asset managers. | Zug, Zug, Switzerland | Ville Vesterinen | Reveal | |
Wagmi Venture Studio | $3.2M | Seed | Web3 & AI venture studio creating transformative experiences that democratize opportunity and ownership of the internet. | Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain | André Caçador | Reveal | |
Fyn | $3.2M | Seed | Fyn helps enterprise and institutional investors manage their digital asset taxation. | Delaware City, Delaware, United States | Pradyumna Doddala | Reveal | |
Ottr Finance | $3.1M | Pre-Seed | Ottr Finance is a Wallet For Everyone. | San Francisco, California, United States | Alexey Zakharov | Reveal | |
Aesthetic | $3.1M | Seed | Aesthetic is an e-commerce platform that enables NFT creators to create free and paid drops, and share content with token-holders. | San Francisco, California, United States | Andrew Look | Reveal | |
Sumi Network | $3.0M | Seed | Sumi Network is a decentralized storage solution provider. | San Francisco, California, United States | — | Reveal | |
Mpeppe | $3.0M | ICO | Mpeppe is the revolutionary meme cryptocurrency at the intersection of sports fandom and blockchain innovation. | New York, New York, United States | — | Reveal | |
Transpose | $3.0M | Seed | Transpose is a Web3 data and infrastructure startup. | New York, New York, United States | Alex Langshur | Reveal | |
Security Token Partners (now Security Token Group) | $3.0M | Series A | Security Token Partners rebranded into Security Token Group in 2018. | Miami, Florida, United States | — | Reveal | |
HAL | $3.0M | Seed | HAL provides blockchain monitoring services intended to create centralized lighthouses. | London, England, United Kingdom | Manlio Poltronier | Reveal | |
Element Black | $2.9M | Seed | Element Black is a Web3 music ecosystem service provider that combines music, social games, and NFT. | Virgin, Utah, United States | — | Reveal | |
Zappaty | $2.8M | Seed | Fully encrypted, cloud-based file sharing and collaboration platform for consumer and business use. | Glasgow, Glasgow City, United Kingdom | David Stickland, John Thornewill | Reveal | |
SteamChain | $2.8M | Program | SteamChain enables original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to offer usage-based financing (hardware-as-a-service) to their customers. | Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States | Michael Cromheecke | Reveal | |
BTP | $2.8M | Seed | BTP is a digital provenance company with a mission to make assets trustworthy | Edinburgh, Edinburgh, City of, United Kingdom | Duncan Johnston-Watt | Reveal | |
Cashero | $2.5M | Seed | Cashero is a blockchain-based instant local & cross-border payment wallet. It offers users multi-currency wallets and USD yields. | Tallinn, Harjumaa, Estonia | Evelyn Wobil | Reveal | |
Moonwalk | $2.5M | Seed | Wallet-as-a-Service Platform | Miami, Florida, United States | Greg Consiglio | Reveal | |
EN Envoy | $2.5M | Pre-Seed | Your favourite NFTs in one profile | Willemstad, Noord-Brabant, The Netherlands | Bram Verstraeten | — | Reveal |
RE Redeem | $2.5M | Pre-Seed | Redeem uses Web3 technology to enable users to send and redeem non-fungible tokens (NFT) by using their phone numbers. | Kansas City, Kansas, United States | — | — | Reveal |
Fohat | $2.5M | Grant | A holding company focused on Energy Intelligence for the energy sector. | Curitiba, Parana, Brazil | Daniela Paes | Reveal | |
Polygen | $2.3M | Seed | Polygen provides a breath of fresh air in the world of blockchain launchpads. | London, England, United Kingdom | Michael Hepburn | Reveal | |
Tractiv | $2.3M | Seed | Providing usage transparency in the market data industry. | Chicago, Illinois, United States | Charles Porter | Reveal |
+59 more closed startups
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many blockchain startups have failed?
The VCbacked Startup Graveyard currently tracks 159 venture-backed blockchain startups that have shut down, collectively raising $5.1B before closing. That is roughly 7 percent of all closed companies in the database, which is based on the last five years of fundraising data.
What is the biggest blockchain startup failure?
By total capital raised, the largest blockchain failure in the database is BlockFi, which raised $1.4B before shutting down.
Why do blockchain startups fail?
The blockchain graveyard is what a completed hype cycle looks like. Infrastructure built for demand that never arrived, tokens that were the product, and business models that only worked while prices went up. Across the dataset, the most common last round before shutdown in blockchain was Seed, and the largest cohort of failures last raised in 2022.
Can I contact founders of failed blockchain startups?
Founder names are shown free on this page for every closed blockchain company. VCbacked paid plans reveal verified founder contact details where available and unlock CSV export.