Research shows that $1.6 billion in liquidity on major decentralized exchanges remained underutilized during the first half of 2026. This amount represented 85 percent of the total tracked across concentrated liquidity pools. Providers missed out on an estimated $150 million in annual fees as a result.
Analytics firm Dune conducted the study, which was commissioned by decentralized exchange aggregator 1inch. It examined data from Uniswap v3 and v4, PancakeSwap v3, and Aerodrome Slipstream across seven chains. Weekly snapshots covered the period from January 6 to June 30.
Roughly $542 million, or 29.5 percent of the liquidity, sat fully out of range in an average week. Positions in concentrated liquidity pools stop earning fees when asset prices move beyond the chosen range. The out-of-range share stayed mostly between 25 percent and 35 percent during the period.
Dune research lead Filippo Armani said decentralized exchanges have grown into deep and liquid markets even though much of the liquidity is not fully at work. Larger positions above $1 million accounted for 47 percent of all idle capital. Individual wallets made up between 82 percent and 94 percent of the attributed idle liquidity on Uniswap v3.
