April Layer 2 Landscape Recap

The on-chain activity on layer 2s (L2s) in April has generally flatlined across the board and saw declining total value locked (TVL), mostly due to the price action of the crypto markets. With the exception of zkSync Era and StarkNet, most other L2s' TVL had a contractionary phase in April. Gas expenditures of most rollups have also fallen, indicating a reduction in the transactions on L2s. 

The most notable on-chain activity in April was the sustained growth in zkSync Era and StarkNet. This growth was likely hinged on the speculation of a potential token airdrop in the future, which is why we continue to see increasing TVLs on these two rollups. However, these rollups are still limited by shallow liquidity and available applications for them to compete with the incumbents. While liquidity can be bootstrapped by token incentives eventually, attracting developers is a different domain altogether. For zkSync Era, its EVM compatibility should allow for it to gain an edge in this aspect, whereas StarkNet would likely fall short as it would require developers to learn to code in Cairo.