Author: Curry, Shenchao TechFlow

Do you remember the Grass that contributed bandwidth to earn rewards?

The Grass Foundation officially launched the Stage 2 rewards query tool on July 1 ( Rewards Checker ), where users can view the USDC reward amounts corresponding to their bandwidth contributions from October 14, 2024, to June 8, 2026 (Stage 2 Epoch 1-19) through the Dashboard.

The claiming channel will open at 1 PM (EST) on July 22, and rewards will be directly issued to users' self-custodied in-app wallets.

This distribution differs from the previous Stage 1 GRASS token airdrop, as Grass has chosen to issue rewards in the stablecoin USDC.

The team's previous official stance was that the project was nearing profitability at the end of last year, and this move aims to directly compensate contributors from the network's real income, rather than continuing to rely on token incentives, marking a significant step for Grass from "subsidy-driven growth" to "self-sustaining economy."

However, after the checker launched, the comment section of related tweets on the X platform quickly got flooded with feedback from numerous users. Many long-running node participants shared allocation screenshots expressing disappointment that rewards were far lower than expected; some even questioned the project's fairness.

Background Review

Grass is a DePIN project aimed at allowing users to participate in network construction and earn rewards by sharing idle internet bandwidth. Users only need to download the Grass app or run a node, and by running it in the background, they can contribute unused bandwidth while accumulating Grass Points and Network Points. These points will serve as important criteria for subsequent reward distributions.

From 2024 to 2025, Grass completed Stage 1 of the token airdrop, distributing about 100 million GRASS tokens to millions of users worldwide, making it one of the largest airdrops in the history of the Solana ecosystem. The project then entered Stage 2, continuing to expand network scale and optimize the points model (including the introduction of Network Points to more accurately reflect actual bandwidth usage).

The expectation was 170 million tokens, and not a single mention of GRASS in the announcement

To understand the gap this time, we need to start from the first round.

On October 28, 2024, Grass completed its first airdrop, distributing 100 million GRASS tokens to about 2.8 million users, accounting for 10% of the total supply. According to the official figures from the Grass website, the value of this batch of airdrop was approximately 200 million dollars calculated at the average monthly price after the token went live, resulting in an approximate average of 70 dollars per person. At that time, some users also complained about the low distribution, but overall, this was one of the most widely covered airdrops in the Solana ecosystem.

The expectations for the second round were based on the publicly available token distribution plan. According to the Grass token economics document compiled by Stakin and Gate Research, 17% of the total supply (i.e., 170 million tokens) was allocated for distribution in the second phase and subsequent ecosystem incentives, which is 70% higher than the first round. In late June this year, the market consensus was still that the native wallet launching in mid-July would be the sole entry point for claiming these 170 million tokens, and tracking reports from platforms like CoinMarketCap were written based on this premise.

The announcement on July 1 rewrote the script. The entire text made no mention of the GRASS token, with the official explanation being that, considering ongoing regulatory uncertainties, to ensure that all eligible jurisdictions could timely claim, the second phase participant rewards would be issued in USDC. As for the distribution of the 170 million tokens being canceled, postponed, or otherwise arranged, there was no further information in the announcement.

600 days of idling, earned 2 dollars: sharing turns into a large complaint scene

Some users shared that they were online for 599 days, accumulated about 2.82 million points, and the final query result was 5.73 dollars USDC; another user claimed that after running a node for two years, they only received 10 dollars, while others posted screenshots showing they earned 80 dollars after 495 days, posting in a mocking tone.

Some users questioned the accuracy of the points statistics themselves, claiming that the number of points they mined did not match the inquiry tool's display, with a difference of nearly half.

“uninstall Grass” became a high-frequency term in the comments section, with some users posting uninstallation tutorials. This scene is not the first time. In September 2024, during the first airdrop, BeInCrypto reported that users compared the tokens earned from seven months of idling to "a Big Mac burger." The difference is that the dissatisfaction in the first round was directed at the number of tokens, while this time there were no tokens at all.

The significant discrepancy in amounts can be explained by the points model.

Starting October 2025, Grass separated the points into two categories: Uptime Points reflect only online duration, while Network Points accumulate only when bandwidth is used by real traffic, and the routing of real traffic highly depends on the geographic location of the node. A community member analyzed on the X platform that this is the primary reason for the main difference in rewards for the same idle duration. Most users are hanging for “duration”, while Grass is paying for “the bandwidth that is used”.

For participants who are still observing, there is only one confirmed operational aspect: the claim will open on July 22 and close on January 22, 2027. Claims can only be made through the official Dashboard; Grass will not proactively send private messages, and any third-party claim links are phishing.

As the controversy evolved, the secondary market reacted oppositely.

According to Bybit data, as of July 2, GRASS was priced at about 0.48 dollars, up about 4% within 24 hours, with a daily fluctuation range of 0.461 to 0.517 dollars, and a trading volume of about 36 million dollars. The historical highest price of this token was 3.89 dollars, currently down about 87% from its peak.

The price logic is not hard to reconstruct. The 170 million tokens account for 17% of the total supply, close to 27% of the current circulating amount of about 630 million, and the market has long seen it as the largest selling pressure hanging over the second half of the year. A single unlock on June 28 of 33.4 million (about 16.3 million dollars) already made token holders nervous. The second phase rewards being changed to USDC means that this potential selling pressure at least temporarily does not materialize; if airdrop farmers do not get tokens, there are no tokens to dump. The interests of token holders and idle users have diverged in this announcement.

According to existing arrangements, Grass will hold a conference call on July 7 for all token holders and network participants, where users can submit questions in advance. Given the current controversy, the official needs to respond to at least three points: first, what is the total pool size of the second phase rewards; second, will the 170 million token distribution still be executed and when; third, and most importantly for users, why does the points statistic differ from some users' local records.

After the claim channel opens on July 22, the actual data received will provide a more complete sample for this controversy. Before that, whether to continue idling or not, the points in users' hands have been priced, leaving only the decision to claim or not to claim.

However, from the current feeling, the crypto bear market has directly ended the airdrop benefits of most projects; the token price may return, but the gameplay of airdrops has already been demystified.