Focus on Google's popular keywords: What are retail investors paying attention to?
Original title: Google Trends as a Retail Barometer: Key Insights
Original author: Stacy Muur, crypto researcher
Original translation: xiaozou, Golden Finance
Bitcoin is halfway through its second decade, and the 20th anniversary is not far away. During this period, the crypto world has also undergone unpredictable changes, influenced by market sentiment, political strategies, and the alternation of bull and bear market cycles.
Despite these fluctuations, new users continue to enter the crypto world through various channels. Which of them is the most popular? Let's explore the answer in this article.
1. Common keywords
To better understand the changes in user interests, I analyzed Google Trends over the past five years. This period covers both bull and bear market cycles, providing an objective perspective.
People frequently search for general concepts like “crypto,” “blockchain,” and “token.” As expected, the volume of searches for these keywords is proportional to the market’s upward movement.

But these searches don’t reveal intent. To better understand user interest, it’s helpful to take a closer look at intent-based searches.

Throughout history, the main uses of cryptocurrency have been trading, investing, and speculating. Airdrops followed closely behind, but not as popular as the more recently searched keywords like “trade” and “invest.” Nonetheless, passive income remains a topic of interest to cryptocurrency-savvy users.
2. Trading related queries
Since we are talking about trading, let’s go a step further and gain insight into user brand awareness and key entry paths.
User attention to topics related to CEX (centralized exchanges) and DEX (decentralized exchanges) reflects the dominance of CEX trading volume over DEX trading volume. Despite various opinions, DeFi is still a small part of the broader crypto market, and centralized exchanges like Binance should not be underestimated in this market.

Key Observations:
· CEX popularity peaked in late December 2019 and fell to a low in mid-March 2021.
· Binance has been leading in search interest for the top centralized exchanges in 2024.

· Interest in DEXs fell to a low in the summer of 2021 but reached an all-time high in late November 2024. This was likely driven by Bitcoin’s new bull run and a surge in meme coin activity on the Solana DEXs.
· Among the leading DEXs by TVL, PancakeSwap dominated search interest in May 2021. In December 2024, Uniswap took the lead, followed by Raydium.

· The popularity of crypto derivatives peaked in 2021, but protocols such as Hyperliquid have recently revived interest compared to Drift Protocol and Jupiter.
· The prediction market surged in November 2024, driven by Trump-related discussions on Polymarket. However, the popularity quickly declined, reflecting a similar trend to November 2020.

3. Token search trends
The search popularity of the word "crypto" is only comparable to that of "Bitcoin", which is the main query term for crypto-related topics.
Search popularity for Bitcoin peaked during the 2021 bull run and hit its lowest point at the end of 2019. Even after Bitcoin reached a price of $100,000 for the first time in late 2024, it failed to regain its former popularity.

Meanwhile, query frequency for other top market cap tokens, including Ethereum, remained relatively stable, although XRP has seen a significant increase following its recent rally.

4. Narrative popularity
When comparing user interest in major verticals such as DeFi, RWA, DePIN, GameFi, and the recently popular AI x Crypto, user interest in the first two is sustainable. In contrast, other fields rely more on hype.
Recently, there has been a surge in interest in the RWA and AI x Crypto fields, while DePIN, DeFi, and GameFi remain in the background.

The popularity of Meme coins soared to unprecedented levels at the end of 2024. At the same time, AI-related tokens are gathering attention, and March 2024 is a critical moment.

5. Keywords in 2024
Now that we have a general understanding of the current interest and major attention projects in Web3, let me share what are the most popular search queries in the crypto field at present (sorted by search query volume).
· Bitcoin — The Unrivaled Attention Magnet
· Ethereum
· DEX
· CEX
· L1 and L2 — Evenly Matched
· DeFi
· Altcoin
· RWA
· AI Agent
· Memecoin
· DePIN
· NFT
· GameFi
· Metaverse
Here are the biggest Web3 brands ranked:
· Bitcoin
· XRP
· TON
· Binance
· Ethereum
· Solana
· USDT
· TRON
· Bybit
· Metamask
· OKX
All other brand searches, including those frequently discussed on Crypto Twitter like Vitruals, Ethena, or any of the L2 chains, lag far behind the above brands.
What can you see?
Most topics discussed on Crypto Twitter do not reach a global audience. Retail investors still join the crypto world through centralized exchanges, and DeFi captures only a small portion of crypto interest. Many of today's hot brands are still beyond the retail audience.
You may also like

Morning Report | OpenAI has submitted an S-1 registration statement draft to the U.S. SEC; Morpho completes $175 million financing

Morning Report | BitMine increased its holdings by 126,971 ETH last week; trader Eugene announced his exit from the crypto market

Wang Chuan: How can one not feel anxious after the neighbor Old Wang made thirty times profit by investing in storage stocks? (Seven) - A quarter-century cycle

Cryptocurrency CEXs are flocking to sell US stocks, and traditional brokerages are facing an "uninvited guest."

$75 billion in foreign capital has fled, and South Korean retail investors have absorbed it all using leverage

Japan’s Three Megabanks Plan Joint Stablecoin Issuance in Fiscal 2026
MUFG, SMBC, and Mizuho reportedly plan to jointly issue fiat-pegged stablecoins in fiscal 2026, signaling Japan’s growing push into bank-led digital payment infrastructure.

Humanity Discloses H Token Dual-Chain Attack Details, With Losses on Ethereum and BSC Exceeding $36 Million
Humanity said the H token attack across Ethereum and BSC caused more than $36 million in losses after leaked ProxyAdmin keys enabled malicious contract upgrades and token minting.

White House Discusses CLARITY Act With Law Enforcement Ahead of Senate Vote
The White House discussed the CLARITY Act with law enforcement ahead of a Senate vote, focusing on illicit finance risks and developer protections.

Bitcoin Trading Guide 2026: Strategies for Experienced Traders

What Is XAUT and PAXG? Why Tokenized Gold Is Booming in 2026

Will the SpaceX IPO Hurt Bitcoin? Here's What Traders Are Watching

Foreign selling in the South Korean stock market accelerates, with cumulative net sales reportedly reaching $75 billion this year
On June 9, The Kobeissi Letter, citing Goldman Sachs data, reported that global investors are selling South Korean stocks at an unusually rapid pace. In the latest trading session, foreign investors sold about $801 million worth of Kospi constituent stocks again; total foreign outflows last week reached about $10 billion, and the market has been in net foreign selling on nearly every trading day over the past month. According to the data cited in the report, foreign investors have sold about $75 billion worth of South Korean stocks so far this year. Meanwhile, South Korean retail and institutional investors together recorded roughly $69 billion in net buying over the same period, suggesting that the market’s main buying support has come from domestic capital rather than returning overseas funds. The information currently disclosed still mainly comes from The Kobeissi Letter’s retelling and Goldman Sachs data summaries, while public details on the statistical period and the specific definition of “selling” remain relatively limited.

Fortune Warns of Strategy’s Financing Structure Risks as Bitcoin Premium Narrows
Fortune warned that Strategy’s Bitcoin treasury model faces growing financing risks as MSTR’s net asset premium narrows and preferred stock dividend pressure increases.

Ferrari Challenge Le Mans: Carl Moon to Dominate in WEEX Livery

Sahara AI Responds to SAHARA’s Sharp Drop: No Contract or Product Security Issues Found, Internal Investigation Underway
Sahara AI responded to SAHARA’s 60% price drop, saying no token contract or product security issues have been found and an internal investigation is underway.

WEEX Deposit/Withdrawal Dynamic Island: Your Asset Status, Always in Sight

Scaling Crypto Derivatives: The Digital Asset Infrastructure Behind High-Volume Trading
In the fast-moving digital asset ecosystem, derivatives platforms face an extreme architectural test. High-leverage futures markets demand more than just standard security—they require absolute operational precision, zero-latency matching engines, and ironclad structural scalability, all while navigating intense market volatility.
As global platforms scale to meet these demands, the industry is shifting away from rigid, monolithic setups toward a more agile, "decoupled" infrastructure philosophy.
The Blueprint for High-Volume Copy TradingFor elite global exchanges like WEEX (founded in 2018), this architectural choice becomes critical when scaling high-volume retail features like social copy trading. When thousands of users automatically mirror the real-time strategies of elite traders simultaneously, it triggers sudden, monumental spikes in concurrent transactional volume.
To prevent execution latency or settlement bottlenecks during these peak volatility events, a platform's primary engine must remain entirely dedicated to risk management, copy-trade synchronization, and order matching.
The Architectural Rule: New-generation platforms must separate front-end user execution engines from heavy backend infrastructural overhead to eliminate operational friction.
By separating these layers, platforms can maintain complete sovereignty over their trading environments and user experiences while strategically aligning with institutional-grade infrastructure ecosystems. This strategic framework allows modern exchanges to leverage advanced Digital Asset Custody infrastructure such as Cobo’s behind the scenes, ensuring that backend wallet management scales elastically alongside trading spikes.
Capitalizing on Market Momentum and 400× LeverageIn a derivatives arena where platforms offer up to 400× leverage on perpetual contracts, capital efficiency and market agility are core business metrics. To capture market momentum, an exchange needs the ability to rapidly expand its asset offerings, supporting everything from legacy crypto assets to sudden, trending altcoins across a massive library of trading pairs.
Adopting a flexible, scalable Wallet-as-a-Service (WaaS) solution such as Cobo’s could completely rewrite the development timeline for high-growth exchanges. Instead of spending months of engineering capital building out custom backend wallet architectures for every new blockchain network, platforms can deploy localized infrastructure in days.
This agility allows platforms to instantly scale their listings to over a thousand trading pairs without compromising security or delaying time-to-market. It mirrors the exact operational advantages seen during high-velocity market events, similar to how advanced wallet infrastructure empowers platforms during sudden asset surges; allowing exchanges to pass that speed and liquidity directly to their global user base.
A Mature Foundation for GrowthThe synergy between trusted infrastructure ecosystems and global trading platforms represents the natural evolution of a maturing crypto market. As WEEX continues to scale its global spot and derivatives offerings for over 6 million users, adopting robust backend paradigms proves that platforms no longer have to compromise between cutting-edge trading velocity and uncompromised structural security.

Get Paid to Onboard? Try WEEX’s New Homepage with Rewards for Registration, Deposit & Trade
Morning Report | OpenAI has submitted an S-1 registration statement draft to the U.S. SEC; Morpho completes $175 million financing
Morning Report | BitMine increased its holdings by 126,971 ETH last week; trader Eugene announced his exit from the crypto market
Wang Chuan: How can one not feel anxious after the neighbor Old Wang made thirty times profit by investing in storage stocks? (Seven) - A quarter-century cycle
Cryptocurrency CEXs are flocking to sell US stocks, and traditional brokerages are facing an "uninvited guest."
$75 billion in foreign capital has fled, and South Korean retail investors have absorbed it all using leverage
Japan’s Three Megabanks Plan Joint Stablecoin Issuance in Fiscal 2026
MUFG, SMBC, and Mizuho reportedly plan to jointly issue fiat-pegged stablecoins in fiscal 2026, signaling Japan’s growing push into bank-led digital payment infrastructure.





