Wormhole announced plans to distribute 617 million W tokens, representing 6% of the total token supply, to nearly 400,000 unique wallets that interacted with the platform and its various applications. Categorized under the Community & Launch category, this giveaway is a deliberate attempt to recognize and reward users who have contributed to the growth and development of Wormhole.

Airdrop distribution takes into account each user's level of engagement with the Wormhole ecosystem, taking into account the length of their participation, the cumulative volume of messages and transmissions, and the consistency of their use throughout the life of the protocol. Participation in applications in the Wormhole ecosystem, such as certain NFT communities and crypto projects, will also be considered.

The W token will become the governance asset of the Wormhole DAO, a decentralized autonomous organization that has not yet launched. W token holders will have the right to vote on important decisions affecting the platform, including fee structure and other operational aspects. The move aligns with the broader trend of decentralized governance in the crypto space, giving token holders the ability to shape the future of the protocol.

The W token will debut as a native asset on the Solana and Ethereum networks, marking a significant step in Wormhole's cross-chain ambitions. However, the scope of the platform extends well beyond these two blockchains: there are plans to expand support for the W token on over 30 connected blockchains, including Aptos, Avalanche, BNB Chain and Sui, as well as layer 2 scaling solutions such as Arbitrum, Base, Optimism and Polygon .

While the airdrop date has not yet been announced, Wormhole has provided users with an eligibility check to determine if their wallets qualify for the upcoming token airdrop.

Pre-market trading of W tokens has already seen significant activity, with bids for tokens selling for approximately $2.49 each as of Monday, potentially valuing the initial circulating supply of 1.8 billion tokens at nearly $4.5 billion. Wormhole's financial backers, who contributed to the project's recent $225 million fundraising, have been allocated more than 11% of the outstanding W tokens.