x402 December Transaction Data Analysis: What Are People Actually Building?
- Core Insight: The x402 protocol validates the scalability of micro-payments for AI agents.
- Key Metrics:
- Processed 63 million transactions, totaling $7.5 million in a single month.
- Average transaction value is only $0.12, entering a domain where credit cards cannot compete.
- Over 1,100 projects participated, primarily for infrastructure services like data and AI.
- Market Impact: Opens a new payment track for the integration of AI and the Web3 economy.
- Timeliness Note: Long-term impact.
Original Author: E.H.
Original Compilation: TechFlow
We analyzed all x402 transaction data for December 2025:
- 63 million payments
- $7.5 million USDC
- Over 1,100 projects participating
This is the first real-world case proving AI agents can pay for services at scale.
Here are our findings
http://blockrun.ai/state-x402-2025.pdf
http://blockrun.ai/state-x402-2025-deck.pdf
A Quick History Recap:
The HTTP 402 "Payment Required" status code was defined in 1997 but was never actually used.
The reason is simple: credit cards charge $0.30 to process a $0.01 payment, a fee of 3000%. Micropayments were doomed from the start.
Until stablecoins changed everything.
December 2025 Data Snapshot:
- 63 million transactions
- $7.5 million USDC in circulation
- 64,000 unique buyers
- 10,000 unique sellers
- Average transaction size just $0.12
For comparison: Visa's minimum viable transaction is around $15, while x402 is processing payments 100x smaller and operating at scale.
The ecosystem is exploding:
- Over 1,100 unique projects
- Over 4,800 mainnet endpoints
- 6 active payment coordinators
Most service providers are small, with no clear dominant player.
Translation: Now is the critical moment to "claim territory."
76% of services cost $0.10 or less
The sweet spot? $0.01-$0.10, accounting for 69% of all services.
This is the micropayment zone—where credit cards can't compete at all.
AI agents pursue efficiency optimization; they pay on-demand, always pay-per-use.
So what are people actually building?
🥇 Data Services: 31%
🥈 AI/Large Language Models (LLMs): 25%
🥉 Blockchain: 15%
Not memes, not speculative projects.
But real infrastructure: APIs, analytics, inference services.
"Real money" is already flowing in.
Base vs Solana—who wins?
- Base: 53% (the main hub for developers)
- Solana: 37% (the top choice for production environments)
Base has the Coinbase ecosystem, Solana wins on speed.
Which one to choose? Depends on your use case.
"Isn't this all fake volume?"
Let's be honest:
Artemis data shows 47% of transaction volume is for leaderboard farming.
But—that's only 14% of the total transaction value.
Smaller transactions = cleaner money flow.
The viability of micropayments has been proven.
The unsolved billion-dollar problem:
What happens when an AI agent pays incorrectly?
x402 has solved "how AI agents pay."
But it still hasn't solved:
- Agent identity verification (KYA, Know Your Agent)
- Reputation systems
- Dispute resolution mechanisms
Whoever solves these will be the ultimate winner.
- 63 million transactions in a single month
- Average transaction value: $0.12
The protocol is working.
The economic model works.
The developers are in place.
The only question left is: What will you build on top of this?
