A Guide to HyperEVM and Its Ecosystem

HyperLiquid, as an ecosystem, has grown a lot recently. Hyperliquid is an L1 blockchain responsible for spot and perpetual trading supported by the platform. It enables users to trade perpetuals at zero gas fees on-chain, which wasn’t possible earlier. This shift with deeper liquidity and CLOB design helped Hyperliquid to even let its users open a position size worth $1B.

With this immense growth in the Hyperliquid perpetual platform, they also opened the doors for developers to utilize the Hyperliquid speed and liquidity through their EVM implementation, HyperEVM. HyperEVM is an L1 EVM implementation that utilizes the HyperBFT consensus mechanism for security. It is essential to recognize that the HyperEVM ecosystem is distinct from HyperCore, which serves as the spot and perpetual trading engine for HyperLiquid.

This piece focuses on core architecture, protocols of the HyperEVM ecosystem, and a guide to start building on it.
 

What is HyperEVM: Architecture, Consensus, and More

HyperEVM is a general-purpose Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) seamlessly integrated into the Hyperliquid L1 blockchain, HyperCore. It isn’t a separate chain of the HyperLiquid but can be treated as an extension to it. HyperEVM uses HyperBFT, a consensus algorithm also utilized by the HyperLiquid blockchain.

HyperEVM utilizes a dual block system which have small and large blocks. Small blocks are reserved for smaller transaction and execute fast, finalizing the transaction within 1 seconds with a 2M gas limit. The transactions that require higher compute resources go into larger blocks with an execution estimate time of 1 minute and a gas limit of 30 M. This allows for the separation of the execution for larger transactions like contract deployment and keeping the smaller blocks still fast without facing any major congestion.

To utilize larger blocks, developers can send the transaction with the following flag, though it is also important to note that they need to than unset this flag to send transactions at a faster rate through small blocks.

HyperEVM dapps utilises direct price data from spot and perp orderbooks in HyperCore. This helps to get the latest price feed without compromising security. Gas token used on the HyperEVM blockchain is HYPE.
 

Start Developing on HyperEVM: RPCs, Bridges, and Fundamentals

As we now understand that HyperEVM handles everything and anything related to smart contracts and deployments, while the HyperCore, the trading engine, handles everything related to the token like spot market, perpetual market, and liquidation if required. Anything trading-related goes to HyperCore, and any smart contract execution goes through HyperEVM.

Here’s something more that can help you start in the HyperEVM ecosystem:

EVM RPCs

• Mainnet: https://rpc.hyperliquid.xyz/evm
• Testnet: https://rpc.hyperliquid-testnet.xyz/evm
   

Native gas

• Gas.zip: https://www.gas.zip/
• DeBridge: https://app.debridge.finance/
   

Big block/small block toggle

• https://hyperevm-block-toggle.vercel.app
   

Python SDK example

• https://github.com/hyperliquid-dex/hyperliquid-python-sdk/blob/master/examples/basic_evm_use_big_blocks.py
   

Oracles

• Pyth: https://docs.pyth.network/price-feeds/contract-addresses/evm
• Stork: https://docs.stork.network/resources/contract-addresses/evm#hyperevm

Crosschain messaging

• LayerZero: https://docs.layerzero.network/v2/deployments/deployed-contracts?chains=hyperliquid
• DeBridge: https://docs.debridge.finance/the-debridge-messaging-protocol/deployed-contracts#evm-chains
• Hyperlane: https://docs.hyperlane.xyz/docs/reference/default-ism-validators

Indexing/subgraphs

• Goldsky: https://docs.goldsky.com/chains/hyperevm
• Allium: https://docs.allium.so/historical-chains/supported-blockchains/hyperliquid

Smart contract tooling

• Gelato: https://docs.gelato.network/web3-services

Account abstraction

• ZeroDev: https://docs.zerodev.app/

Visit for more resources here in the HyperEVM docs.
 

Hyperliquid Improvement Proposals (HIPs)

HIP-1: Native Token Standards

HIP-1 is a fungible token standard. The sender of the token genesis transaction supplies the information about the token name, decimal, and supply. The gas cost for this deployment is decided through a Dutch auction with a duration of 31 hours.
 

HIP-2: Hyperliquidity

Hyperliquidity is inspired by the Uniswap design for the tokens from HIP-1; it requires bootstrap liquidity. It is an on-chain strategy that is a part of Hyperliquid’s block transition logic. This strategy guarantees a 0.3% spread every 3 seconds.
 

HIP-3: Builder-Deployed Perps

Hyperliquid would utilize this HIP to target builder-deployed perps, thereby decentralizing the perp listing process. It is still in testnet at the time of writing.
 

HyperEVM Ecosystem: A Peek Into the Stage of Ecosystem

Hyperliquid, as an ecosystem came far. Hyperliquid is currently responsible for most of the volume on-chain, taking the ratio of DEX to CEX futures trading volume higher, currently at ~8.5%.

Source: https://www.theblock.co/data/decentralized-finance/derivatives/dex-to-cex-futures-trade-volume 

If we compare the volume and open interest of DEX to its CEX counterparts, we get the following stats:

DEX Derivatives

Total 24H Volume: $17.30 B 
Total Open Interest: $8.13 B 
Top Exchange by 24H 
Volume: Hyperliquid 
-> 24H Volume: $14.58 B
-> Open Interest: $6.66 B

CEX Derivatives 
Total 24H Volume: $1709.94 B 
Total Open Interest: $485.41 B 
Top Exchange by 24H 
Volume: Binance
-> 24H Volume: $125.78 B 
-> Open Interest: $25.26 B

This clearly shows us that Hyperliquid is taking the majority of on-chain perpetual volume. With this growth, Hyperliquid expanded the support for developers to build on their L1 through HyperEVM. The current ecosystem sits at 100+ dapps.

Let’s have a look at different verticals growing under the Hyperliquid umbrella. This section is sourced from Ponyo, a research analyst at Four Pillars.
 

DeFi

The growth of DeFi is inevitable on HyperEVM because it supports native price oracles, giving live price data, which is essential for every price-dependent protocol.

1. DeFi.app
2. Felix Protocol
3. Hana Network
4. Harmonix Finance
5. HyperLend
6. HyperSwap
7. HyperUnit
8. HypurrFi

and more.
 

LSTs

LSTs (Liquid Staking Tokens) are the assets that let users earn yield on the native asset and still have the liquid asset to trade across DeFi. The protocols building this on HyperEVM are:

1. Kinetiq (kHYPE)
2. LoopedHYPE
3. StakedHYPE (stHYPE)
    

SocialFi

SocialFi is a growing narrative in all over the ecosystem with various projects surfacing and making the space more interacting and fun. Protocols building this on HyperEVM are the following:

1. HypurrFun (HFUN)
2. PvP.trade

NFTs

NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) have already made their mark in the crypto ecosystem, and it has continued to grow in HyperEVM as well, with some notable projects as follows:

1. Drip Trade
2. Liquina and LQnians
3. Odd Otties
4. PiP and Friends
5. Wealthy Hypio Babies
    

Infrastructure and Tools

Infrastructure and Tooling are essential for any ecosystem, with Hyperliquid having protocols across to help around bridging, oracles, name services, developer tools, and development.
 

Data Analytics

Data analytics platforms are important to understand the growing ecosystem and find any upcoming opportunities.

1. HyperDash
2. HyperScanner
3. HyperStats
4. HyperTerminal
5. Nansen and Dune
    

Conclusion

HyperEVM marks a great evolution for EVM by merging execution with native financial rails on a single layer‑1 chain. Its dual-block architecture, shared HyperBFT security give a platform to build products that were not possible before.

Developers benefit from full EVM compatibility and familiar tooling, while community members can leverage liquidity, bridges, staking, and oracle access without friction. With an expanding ecosystem, featuring DeFi, LSTs, NFTs, and more, it is built to serve a wider range of audiences.

After taking over the on-chain perp trading volume, Hyperliquid aims to expand its support for developers to build great protocols on HyperEVM and take the ecosystem forward, creating a better flywheel for HyperLiquid and HYPE token.

At QuillAudits, with our 7+ years of experience, we audit the HyperEVM ecosystem projects, making them more resilient and better for users.