The data for 2025 is in. On the surface, it looks like "stabilization"—the massive drops from 2023 have slowed down. But when you look closer at who is left and where the money is going, a different picture emerges.
We aren't dying, but we might be becoming a closed fortress.
📝 YEARLY GROWTH & ENGAGEMENT REPORT
| year | Posts | Daily Avg Posts | Posters | Interactions | Users | Curators (Silent) | New Accts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 1,410,724 | 3,864 | 42,037 | 5,724,127 | 50,702 | 8,665 | 910,098 |
| 2022 | 1,351,925 | 3,703 | 38,356 | 8,229,731 | 46,064 | 7,708 | 97,468 |
| 2023 | 1,074,812 | 2,944 | 27,138 | 8,944,548 | 32,956 | 5,818 | 47,666 |
| 2024 | 916,673 | 2,511 | 31,169 | 8,149,741 | 38,919 | 7,750 | 63,974 |
| 2025 | 842,548 | 2,308 | 25,575 | 7,256,485 | 40,053 | 14,478 | 57,556 |
"The numbers for 2025 tell a story of stabilization. After the brutal drops of 2023 (-20%) and 2024 (-15%), the decline in posting volume has slowed significantly to just -8%. But the most interesting anomaly is the user count: despite fewer posts, we actually saw a 2.9% increase in active users.
This suggests we have reached a 'hard floor.' The casual tourists and reward-farmers who fled during the bear market are gone. What remains is a smaller, but far more stubborn ecosystem. The quantity is lower, but the network itself isn't shrinking anymore—it’s hardening."
📝 🧲 RETENTION: YEAR-OVER-YEAR LOYALTY
| year | Total Posters | Retained from Prev Year | Retention Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 38,356 | 15,720 | 37.40% |
| 2023 | 27,138 | 13,179 | 34.36% |
| 2024 | 31,169 | 10,252 | 37.78% |
| 2025 | 25,575 | 10,413 | 33.41% |
"Retention has remained remarkably consistent over the last three years. The data shows a '1-in-3 Rule': roughly 33-37% of people who posted last year are still posting this year.
In the volatile world of crypto, where apps rise and fall in months, this is our strongest metric. It means that once someone survives their first year on Hive, they tend to stick around. The churn is happening almost entirely at the onboarding phase (new accounts), not among the established core."
📝 📅 DAILY EXTREMES (BEST & WORST DAYS)
| yearr | Best Date | Max Posts | Worst Date | Min Posts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 2021-04-05 | 5,947 | 2021-01-01 | 2,488 |
| 2022 | 2022-01-17 | 6,702 | 2022-12-25 | 2,364 |
| 2023 | 2023-02-24 | 3,872 | 2023-12-25 | 2,375 |
| 2024 | 2024-03-12 | 3,070 | 2024-11-10 | 1,923 |
| 2025 | 2025-12-04 | 3,287 | 2025-12-24 | 1,393 |
"The daily activity extremes for 2025 confirm that Hive is still very much a human network, subject to real-world calendars.
The Worst Day: December 24th (1,393 posts). As expected, people log off for the holidays.
The Best Day: December 4th (3,287 posts).
This 50% drop-off during holidays is actually a healthy sign—it proves our traffic isn't dominated by automated scripts that run 24/7 regardless of the season. Real people take breaks."
📝 👥 USER HABITS: POST FREQUENCY (COUNT & %)
| yr | 1 Post | 2-5 Posts | 6-10 Posts | 11-25 Posts | 26-50 Posts | 51-100 Posts | 100+ Posts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 10,842 (25.8%) | 12,277 (29.2%) | 4,810 (11.4%) | 5,081 (12.1%) | 2,962 (7.0%) | 2,434 (5.8%) | 3,631 (8.6%) |
| 2022 | 10,493 (27.4%) | 10,312 (26.9%) | 4,038 (10.5%) | 4,653 (12.1%) | 2,981 (7.8%) | 2,288 (6.0%) | 3,591 (9.4%) |
| 2023 | 6,522 (24.0%) | 7,378 (27.2%) | 2,910 (10.7%) | 3,676 (13.5%) | 2,017 (7.4%) | 1,753 (6.5%) | 2,882 (10.6%) |
| 2024 | 10,685 (34.3%) | 9,451 (30.3%) | 2,529 (8.1%) | 2,781 (8.9%) | 1,733 (5.6%) | 1,508 (4.8%) | 2,482 (8.0%) |
| 2025 | 7,710 (30.1%) | 6,623 (25.9%) | 2,546 (10.0%) | 3,308 (12.9%) | 1,627 (6.4%) | 1,388 (5.4%) | 2,373 (9.3%) |
We see two diverging trends here.
Less Spam: The percentage of 'One-Hit Wonders' (users who post once and leave) dropped from 34% in 2024 to 30% in 2025.
Higher Intensity: The dedicated users are working harder. The share of users posting 100+ times a year rose to 9.3%.
Basically, the casual middle ground is thinning out. You are either here to post almost daily, or you aren't posting at all. This polarization of activity is what drives the 'exclusive' feel of the current chain. Let's consider the hard core user, the ones who do post at least once a week, so an average, 52 posts or more. That group only cover 14.7% of the user base. This is way too low.
We are speaking here about a little bit over 4000 users. Way too low.
And still there are post which are under rewarded, meaning that the biggest part of those 4K users don't look outside their upvote circle. Which is slowly choking Hive.
📝 💰 ECONOMICS: PAYOUTS & ZERO VALUE POSTS
| year | avg_payout | median_payout | Zero_Payout_Posts | Zero Payout % |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | $7.35 | $1.12 | 255,581 | 18.12% |
| 2022 | $7.03 | $1.37 | 233,512 | 17.27% |
| 2023 | $5.07 | $1.18 | 191,248 | 17.79% |
| 2024 | $4.89 | $1.27 | 166,330 | 18.14% |
| 2025 | $4.35 | $1.27 | 168,879 | 20.04% |
This is the most concerning dataset in the report. In 2025, 20.04% of all posts received $0.00 payout. That is up from 18% in 2024 and 17% in 2023.
While the average payout dropped to $4.35 (driven by HIVE price action), the increase in zero-payout posts suggests the reward pool is becoming a closed fortress. New users or casual bloggers are finding it harder to get that first upvote. If 1 in 5 posts earns nothing, we risk becoming an ecosystem where only the established 'whales' and their friends can afford to play. This isn't just 'quality control'—it's a barrier to entry. I could run metrics which do prove that the bug curating accounts are feeding this behavour. But that is for another post.
So, 50% of the posts do earn more than 1.27 and 50% earn less.
📉 TREND ANALYSIS: 2024 vs 2025
| METRIC | PREV | CURR | CHANGE |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🟢 Users | 38,919 | 40,053 | +2.91% |
| 🔴 Posters | 31,169 | 25,575 | -17.95% |
| 🔴 Posts | 916,673 | 842,548 | -8.09% |
| 🔴 New Accts | 63,974 | 57,556 | -10.03% |
| 🟢 Curators | 7,750 | 14,478 | +86.81% |
| 🔴 Avg Payout | 5 | 4 | -10.93% |
As we all know, you can almost use all stats to prove everything. I do see some things which are less worse then expected, but I also see some things which more or less prove that we are choking Hive. It starts to look more and more like an exclusive club of people taking about Hive, photography and starting more and more to look like a cooking book. If you don't use any of these 3 tags, you are almost doomed. One thing which can help you is if you do translate your post into multiple languages, no idea why this is helps, but it does pull the attention of curators.
And yes, if you don't earn more than 1.27, just be assured that there are automated posts explaining the translation of a Spanish word in English, which would kill your motivation. But hey that is the route the community want to give a share of the reward pool to.
Feel free to interprete the stats how you want. And feel free to let me know what your opinion is.
Cheers,
Peter