Solana has been surging again lately, rising 38% this week alone to pass $200 for the first time since 2021—and it has skyrocketed from the sub-$10 mark it hit in late 2022. And if you’re looking to fill your wallet with even more Solana, then why not earn more by playing games?

Numerous play-to-earn games are based on Solana, and either reward players with SOL itself or another token within the Solana ecosystem, which can be swapped for SOL at an exchange. In some of the examples below, you’ll need to purchase an NFT to enable in-game earnings—but it might be worth it if you’re planning to play a bunch.

Here are six notable play-to-earn games that you can play today to earn tokens and stack SOL—with one more game launching soon that you should keep tabs on. Stay tuned as we plan to expand this list with newer titles over time.

Ev.io

What would have made the classic Quake III Arena even better? Earning cash while fragging foes, probably. Well, that’s basically what Ev.io serves up. This web-based game takes the old-school arena first-person shooter (FPS) format and adds the ability to earn cryptocurrency while you play, which only amplifies the sense of frenzied competition.

Ev.io is totally free to play, although you’ll need to buy an NFT if you want to earn the in-game “e” currency that can be cashed out for SOL. Luckily, we’ve put together a guide on how to get started with earning in the game. Also, Ev.io has given out the Solana meme token BONK, as well, so there’s been plenty of earning potential.

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Frenetic Shooter 'Ev.io' Lets You Earn Solana While Fragging Enemies

Ev.io is a free-to-play, web-based shooter that recalls first-person shooter pioneers like Quake and Unreal Tournament—but this one lets users earn cryptocurrency for playing, too. Set in a futuristic world, your character is equipped with a gun of your choice and a melee weapon. You have the option of fighting enemies in a free-for-all deathmatch or battling it out in teams, plus you can dip into a sniper shotgun mode or a survival mode akin to the popular Call of Duty “Zombies” experience. In...

Stepn

Move to earn—simple enough, right? Stepn took the idea of activity tracking apps and ran with it (pun intended), pairing crypto rewards as a way to motivate players to get out there and log their jogs and jaunts. While the Stepn hype has fallen sharply from the early 2022 peak, you can still earn the GST reward tokens on Solana by playing.

You’ll need to buy NFT sneakers in the game to get started, however, but putting a little skin in the game might motivate you to up your exercise routine and ultimately rack up more SOL.

What Is Stepn? The ‘Move-to-Earn’ NFT App That Pays You Crypto to Exercise

On February 19, 2023, the lifestyle app Stepn airdropped its rarest NFT sneaker yet, the Genesis Sneaker. Stepn is the evolution of two concepts that have been gaining traction for several years now: the augmented reality (AR) game and play-to-earn gaming.  AR games typically feature a virtual world overlaid onto the real one. The concept properly took off in 2015 with Pokemon Go, which scattered virtual Pokemon across a real life map of the world and let users track and collect them via GPS.  S...

Aurory

You’ll typically need to own NFTs to earn Solana-based AURY tokens in Aurory, a Pokémon-inspired role-playing game that runs across Solana and Ethereum scaling network Arbitrum. As a blog post explains, Aurory players earn in-game (off-chain) sub-tokens by battling their Nefties NFT creatures, which are then automatically converted to AURY tokens and awarded to players.

More recently, Aurory has advertised AURY rewards for winning matches in the Blitz player-vs-player (PVP) mode. And NFT owners can also stake their assets to earn AURY rewards, as well. There are multiple ways to earn in one of Solana’s most prominent games.

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You Can Now Earn Crypto by Playing Solana Game 'Aurory' on Epic Games Store

Aurory, a Solana role-playing and monster-battling game, has launched its Seekers of Tokane experience to the public on the Epic Games Store after previously restricting access to NFT holders and access code recipients. Seekers of Tokane serves up a chunk of the overall Aurory experience, letting players battle with Pokémon-esque creatures (called Nefties) and explore a lush fantasy land. It plays like a “roguelike” game, in which players must grab loot and attempt to exit with their winnings—be...

In February, Aurory launched limited-time public access to its Seekers of Tokane game experience via the Epic Games Store, timed with the launch of a special "Dracurve's Awakening" in-game event. For the event, Aurory served up $50,000 worth of AURY rewards—including $35,000 for NFT owners, and $15,000 for other players. The promotion ended on February 26, but we wouldn't be surprised to see more on this front ahead.

MixMob

"Race-to-earn" game MixMob mashes up racing games and card-based strategy into a unique concoction—and it's one that serves up token rewards to players. You can earn SUD tokens for playing, plus there are opportunities to wager tokens on other players' matches.

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Solana's 'MixMob' Game Sets MXM Token Launch, First Airdrop Details

Solana gaming platform MixMob will launch its MXM token this week, and we have first details for how the airdrop will work—and how many tokens will be provided to early supporters. MixMob will launch the MXM token this Thursday, February 1, and the team says that the token will be listed on Bybit and “other leading” crypto exchanges. MXM is the governance token for MixMob, and it will also be airdropped to early users. According to a MixMob representative, the project will give out 63 million MX...

On February 1, MixMob launched an airdrop for its MXM governance token to reward NFT owners, as well as players of the game's incentivized beta. Token rewards look to be a key part of the overall MXM experience, so there's compelling reason to get involved ahead of potential future drops.

Star Atlas: SAGE Labs

While developer ATMTA gradually builds out its epic vision for the full-fledged version of sci-fi simulation Star Atlas, it launched an on-chain Solana web game called SAGE Labs that lets early players plug into the same kind of open economy with a simpler interface.

And there are sizable rewards to be claimed. Late last year, Star Atlas served up Golden Ticket tokens to players, which could be entered in drawings to win crypto tokens and NFT in-game items collectively valued at a total of $1.35 million. You’ll need some SOL or ATLAS in your Solana wallet to play since everything is handled on-chain, but the potential rewards are substantial.

Bitcoin Is Booming—You Can Earn More by Playing These Free Games

Bitcoin has been on a hot streak since Donald Trump's election win last month, boosting its all-time high price mark by $30,000 during the span and finally smashing through the $100,000 milestone last week. If you’re keen on stacking satoshis however you can, then here’s one way that won’t cost you anything but time: You can earn Bitcoin by playing a bunch of free games. Decrypt’s GG has been covering the rising trend of free-to-play mobile games and apps that offer up small bounties of Bitcoin...

DeFi Land

Many early crypto games were derided as being DeFi apps dressed up as games, but DeFi Land embraces that vibe wholeheartedly, pairing a farming simulation experience with play-to-earn rewards—plus the ability to transact crypto tokens via DeFi protocols.

You’ll need specific NFTs to unlock the play-to-earn version of the fishing, shooting, and harvest mini-games, as well as pet NFTs to earn tokens for taking care of animals. DeFi Land serves up Solana-based GOLDY tokens for those NFT owners when they play, letting you earn back some of your investment.

On top of that, DeFi Land also lets players engage with DeFi protocols that could earn you yield for staking tokens, but be careful—it might look like a game, but you’re playing with real tokens.

Nyan Heroes

And here's one you can put on your radar. Nyan Heroes, an Overwatch-like hero shooter launching on Solana, is set to debut its early access playtest via the Epic Games Store from March 26 to April 9. And in advance of the launch, Nyan Heroes has already debuted its play-to-airdrop campaign, which will reward players for completing quests around the game—and then for playing, too.

In the airdrop campaign, users can earn MEOW points for completing quests, and then those points will eventually translate into NYAN tokens on Solana once the token is generated. There's no exact timeline for that, but the game looks super fun and we've seen other gaming airdrop campaigns reward players handsomely in recent months. It's worth a look!

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Solana Shooter 'Nyan Heroes' Nearing Early Access With Airdrop Rewards

Singapore-based game studio 9 Lives Interactive announced Thursday that it has secured $3 million in funding to support the global launch of Nyan Heroes, a "hero shooter" game with assets minted on the Solana blockchain. And players will have a chance to test it out very soon. The investment round was led by Mechanism Capital, with participation from Sfermion, Momentum 6, 3Commas Capital, Devmons GG, Kosmos Ventures, and CSP DAO. 9 Lives Interactive previously raised $7.5 million in 2022. Nyan H...

Editor's note: This story was originally posted on November 28, 2023 and last updated with new information on March 18, 2024.