The Cardano blockchain has experienced an explosion in on-chain activity and now trails only Bitcoin in current 24-hour transaction volume, surpassing Ethereum in the process, according to Messari.

Cardano 

ADA

$0.321

 currently has $17.04 billion in 24-hour transaction volume, according to data from on-chain analytics firm Messari. With Bitcoin 

BTC

$18,157

 at $18.85 billion and Ether 

ETH

$1,399

 at $5.25 billion, according to Messari. Cardano is in second place in that category and is closing in on the top position for this metric.

Overall, this month has seen tremendous activity on Cardano. On Feb. 14, 24-hour transaction volume topped $35 billion and on Saturday, it reached $31 billion. However, it is still far from the $138-billion all-time high in the volume set on Sept. 3 last year.

ADA daily transaction volume from Jan. 24 to Feb. 22. Source: Messari

Transaction volume on Cardano has spiked in recent weeks in large part due to the launch of the SundaeSwap decentralized exchange. The hype around this launch caused days of congestion on the blockchain from the huge influx of transactions. 

Regardless of the SundaeSwap effect on the network, the total number of transactions on Cardano has increased 480% from 5.5 million on March 30, 2021, to nearly 32 million on Feb. 20, 2022, according to Google’s Cardano Blockchain Insights.

Conditions were ripe for Cardano’s move up the ranks as both Bitcoin and Ethereum have seen declining network activity lately. Bitcoin’s 24-hour volume is down 84% from its three-month peak of $116 billion on Nov. 25. Ethereum’s volume has been declining since Dec. 4 when volume reached a three-month peak of $21.29 billion. It was down 82% to a three-month low of $3.99 billion on Saturday.

ETH daily transaction volume from Nov. 25 to Feb. 22. Source: Messari

Despite trailing in transaction volumes, Messari shows Ethereum still dominates Cardano in several other key network usage metrics. Ethereum boasts 76 million addresses to Cardano’s 3.4 million addresses for example.

Related: Blockchain-based internet company 3air abandons Cardano for SKALE network

Cardano was listed by Morgan Stanley’s wealth management global investment office as one of the four “Ethereum killer” blockchains that could usurp smart contract superiority from Ethereum due to its lower costs and faster speeds. The others in the report included Solana, Polkadot and Tezos.

The positive on-chain metrics have not helped ADA prices, which have slumped 13% over the past 24 hours, according to CoinGecko. ADA is currently trading at $0.833, down 73% from its $3.09 all-time high on Sept. 2, 2021.