DeFi Explained: Top Protocols, TVL, and How It Really Works in 2025
When you hear DeFi, short for decentralized finance, it means financial services built on blockchains without banks or middlemen. Also known as open finance, it lets you lend, borrow, trade, and earn interest using crypto—no approval, no paperwork, no gatekeepers. This isn’t theory anymore. In 2025, over $120 billion is locked in DeFi protocols, and millions use them daily to earn more than their bank accounts ever could.
But DeFi isn’t one thing. It’s made up of tools like Total Value Locked (TVL), a metric that measures how much money users have deposited into DeFi apps to earn rewards or enable lending, and protocols like Aave, a lending platform where you can deposit crypto and earn interest, or borrow against it without selling, and Uniswap, a decentralized exchange that lets you swap tokens directly from your wallet using smart contracts. These aren’t just apps—they’re financial infrastructure. TVL tells you how much trust people have placed in them, but it doesn’t tell you if they’re safe or sustainable. Many high-TV L projects collapse when rewards dry up. Real DeFi success comes from utility, not hype.
DeFi doesn’t work in a vacuum. It depends on Ethereum’s Layer 2 networks like zkSync and Starknet to keep fees low, and on users who understand how interest rate models shift with demand. If too many people borrow from Aave, rates spike. If no one trades on Uniswap, liquidity vanishes. That’s why the best DeFi users don’t chase the highest APY—they watch usage patterns, check audits, and avoid tokens with no real purpose. You’ll find posts here that break down exactly how TVL is calculated, why Lido leads in staking, and why some DeFi apps look great on paper but are dead in practice.
Some of the posts here expose scams disguised as DeFi opportunities—tokens with no code, exchanges that vanish overnight, airdrops that vanish after claiming. Others show you how real users earn passive income through lending, liquidity mining, and yield aggregation. You’ll learn why a $10 million TVL on a new protocol can be riskier than a $5 billion one, and why Uniswap’s simple design still outperforms flashy competitors. There’s no magic here. Just math, incentives, and people who know how to read the data.
What you’ll find below isn’t a list of the next moonshot. It’s a collection of real, grounded insights—what works, what doesn’t, and why. Whether you’re trying to earn interest on your ETH, avoid a rug pull, or just understand why your favorite DeFi app suddenly stopped paying out, the answers are here. No fluff. No promises. Just what’s actually happening in DeFi today.
Future of Wrapped Asset Standards in Blockchain Interoperability
Wrapped assets like WBTC enabled Bitcoin to enter DeFi, but centralized custody and fragmentation make them a temporary fix. Native cross-chain tech is rising - and wrapped tokens may soon become obsolete.
- November 4 2025
- Terri DeLange
- 20 Comments