if you want to go gem hunting in the ethereum universe then base is the place to be it’s got more developers funding and projects than you can shake a stick at and you know what that means what does it mean what does it mean yep opportunity is everywhere now in order to try and find that next 100x you need to know all about the chain and how it works and today we’re going to show you all that and more my name is Guy stay tuned for the good stuff so in this guide you’ll learn everything you need to know to navigate bass like a pro and seize all those opportunities but before we begin what exactly is bass what makes it special and why should we care well for those unfamiliar bass was built by top crypto exchange coinbase and is ethereum’s top layer to by what measure I hear you ask well lots of them actually let’s start with tvl or total value locked this refers to the sum value in Us doll of all the crypto locked in protocols on a particular chain now the last time we looked at Bass was not long after the chain went live in 2023 back then bass’s tvl was about 10 times smaller than that of optimism on Whose technology Bas is uh based today however the tables have turned B’s tvl is about five times greater than optimism putting it in the top spot above arbitrum and the rest of the gang in fact ever since B Bas went live its slice of the total tvl on ethereum’s layer 2s hasn’t stopped growing Bas tvl tripled in 2024 and if it continues at this rate it looks like it’s got the layer 2 Wars all wrapped up we should note though that tvl is not a perfect proxy for popularity because individual whales can contribute more tvl than thousands of us regular folk still it helps to know where the money is especially if you’re trying to make some not Financial advant on that note another important metric is the number of crypto wallets that interact with the chain in a certain period of time so monthly active addresses for example now for various reasons there are many more wallet addresses than there are human users on any given blockchain as such this metric is also an imperfect proxy for popularity nonetheless Bas has far more monthly active addresses than any other layer to and this is a pretty good indicator that Bas is where the party ad at the time of making this video there were more than 1.5 million monthly active addresses on bass almost six times as many as its nearest competitor arbitrum and if you need any more confirmation that bass is the place to be just look at the volume this metric shows the sum trading volume on every decentralized exchange on a blockchain over 24 hours so for example here we have optimism and arbitrum with $130 million and $877 million respectively base meanwhile has more than $2 billion in 24-hour volume more than double optimism and arbitrum combined so already we can see liquidity users and onchain activity are forming a critical mass Bas has broken away from the layer 2 pack and its lead is convincing enough to become self-perpetuating in North America base now has more active developers than any other blockchain apart from the ethereum main net and salana yes just let that sink in Bas is not just beating other layer twos it’s leapfrogged all but two layer one blockchains in this regard one of them being ethereum itself having more developers is a very good sign that suggests we can look forward to more cool stuff happening on bass in the future all right so now that we’ve picked a winning chain it’s time to learn how to use it the first thing you’ll need is a crypto wallet compatible with BAS now there are many good options nowadays but today we’re going to stick with two Classics metamask and coinbase wallet both are very good wallets but the experience of using Bas is rather different on each coinbase wallet has the advantage of built-in support for Bas which makes using the chain very convenient especially if you’re a beginner in our previous guide to Bas from 2023 we pointed out that coinbase wallet might be less widely supported than metamask making it less convenient or even impossible to connect your wallet to to certain web 3 applications it’s likely still the case that metamask is more widely supported because it is the go-to wallet for the ethereum ecosystem however you shouldn’t have a problem connecting your coinbase wallet to web3 Applications nowadays because it’s supported by wallet connect a protocol commonly used by web3 applications to enable compatibility with even quite obscure wallets needless to say coinbase wallet is anything but obscure still if you do find yourself trying to connect to some half-baked dap that neither supports coinbase wallet nor uses wallet connect then you can always fall back on metamask now let’s take a look at how to set up on base with each of these wallets we’ll leave all of the links you’ll need in the description under this video by the way and that includes a link to our step-by-step guide to setting up metamask so if you don’t already have a metamask wallet you may want to start there if you do already have metamask then the next step is to add the base Network to do this open the extension and click on the network select drop-down menu in the top left scroll down past arbitrum and Avalanche C chain and you’ll see the Base main net hit add Network and then approve and voila your in and your metamask wallet is connected to base okay next let’s check out how to set up a coinbase smart wallet to get started head to the coinbase wallet website and smash the big blue download button on the homepage you’ll see options for downloading to iOS and andro Android devices getting set up on the web and Via browser extension we’re on a desktop so we’ll go for the web route click through and you’ll be sent straight to the coinbase wallet web app here click on the create a wallet button in the top right you’ll then be shown a QR code and asked if you want to set a pass key for your wallet this makes setting up a new wallet very convenient because you only need to use a mobile device to scan the QR code on screen alternatively you can set up a pass key via USB or via your browser profile we’ll go ahead and scan the QR using an iPhone choose save Pass key on your mobile devic’s camera app and follow the instructions on screen in our case this means logging in Via face ID and boom you just finished setting up your new coinbase smart wallet on the bass network yes it really is that easy now if you’ve ever set up a crypto wallet before you may be wondering at this stage how you manage to make a wallet without even seeing a private seed phrase well this is thanks to a little something called account abstraction which allows you to recover your wallet via Pass Key now you may want to add an extra layer of security by setting up a recovery key in case you lose access to your pass key however this entails making a transaction on the base blockchain and for that you will be charged a small gas fee of a few cents wallet connected to the Bas Network you’ll need to fund it with some eth in order to pay those gas fees it is possible to buy crypto directly from within your wallet but we don’t recommend this because it’s typically one of the most expensive ways of buying crypto instead you can either Bridge eth from another evm blockchain to base or you can take a shortcut via a centralized exchange I’ll demonstrate both starting with bridging eth to the base chain if you head to bridge. b.org you’ll find coinbase linking to two third-party bridges that you can use to get your assets from other evm blockchains onto base previously there was an official base bridge but this has been deprecated apparently in the name of decentralization and censorship resistance if you think you would have preferred using an official Bridge well fear not because you didn’t miss out on much it was extremely slow and could take hours or even days for you to receive your eth at either end of it so now we have these two third party options instead coinbase clearly states that it is providing links to these bridges for your convenience but does not take any responsibility for their operation now this is a much needed disclaimer because bridges are notoriously vulnerable to exploits by hackers if coinbase is happy to post these bridges on the official Base website then they are probably fine to use however we have not audited their code nor used them before and as you can see coinbase provides no guarantee of their safety we’ll go ahead and use one of the bridges so you can see how it works so on bridge. b.org we’ll click on the bridge called super Bridge here you’ll need to connect another crypto wallet that contains some eth we’ll use metamask make sure you are connected to the network where your eth is by using the menu in the top right of the bridge window then enter the amount of eth that you would like to bridge to base and hit review note that you will be charged a gas fee on the corresponding Network for this transaction hit continue and then read through the terms these are important once a bridge transaction has been initiated it cannot be sped up or canceled and if you somehow Bridge assets to a wallet that doesn’t support base then they will be lost forever according to the terms this should take about 3 minutes okay let’s tick each box and then hit continue after we initiated the transaction took a little over 3 minutes for our eth to arrive on bass not too bad now the other way of getting your assets onto base may be cheaper and more convenient for you if you already have an account on one or more centralized exchanges you can use it to send eth to a base wallet address since there’s no blockchain bridging involved in this process you will pay a considerably smaller gas fee and the transaction may be faster every centralized exchange worth its salt will be able to send eth to base so you can use whichever one you prefer if you don’t yet have an account on a centralized exchange you should choose very carefully so why not start by watching our video on our top five centralized exchanges on the market today link to below okay once you’ve chosen an exchange you’ll need to make an account there if you need any help with this there are plenty of good tutorials online so we won’t go into all of that here today we’ll use one of our favorite exchanges buybit and if you do make an account on buybit you can grab up to $60,000 in deposit bonuses by signing up via the coin Bureau deals page which is also linked to down below now the good thing about this method is that you don’t necessarily need to buy more eth on the exchange if you have some eth lying around in a wallet and perhaps even on another Network you can simply send it to your centralized exchange wallet address from there you can send it to a base address this is quite a safe method of getting assets from one chain to another too because you’re doing away with the bridge risk and your assets will only be kept on an exchange momentarily while you’re transferring them okay we’ll go ahead and send some eth in our metamask wallet on the ethereum main net to an exchange and then back to metamask but on the base Network to do this log into your exchange account and head to your assets page depending on the exchange this may mean going to your funding account or spot account in by bit’s case it’s the funding account under assets here we’ll find eth and click deposit you’ll need to choose the network that you’re sending eth from in our case it’s the ethereum mainnet you’ll likely see some disclaimers here telling you to double check your network selection asset selection address input and so on these are all very important because one mistake could mean you’re sending your assets into a black hole never to be seen again okay we’ve read these through carefully so we’ll hit acknowledge to proceed now that we can see our eth deposit address all we need to do is copy it next open up metamask and make sure it is connected to the right Network click on send and then paste your exchange wallet address and enter the amount of eth you want to send click continue and then double check you haven’t made any mistakes if everything looks in order go ahead and hit confirm your eth will now be on its way to your exchange account this surprisingly took a little longer than it did to bridge from ethereum to base but we got there in the end now once the eth hits your exchange account it’s time to send it back to your wallet via base so open up metamask hit receive and then copy address note that your metamask wallet address is identical on ethereum base and other layer 2s next on your exch change account find withdraw paste in your metamask address and then select base mainnet from the drop-down menu below enter your desired amount of eth accounting for the network fee that will be deducted once everything looks good hit confirm byy bit then prompts us to double check one more time then submit and enter our withdrawal password and two Factor authentication code this may be a bit cumbersome but it’s a very good thing once the transaction has gone through you’ll find your eth has arrived back in your metamask but on base all right now you’re armed with a loaded wallet all that’s left to do is to go digging on chain for promising protocols and cryptos for a bird’s eye view of the top cryptos nfts and dexes on base there’s no better place than coin market cap or coin gecko where you can sort the rankings by volume market cap and so on as you may have noticed Bas is home to some of the key cryptos in the AI agent narrative that exploded in late 2024 time will tell if this will be the top narrative on base in 2025 it’s a very strong Contender but the market has a tendency to rotate in and out of narratives quite ruthlessly if you want to stay ahead of the curve on base checking the crypto’s ranked on coin gecko or coin market cap frequently is a must that way you’ll be able to spot when certain groups of cryptos start outperforming the rest of the market and crucially when the market loses interest in those cryptos too meanwhile another indispensable tool for onchain research is defi Lama if you enjoy crunching numbers to identify protocols with a token that may be undervalued or indeed protocols that have no token but may airdrop one in the future then defi Lama is your best friend because it collects a lot of data in one place it’s a good idea to try sorting the protocols listed here by different metrics just for example virtuals was at the very bottom of this list when we first open the page despite it being one of the hottest protocols on bass at the time of making this video at least but if we sort the list by fees then it jumps into the top 10 the more you know at the time of making this video there were 425 different base protocols listed on defi Lama so you won’t run out of things to research anytime soon you could spend all day pouring over documents evaluating tokenomics sniffing out potential airdrops and so on however one thing that you should be extremely cautious about is actually connecting your own wallet to any of these protocols con connecting your wallet means granting the protocol a certain degree of access and this is unfortunately something that is overlooked by far too many unsuspecting victims of malicious code right before they get their wallet drained dusted or otherwise infiltrated so if you do decide to connect your wallet make sure you read through exactly what permissions you’re granting the protocol when you do so it’s also best practice to disconnect your wallet and revoke those permissions whenever you are not using them protocol in question and if you want to try out some of the newer or more obscure protocols consider making a burner wallet just for this purpose if you only keep a small amount of crypto in the wallet for paying transaction fees then it’s not the end of the world if you do have the misfortune of connecting to some malicious protocol it might sound inconvenient to maintain another wallet just for this purpose but if anything ever happens to your main wallet well you’ll wish you’d done exactly that once you understand the risks of experimenting on chain you’ll be better equipped to do so safely however there is one more kind of risk we should address and that’s space itself when we made our first base guide back in 2023 it had just launched and was anything but battle tested well it’s safe to say that this has now changed base wouldn’t be the number one layer two if people didn’t feel safe putting their assets on it however one thing that hasn’t changed is centralization risk now coinbase says it is dedicated to C centralization but Bas still only has one sequencer node operated by coinbase this means that base has a single point of failure it should also mean that coinbase has the ability to censor transactions although they deny this now previously we were less concerned about coinbase’s commitment to decentralization and more concerned about the possibility that the US government might force it to exercise its control over Base by censoring transactions Banning people implementing kyc and so on but now that regime change has come to Washington this suddenly seems a much more remote possibility and in coinbase’s defense base is far from the only Layer Two to rely on a centralized sequencer it has also taken other steps in the direction of decentralization such as mothballing the official Bridge coinbase has also implemented fault proofs which allow anyone to Monitor and challenge invalid withdrawals without the need for a trusted third party thereby reducing Reliance on centralized intermediaries so we look forward to seeing how far Bas has decentralized the next time we update this guide for the time being the blockchain level risk is really no greater than on any other ethereum layer too so if you’re happy there you’ll be happy here as long as you are aware of and manage your risk on base you’re in an excellent position to start reaping its rewards too okay now let us know what you thought of this guide to base in the comments below and if you want to find out what the top mistakes crypto users make in a bull market are and how you can avoid them then this video here is a mustat please do like and subscribe if you enjoyed this video thank you for watching and I will see you again soon [Music]
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