[the docs]
How Waves works
You launch a token on Solana. Its liquidity locks when the curve graduates, and from that moment the creator fees it earns are never paid out to a wallet. They run one engine you picked at launch, over and over, on a fixed rhythm.
Overview
Most memecoins die the same way. The chart fills up, the creator collects fees into a personal wallet, and the pool stays exactly as thin as it was on day one. Waves removes that step. The fees a token earns are pointed at the token itself before anyone can trade it.
What that buys you:
- A reason to hold. Every trade does something visible for holders, not for one wallet.
- A rule nobody can bend. The engine is chosen once, at creation, and there is no switch to change it later.
- A public record. Every cycle is an ordinary transaction, linked from the token page.
Waves is a launchpad, not a fund. It never takes custody of your tokens and it never asks you to deposit anything to "activate" a launch.
How a launch works
A launch has four stages, and they always run in the same order.
The important part is stage one. The token's engine is written down at creation, and the fee recipient is set to that engine's vault before trading is possible. There is no window in which fees land somewhere else.
Creating a token
Creating is free apart from the network fee. You will need a Solana wallet, a little SOL for that fee, and three decisions.
- Identity. Name, ticker and image. These are written into the token and cannot be edited afterwards, so check the spelling.
- Engine. One of the four below. This is the decision that matters, and it is permanent.
- Optional first buy. If you want a position, buy it like anyone else, in the open. We do not reserve a team allocation for you.
After you confirm, the token exists, its vault exists, and the vault is already the fee recipient. Nothing else is required from you. You never have to come back and "turn it on".
The four engines
One engine per token. Each runs the same four steps; only the last two differ. In every case the vault collects the fees, keeps a small amount of SOL back for the network fee of the next cycle, and spends the rest.
Deepen the pool
The fees go back into the locked liquidity. The market gets deeper every cycle, which means the same buy or sell moves the price less than it did yesterday, and none of that liquidity can be pulled back out.
Pick it if you want the chart to get harder to push around over time, and you care more about a market that survives than about a fast headline.
Buyback and burn
The fees buy the token on its own market and send what they bought to a burn address. Circulating supply only moves one way, and the buy itself lands in the market like any other buy.
Pick it if you want the most visible engine. Every cycle is a buy on the chart and a burn anyone can verify.
Staking rewards
Holders who stake share the fees in SOL, in proportion to how much of the staked supply they hold. Nothing new is minted for this: the rewards are the fees the token actually earned.
Pick it if you want to reward the people who commit rather than everyone who passes through.
Holder rewards
Every holder earns, weighted by balance, with nothing to stake and nothing to lock. Holding is the whole condition.
Pick it if you want the simplest story a new buyer can understand in one sentence.
Choosing one
| Engine | Who it pays | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Deepen the pool | The market itself | Long-term depth and calmer charts |
| Buyback and burn | Everyone, through supply | The loudest, most visible loop |
| Staking rewards | Stakers, in SOL | Rewarding commitment |
| Holder rewards | All holders, in SOL | The simplest pitch |
There is no wrong answer, but there is a permanent one. Decide before you create, because afterwards the only way to change engines is to launch a different token.
The cycle
An engine does not run continuously. It runs in cycles, and a cycle is one ordinary transaction that anyone can send.
- Every five minutes is the rhythm we aim for once a token is live.
- Anyone can start one and earns a small bounty for paying the network fee, so the engine does not depend on us being awake.
- Our bot is a backup. It fires only when nobody else has for a while.
- Nothing is lost if a cycle fails. The fees stay in the vault and the next cycle picks them up.
- A quiet token still works. If there were no trades, there are no fees, and the cycle simply does nothing.
Why a bounty instead of a schedule
A schedule needs a server, and a server needs a key and an owner. A bounty needs neither: anyone with a wallet can run the cycle and get paid for it. That is what keeps the engine alive if we disappear.
Staking in detail
Staking means moving your tokens into the vault that belongs to that token. The vault records the balance and credits SOL against it on every cycle.
- There is no lock-up. Unstaking returns the same amount of tokens you put in.
- Only the wallet that staked can unstake it.
- Rewards already credited stay claimable even after you unstake.
- Your share is your staked balance against everyone else's, measured when the cycle runs. Staking right after a cycle means you are in for the next one.
- Rewards depend entirely on trading volume. A quiet token pays little, and a quiet week pays nothing.
Fees
Every trade on a token launched here pays a fee. It splits three ways, and only one of those parts is yours to point.
| Part | Goes to | Who controls it |
|---|---|---|
| Platform share | The launch platform the token trades on | Fixed by that platform, not by us |
| Creator share | The token's own engine | Set at creation, then nobody |
| Cycle bounty | Whoever runs the cycle | A small, fixed slice of each cycle |
The exact percentages are published here before the first launch, and they will be the same for every token, including ours. What is already fixed is the shape: the creator share never lands in a personal wallet, and we do not take a cut of it.
The token page
Every token gets a page that is built from chain data, not from our database. You should be able to check everything we claim without trusting us.
- The engine it was launched with, and the vault that receives its fees.
- The cycle log: when each cycle ran, what came in, what it did, and a link to the transaction.
- Totals: fees collected, tokens burned, SOL paid out, liquidity added.
- For staking tokens: your staked balance and what you can claim.
After launch
| What | Who can change it |
|---|---|
| The engine | Nobody. It is set when the token is created. |
| The liquidity | Nobody. It locks when the curve graduates. |
| Where fees go | Nobody. The vault is the fee recipient from the first trade. |
| Name, ticker, image | Nobody. They are written into the token. |
| Your own stake | You, at any time, from the token page. |
| Who runs a cycle | Anyone, whenever they want. |
Safety and limits
We would rather be boring about this than sell you something we cannot back.
- No audit at the start. The contracts will be new. We will begin with low limits and say so plainly on this page.
- Price guard on every buy. A buyback or a pairing buy refuses to execute if the price moved further than the guard allows.
- No custody. Waves never holds your tokens. Staking moves them into the token's own vault, and only your wallet can take them out.
- No admin switch. There is no function that lets us redirect fees, pause your token or change your engine.
- Bounties are capped so that running cycles is worth doing but never worth spamming.
What can go wrong
- Rewards come from trading fees, so they rise and fall with volume and can be zero.
- A buyback moves the price while it runs. The guard limits how far, it does not remove the effect.
- Deepening the pool does not stop the price from falling. It only makes each trade move it less.
- New contracts can have bugs. Low limits reduce what a bug can cost, they do not make it impossible.
- A memecoin can lose its value entirely. Use only what you can afford to lose.
The $WAVE token
$WAVE is the token of the launchpad itself. It launches the same way as everything else here: on the open market, with its liquidity locked when the curve graduates, and with its own engine running its fees.
- No presale, no private round, no team allocation set aside.
- The contract address is published on the front page the moment it exists, and nowhere else first.
- Its engine and its fee split are announced here before launch.
If you see a $WAVE contract anywhere that is not on our front page, it is not ours.
FAQ
Do I need to keep the site open for my engine to run?
No. Cycles are transactions on Solana. Anyone can send one, and our backup bot sends one when nobody else has.
Can I change my engine later?
No. That is the point of it. If you want a different engine, launch a different token.
Can Waves take my fees?
No. The vault is the fee recipient and it can only do the one job it was created with. We do not have a key that changes that.
What do I earn as the creator?
From the engine, nothing. You earn the way everyone else does, by holding the token you launched. A token whose creator is not extracting fees is an easier token to sell to buyers.
What happens if my token never graduates?
Then it trades on the curve and there is no locked market yet. Fees accumulate, and the engine starts working on them once the market exists.
Is staking safe?
Your tokens sit in the token's vault and only your wallet can withdraw them. The risk is the contract itself, which is why limits start low and we tell you when there is no audit.
How much is the cycle bounty?
A small, fixed slice of what the cycle collects, published before launch. It exists to pay the network fee of whoever runs it.
Which platform do the tokens launch on?
Solana. The exact launch venue is announced before the first launch, together with the fee split.
Can I run a cycle myself?
Yes, that is by design. Once the engines are live, the token page has a button for it and the transaction is an ordinary one.
Is any of this live right now?
The site and the token come first. The engines are being built, and this page will mark each one live on the day its contract is deployed.
Glossary
- Bonding curve
- The mechanism a new token trades against before it has a normal market. The price rises as people buy and falls as they sell.
- Graduation
- The moment the curve fills and a normal market opens, with the liquidity locked.
- Locked liquidity
- Liquidity that cannot be withdrawn by anyone, including the creator and us.
- Creator share
- The part of each trading fee that would normally go to whoever launched the token. Here it goes to the token's engine.
- Engine
- The single job a token's fees do: deepen, burn, pay stakers or pay holders.
- Vault
- The contract that receives a token's fees and runs its engine. It has no owner and no other abilities.
- Cycle
- One run of the engine: collect, claim, convert, pay.
- Bounty
- The small reward paid to whoever sends the cycle transaction.
- Price guard
- A limit on how far the price may move during a buy, so a cycle cannot be sandwiched for much.
- Burn address
- An address nobody holds the keys to. Tokens sent there are out of circulation forever.