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Study finds 85% of concentrated liquidity on DEXs sits idle

Dune estimates providers give up roughly $150M a year in fees, and about 29.5% of capital is fully out of the active price range.

Reported · Written up by our desk · Market Structure

Onchain research by Dune, commissioned by 1inch, found that an average of 85% of concentrated-liquidity capital on decentralized exchanges sat underutilized during the first half of 2026. The study estimates that 29.5% of that capital was fully outside the active price range, equaling about $542M idle in a typical week across the pools analyzed.

The research also calculates a fees opportunity cost for liquidity left out of range. Dune estimates out-of-range liquidity providers forgo on the order of $150M per year in fees, based on the idle total value locked multiplied by an assumed roughly 35% fee APR that in-range capital earned over the same period.

Dune said it rebuilt positions for about the 200 most active pools on Uniswap v3, PancakeSwap v3, Aerodrome Slipstream, and Uniswap v4 using deposit and withdrawal history. It used 26 weekly snapshots across seven chains, covering about $1.84B in average TVL, and found that most idle capital sits in individual wallets while automated managers and bots are more likely to keep positions in range.

The study attributed idleness mainly to asset pair volatility and price movement rather than the venue itself. It also noted that around a third of the idle capital had gone untouched for more than 90 days, with the heaviest idle observed on Uniswap, including that even stablecoin pairs ran around 30% out of range.

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