How to launch a token on pump.fun: a step-by-step guide

pump.fun is the memecoin launchpad on Solana. You can launch a token there in a few minutes with nothing but a Solana wallet: the token trades on a bonding curve from its first second, and once enough people buy in, it graduates to a pool on PumpSwap, pump.fun's own exchange. There is no contract to write and no liquidity to add yourself.

That speed is also why most launches fail. This guide covers how pump.fun works, what it costs, the steps to launch, and what decides whether a token survives its first week.

How pump.fun works

• The bonding curve. A new coin does not start in a liquidity pool. It trades against a bonding curve that sets the price from the supply sold so far: every buy pushes the price up, every sell pushes it down.
• The quote asset. Most coins trade against SOL. With pump.fun's Custom Pairs, a coin can trade against USDC or a tokenized stock instead; then every buyer needs that asset, and the creator's fees are paid in it too.
• Graduation. When the curve fills (around 85 SOL for a SOL-quoted coin), the coin migrates to a PumpSwap pool quoted in the same asset. The migration is automatic and costs nothing, and from then on the coin trades on that pool.
• Mainnet only. There is no pump.fun on Solana's devnet. Every launch, buy, and sell spends real money.

What it costs

• Solana network fees on every transaction, which are small.
• Your dev buy, if you make one: an optional purchase of your own coin at launch.
• pump.fun's trading fees, paid by traders. Part of them goes to the creator: since September 2025, pump.fun tiers the creator's fee by market cap, from 0.95% of each trade for small coins down to 0.05% for coins above about $20 million.

How to launch a token on pump.fun, step by step

1. Decide what the token is for. A coin with a reason to exist, a product, a community, a joke with a following, outlives one launched only to be traded. How to launch a token covers that decision.
2. Get a Solana wallet and fund it. Phantom is the most common. You need SOL for network fees and for any dev buy, or the pair asset if you launch a Custom Pair coin.
3. Prepare the metadata. A name, a ticker, an image, a short description, and your links: X, Telegram, website. The image and the description are what buyers see first.
4. Decide on a dev buy. Buying some of your own coin at launch gives you an opening position, and it is public: buyers can see how much the creator holds.
5. Create the coin. Sign the transaction in your wallet. The coin gets its address, and its page on pump.fun goes live.
6. Share the address from one place. Post the contract address from your official accounts only. Launch hours bring copycat coins with the same name.
7. Run the community from the first minute. Answer questions, remove scam links, and post what you are building. Growing a token community covers the daily work.

Why most pump.fun tokens fail

Launching is easy, so almost everyone does it. On pump.fun, the weekly share of coins that graduate from the curve has stayed below 2 percent. The coins that make it usually have something behind them: a product, a real community, or a team that keeps showing up after launch day.

Nobody can promise a coin's price, and nobody should promise its buyers a return.

Launching on pump.fun with Modus

Modus launches on pump.fun from a chat, as part of the same project as the product the token belongs to.

1. Describe the coin in the chat. Modus can generate the image, and it uploads the image and metadata for you.
2. Read the recap. Name, ticker, description, links, the quote asset, and your dev buy, with the fees stated in plain words before you sign.
3. Sign in your wallet. Your Phantom wallet signs every transaction; Modus never holds your keys.
4. Follow it from the chat. A status card shows the market cap, whether the coin is still on the curve or has graduated, and its creator-fee split. You can buy and sell from the same chat, on the curve or on PumpSwap.

What Modus charges on pump.fun, stated before you sign:

• A share of the creator fees. At launch, Modus asks to write a creator-fee split into the coin: 80% to you, 20% to Modus. It is shown in the recap, and once pump.fun records it, nobody can change it.
• A 0.75% fee on trades made through Modus, taken in the same transaction and shown on the wallet card.

If you only want a memecoin and nothing else, launching on pump.fun's own site keeps all of the creator fees. Modus vs pump.fun compares the two honestly.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need to know how to code?

No. pump.fun creates the token from a form, and Modus from a chat. There is no contract to write.

Can I test a launch first?

Not on pump.fun: it runs on mainnet only. If you want a rehearsal, a classic SPL token can be launched on devnet first; Modus supports that path too.

When does a pump.fun coin graduate?

When its bonding curve fills: around 85 SOL for a SOL-quoted coin. The liquidity then moves to a PumpSwap pool automatically.

Will my coin make money?

Nobody can promise that. Creator fees depend on how much people trade your coin, and most coins never leave the curve.