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Jupiter Perps is the better pick in 2026 for nearly every trader: it has the deepest pool on Solana, a clean record and far more liquidity. Drift, now relaunched as Velocity after a roughly $285 million exploit on April 1, 2026, has lower costs for limit-order traders and gentler partial liquidations, but almost no volume. Jupiter Perps scores 7.9/10 and Velocity 5.3/10 in our method.
Risk notice: Crypto trading is high risk and leverage can liquidate your whole position in minutes. Perps DEXs and wallet connections use hot wallets. This page is not financial advice; only trade what you can afford to lose.
Facts on this page were checked October 23, 2026, from Jupiter's and Velocity's own docs and the sources linked below. This is a research-based comparison built from published docs, not a hands-on trial.
Quick verdict
- Pick Jupiter Perps for simple SOL, ETH or BTC leverage against a $731M pool at oracle prices, plus new Beta markets for HYPE, ZEC and stock perps. Visit Jupiter Perps
- Pick Velocity (Drift) only if you are a former Drift user who wants to stay with the platform, or you place limit orders and value the maker rebate and partial liquidations, at small size.
Side by side
| Jupiter Perps | Velocity (ex-Drift) | |
|---|---|---|
| Our score | 7.9/10 | 5.3/10 |
| Model | JLP pool at oracle prices | JIT auctions, keeper order book, vAMM backstop |
| Max leverage | 250x (SOL, ETH, wBTC); 20x Beta | 20x (BTC, ETH, SOL); 10x HYPE, ZEC |
| Markets | 3 main + 6 Beta | 5 |
| Taker fee | 0.06% open and close + price impact | 0.06% (to 0.02% by volume) |
| Maker fee | Not applicable on main markets; 0.005% Beta | 0.0025% rebate |
| Holding cost | Hourly borrow fee | Funding rate |
| Collateral | Longs in the asset, shorts in USDC | USDT; SOL and others at lower weights (cross-margin) |
| Liquidation | All remaining collateral taken | Partial, to a 2% buffer |
| TVL | $731.04M | Not shown on DefiLlama |
| 30-day volume | $4.63B | $2.21M |
| Security record | No perps exploit found | About $285M drained April 1, 2026 |
Sources: Jupiter docs, fees and liquidation; Velocity fees, liquidations and markets; usage from DefiLlama for Jupiter Perps and Velocity. Velocity's liquidity model is from an independent review.
What happened to Drift
Drift was drained on April 1, 2026 after an attacker used pre-signed durable-nonce transactions to take over its 2-of-5 admin multisig, which had a zero timelock, then whitelisted a fake token as collateral and withdrew real assets (Chainalysis). Drift said Mandiant attributed the attack to North Korean group UNC6862 (Drift).
Tether and partners proposed up to $147.5 million in support, and the exchange switched its settlement asset from USDC to USDT (CoinDesk). It restarted as Velocity at the end of September after OtterSec and Asymmetric Research audits (ChainCatcher). Victims hold DFX recovery tokens, and an October report said the recovery pool covered about 1% of claims (KuCoin News).
Jupiter said its JLP pool stayed fully backed and that it was not involved in Drift markets (Phemex News).
Fees
On a market order, both charge 0.06% at the base tier. The differences (our arithmetic, $10,000 position):
- Round trip: $12 on either. Jupiter can add a price-impact fee on large orders; Velocity's taker rate drops to 0.05% above $5M of monthly volume.
- Holding cost: Jupiter charges an hourly borrow fee. Its docs' illustrative 0.0016% an hour works out to about $3.84 a day on $10,000. Velocity uses funding, which can be paid or received depending on the side and market.
- Limit orders: Velocity pays makers a 0.0025% rebate. Jupiter's main markets have no maker side at all; only its Beta order-book markets do, at 0.005%.
For a cheaper order book with real liquidity, Pacifica (0.040% taker) and Phoenix (0.035%) undercut both; see best Solana perps DEX.
Leverage and liquidation
This is where the two differ most.
Jupiter allows 250x on SOL, ETH and wBTC, and its maintenance margin is set from a 500x protocol limit. A fresh 250x position sits roughly 0.2% from liquidation before the close fee (our arithmetic). When it hits, all remaining collateral is taken: Jupiter's own example returns $0.
Velocity caps leverage at 20x and liquidates partially. Its docs walk through a 10x SOL long that is liquidated after a 7.22% drop: open orders are cancelled, 57% of the position is closed, and the account keeps the rest of its position and about $1,983 of collateral.
So Velocity's rules are kinder once you are underwater, and Jupiter's maximum leverage is far riskier. Either way, a stop-loss placed well before your liquidation price matters more than which venue you pick. During spikes, orders and stops can land late; see Solana priority fees and slippage and Solana MEV protection explained.
Safety and trust
Jupiter: largest pool on Solana, three oracle sources (Chaos Labs Edge primary, Chainlink and Pyth as fallback), fully published fee and liquidation formulas, and no exploit of the perps program that we found. Main risks are oracle failure and your own leverage.
Velocity: a post-fork OtterSec audit with 41 High findings, all fixed per its audits page, and a tiered key system where routine changes are timelocked. But its admin-keys page says root "cold" changes, such as replacing a market's oracle, are not timelocked, and it doesn't publish key custody. That's the same category of control the attacker abused in April.
Liquidity
Velocity's $95,213 of open interest and $2.21M of 30-day volume on DefiLlama compare with Jupiter's $47.42M and $4.63B. Thin liquidity means wider spreads, less reliable fills and messier liquidations in a fast market. Jupiter's pool model avoids order-book depth problems altogether up to its price-impact thresholds.
Other options
If you want perps alongside memecoin trading, Axiom has a Perpetuals tab that trades on Hyperliquid at up to 50x (DefiLlama), not on Solana. For spot apps, see best Solana trading app. Perps profits and losses are taxable in most countries; see Solana memecoin taxes.
Bottom line
Choose Jupiter Perps unless you have a specific reason to back Drift's recovery. Velocity's docs and liquidation rules are good, but a fresh deployment with five markets and $2 million of monthly volume can't match Jupiter's depth or record yet. Visit Velocity