Sui vs NEAR and Why Sui Locks 3.7 Times More TVL Per Dollar of Market Cap

Sui, the Move-based layer 1 locked $496.6 million of TVL against a $3.34 billion market cap at the Friday 18 September 2026 close. That's 14.9 cents of TVL per dollar of Sui market cap. NEAR locked $194.1 million against a $4.91 billion cap, which works out at 4.0 cents. On Sui vs NEAR the gap runs 3.77 times.

Run the same division on fully diluted value and Sui still wins, 6.1 cents to 4.0. Stablecoins parked on chain favour Sui $475.4 million to $80.7 million, and 30 days of chain gas to 18 September favour it $127,766 to $61,119. What NEAR owns is the tape. It closed 18 September at 3.759, up 19.33% on the session.

What Are Sui and NEAR?

Sui runs the Move language over an object model, so a simple transfer skips full consensus and settles through a lighter path. Its own documentation caps the token at 10,000,000,000 SUI and says plainly that the total supply is unavailable for transactions, because a multi-tiered vesting schedule releases it over years. Our explainer on the Sui layer 1 covers the object model and where validators fit into it.

NEAR shards its chain and settles across those shards, and it has spent 2026 rebuilding itself around AI agents and cross-chain intents. The supply side reads nothing like Sui's. CoinGecko put NEAR's circulating supply at 1,306,731,469 tokens against a total of 1,306,731,496 at 12:57 UTC on 19 September 2026, a gap of 27 tokens. Our NEAR Protocol explainer walks through sharding and what the token pays for.

Sui vs NEAR TVL Per Dollar of Market Cap

The Sui vs NEAR TVL comparison starts with one feed and one instant. DefiLlama stamps each chain row at 00:00 UTC, so the row dated 19 September 2026 carries the instant of the Friday 18 September close. Sui reads $496,596,072 there and NEAR reads $194,084,022. The raw Sui chain series is the file both figures come from, and the newest row keeps moving until the day rolls over, so it is a reading taken at that stamp and it will differ from the one you pull.

Both caps are rebuilt from supply and our own dated close, never from a cap field. Sui's 4,096,537,146.5 circulating tokens times the $0.8143 perpetual close give $3,335,810,198. NEAR's 1,306,677,500 tokens, read from the protocol's own mainnet node at 22:28 UTC on 18 September, times the $3.759 close give $4,911,800,722.

Divide TVL by cap and Sui holds $0.1489 of locked capital for every dollar of token value against NEAR's $0.0395. That's 3.77 times.

The decider survives a change of instant. Take the settled rows one day earlier and DefiLlama's 18 September stamp against the 17 September closes puts Sui at $0.1508 and NEAR at $0.0408, a ratio of 3.70. Round both readings down and 3.7 is the figure that holds either way.

The obvious objection is that Sui's cap flatters it, because 59.03% of the supply hasn't reached the market. Answer it on fully diluted value and Sui still wins. Ten billion SUI at the anchor close values the network at $8,143,000,000, which puts locked capital at $0.0610 per dollar, 1.54 times NEAR's $0.0395. NEAR has no dilution left to price, so its two figures are one number. Which layer 1 platforms survive is the question this ratio exists to answer, and capital parked per dollar of token is a cleaner proxy for it than a transaction count.

Does Sui TVL Hold Up in SUI Terms?

TVL in dollars reprices with the token, so a chain whose token doubles shows a bigger pile without a single new deposit. That trap is live on both names.

NEAR TVL rose 44.42% over the seven sessions into the anchor, from $134,391,035 to $194,084,022. NEAR itself rose 59.08% across the same seven. Measure the collateral in NEAR and it shrank 9.2%.

Sui ran the same way and a shorter distance. Sui TVL rose 8.39% over those seven sessions while SUI rose 12.36%, which leaves the pile 3.5% smaller in SUI.

Stretch to thirty sessions and the two names separate properly. NEAR TVL is up 94.04% against a token up 117.16%, so measured in NEAR the collateral fell 10.6%. Sui TVL is up 18.51% against a token up 15.36%, a 2.7% gain in SUI. Over a month Sui added real collateral and NEAR's pile grew because NEAR did.

Why Sui's Chain Fee Lead Shrinks When You Widen the Definition

Chain gas is the narrow reading. Across the 30 UTC days to 18 September 2026, DefiLlama's Chain-category row for Sui totals $127,766 against NEAR's $61,119, a 2.09x lead for Sui on the fees the validators themselves charge.

Widen it to every protocol the same feed tracks on each chain and the order flips. NEAR took $6,325,422 over those 30 days against Sui's $3,325,290. One application accounts for $5,865,608 of NEAR's total, the NEAR Intents bridge, which leaves everything else on the chain at $459,814.

So the fee comparison turns on which row you read, and both rows live in the same file. Sui's fee base spreads across lending and exchange protocols, with Cetus CLMM at $616,422 over the window and NAVI Lending at $489,912. That spread is the part of Sui's case that doesn't rest on one counterparty, and it is why this page names the population behind every fee number it prints.

What Does Sui's Token Unlock Overhang Cost?

The Sui token unlock schedule is what that capital lead costs. Sui has 5,903,462,854 tokens outside circulation, 59.03% of the ten billion cap, and its documentation describes the multi-tiered release that feeds them in. Every one of those tokens lands in a market that has to absorb it. How to trade a token unlock sets out what that supply does to price around the dates.

NEAR carries no cliff at all, and that's the loser's best card.

The protocol mints, though, and it never stops. NEAR's total supply rose 53,954 tokens between block 216,260,215 at 22:28 UTC on 18 September and block 216,346,615 at 13:00 UTC on 19 September, both read from the protocol's own node. Run that pace out over a year and it comes to roughly 2.5% of the float. Sui's overhang arrives on a schedule you can read in advance, and NEAR's arrives every block.

Sui carries a second specific risk that NEAR doesn't. The Move blockchain safety flaw covers a bug class in the language Sui is built on, and the chain holding $496.6 million of other people's capital is the one that pays when a bug class becomes an exploit.

Sui vs NEAR Price Into the 18 September Close

On Sui vs NEAR price the loser of the capital test won every horizon on our own book. NEAR gained 19.33% on the 18 September session and 117.16% across thirty. Sui gained 9.86% and 15.36% over the same two windows. Across seven sessions the split ran 59.08% to 12.36%.

NEAR's 3.759 close is the highest of the 52 weeks from 19 September 2025, and it stands 113.18% above its own 200-session average. Sui's 0.8143 sits 77.72% below its 52-week closing high of 3.6543, printed on 20 September 2025.

The moving averages tell the same story. NEAR's 50-session average crossed above its 200 on 26 May 2026 and has printed no death cross since. Sui's crossed below on 21 October 2025 and hasn't crossed back, which leaves its 50 running 13.2% under its 200 and its close 3.15% under the 200.

Year to date from the 31 December 2025 closes, NEAR is up 148.78% from 1.511 and Sui is down 41.99% from 1.4037. Our Sui price prediction through 2031 works the token's own levels out over the longer horizon.

Turnover points somewhere else entirely. The Sui perpetual turned over $21,330,578 on the anchor bar against the NEAR perpetual's $8,505,240, and across 2026 to the anchor the split runs $5,300,751,276 to $1,115,944,331. Sui is the bigger market on our book by 4.75 times, and NEAR is the one that moved.

Can You Trade Sui or NEAR on Phemex?

Both perpetuals are Listed. SUIUSDT and NEARUSDT each carry up to 50x leverage and settle funding every eight hours, read from the 28,800-second interval field in the product record and never from the page copy. Spot pairs for both tokens are Listed as well.

If the capital argument is the exposure you want, the SUI side is the trade, and 59.03% of the supply is what you carry while you wait. If the tape is the argument, NEAR is the contract running, and a long there is a bet that a token at its 52-week closing high keeps going. A position held for a full day pays or collects funding three times on either one.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much of NEAR's 30-day fee total came from one application?

$5,865,608 of $6,325,422, or 92.7%, from the NEAR Intents bridge over the 30 UTC days to 18 September 2026.

Where did SUI bottom over the 52 weeks to the anchor?

At a 0.6513 close on 18 August 2026, which leaves the 18 September close 25.0% above it. NEAR's lowest close of the same 52 weeks was 0.961 on 11 February 2026.

What did Sui TVL do across the 30 days to 18 September?

It rose 18.51%, from $419,027,524 on DefiLlama's 20 August row to $496,596,072 on the 19 September row.

How wide was the NEAR perpetual's anchor session?

Its 18 September bar ranged from 3.075 to 3.833 on $8,505,240 of turnover, under half the Sui perpetual's dollar volume on the same day.

Bottom Line

Sui wins the stated metric and it isn't close. $0.1489 of TVL per dollar of market cap against $0.0395 is a 3.77x gap. It holds at 3.70 on the previous day's settled rows and it survives the dilution objection at 1.54 times on fully diluted value.

The market went the other way. NEAR more than doubled across thirty sessions while Sui added 15.36%, which means traders paid up for the chain with the thinner capital base and the faster tape.

That is the trade in this pair. If you think capital efficiency eventually prices, Sui down 41.99% on the year with 59.03% of its supply still to come is the uncomfortable version of that view. If you think flow prices, NEAR at its 52-week closing high has already answered you.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and is not financial advice. Cryptocurrency trading involves substantial risk. Always do your own research before making investment decisions.