Solana is one of the leading blockchain, attracting developers and traders with its high throughput and low fees. With this speed and scalability, new opportunities have emerged for advanced trading strategies.
One notable approach is MEV (Maximal Extractable Value), which focuses on optimizing the ordering and inclusion of transactions to potentially capture additional value.
Specifically, Sandwich bots have garnered interest by leveraging price differentials during transactions, offering traders a potentially profitable mechanism to secure consistent gains.
What Are Sandwich Trades?
A sandwich trade is a specific MEV strategy where a bot manipulates the price of a token by "sandwiching" a user’s transaction between two of its own:
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Front-running: The bot detects a user’s buy order for a token (e.g., on a decentralized exchange like Raydium or Orca). It places its own buy order just before the user’s transaction in a block, purchasing the token at a lower price and driving the price up.
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User Transaction: The user’s buy order executes at the now-inflated price caused by the bot’s initial purchase.
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Back-running: The bot immediately sells the tokens it bought at the higher price, profiting from the difference.
The Rapid Rise of Solana MEV
The influence of Sandwich bots on Solana has been increasing significantly. Over the past 30 days, based on Flipside data, these bots have captured between 1.7% and 5.4% of the total daily trading volume, with an average share of 2.9%.This has resulted in a staggering $3.85 billion in Sandwich trades executed on Solana.
Trades were conducted through more than 3.9 million bundles, generating over 260,000 transactions per day. On some days, this number even peaked at 486,000 transactions, demonstrating the growing influence of MEV strategies in Solana’s trading ecosystem.
Also, as seen in the bar chart, in early February, when DEX volume was higher, the share of sandwich bots was also greater—about 1% above the average.
On days with relatively higher trading volume, it even surged past 5%. However, over time, as trading volume declined and fewer memecoins were launched, the share of these bots also decreased, dropping to below 2% at some points.
Sandwich Bots: Who Dominates the Market?
While the number of sandwich bots on Solana continues to grow, competition is intense. Only a handful remain consistently profitable—primarily due to their superior speed and precision.
These top contenders dominate the market and command the majority of trading volume, driving new entrants to innovate and optimize their performance.
Among them, one bot stands out: E6YoRP3adE5XYneSseLee15wJshDxCsmyD2WtLvAmfLi. This bot alone accounts for 42% of all sandwich volume, executing trades worth over $1.6 billion in the last 30 days.
In second place, we have 89Ny6a4mALkQgEVN8UbKSc9TdLi6t9rFYdtihrXZEpq6, which has processed $433 million in trades—around 11.2% of total MEV bot activity. This volume is approximately one-fourth of what the top bot, E6Y, has processed.
The third-largest MEV bot is B91piBSfCBRs5rUxCMRdJEGv7tNEnFxweWcdQJHJoFpi, responsible for $277 million in trading volume, which equates to 7.2% of total MEV bot trades.
Inside Solana’s Largest MEV Bot: E6Y
Given its dominance, it’s worth taking a closer look at E6Y, the largest sandwich bot in Solana’s ecosystem.
Over the past 30 days, this bot has processed 280,000 bundles, generating a total revenue of 57,400 $SOL. After accounting for transaction fees (2.8 $SOL) and Jito tips (7.98k $SOL), its net profit stands at 49,400 $SOL.
This translates to a daily profit of 1,646 $SOL, which, based on the 30-day average $SOL price, is approximately $300,000 per day.
However, bundle activity has been declining. At the beginning of February, E6Y processed a record 26,000 bundles in a single day, but since then, this number has steadily dropped, sometimes falling below 4,000 bundles per day.
Where Do the Profits Come From?
Analyzing E6Y’s trades, we find that the most profitable trades involved tokens paired with $SOL. Additionally, meme coins have played a significant role in the bot’s revenue.
One interesting case is $POPE, a meme coin that gained notoriety in our previous report. In a single transaction, $Malenia and $LIBRA insiders artificially pumped and dumped this token, trading 20k $SOL. By sandwiching that transaction, E6Y managed to earn 8,400 $SOL in profit—this clearly reflected as a significant spike in the bot’s profit chart on February 25.
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