Who are “shrimps” in crypto and why are they important to the market?

In the world of cryptocurrencies, there is terminology similar to the food chain in the animal kingdom. Large investors holding significant amounts of crypto assets are referred to "whales".

Meanwhile, small or retail investors whose assets represent only a tiny share of the market are called "shrimps" in the cryptocurrency market.

What is a shrimp in cryptocurrencies?

The word "shrimp" refers to the small crustacean. In the context of the cryptocurrency market, it describes small investors with relatively low holdings, usually no more than one Bitcoin in total assets.

This threshold is the most commonly accepted definition of a crypto shrimp, although some experts within the crypto community classify investors with balances below 0.1 BTC as "crypto shrimps."

Note: There is also a meme coin called SHRIMP built on the Solana blockchain. However, this asset has nothing to do with the term "shrimp" in the context of cryptocurrencies or its meaning. In fact, the meme coin is based not on a shrimp, but on a capybara.

The term "shrimp" in cryptocurrencies refers specifically to the size of an investor's capital and has nothing to do with the trading or investment strategy or the type of asset storage they prefer.

The concept of a crypto shrimp is highly symbolic because the difference in asset volume between retail investors and large holders is as significant as the size difference between a shrimp and a whale.

Usually, the term "shrimp" in crypto refers to beginner investors willing to invest relatively small amounts in digital assets. While such investments have little immediate impact on cryptocurrency price dynamics, they are an important factor in forming long-term demand for crypto assets.

Crypto shrimps often use the DCA (Dollar Cost Averaging) strategy, purchasing digital assets in small amounts at regular intervals. This approach helps reduce the impact of market volatility.

According to Glassnode, the number of crypto shrimps with balances below 1 BTC continued reaching all-time highs even during market downturns, demonstrating sustained long-term interest from retail investors in digital assets.

The "animal" classification of cryptocurrency market participants is easy for the general audience to understand: while whales can "move" the market — for example, by sharply increasing or crashing asset prices — shrimps create mass user demand but usually do not directly influence prices, except in rare cases or in low-cap cryptocurrencies.

In addition to whales holding more than 1,000 BTC and crypto shrimps, several other investor categories are distinguished by the size of their holdings and their market influence:

Sharks (50–1,000 BTC);
Dolphins (100–500 BTC);
Fish (50–100 BTC);
Octopuses (10–50 BTC);
Crabs (1–10 BTC).

The role of shrimps in cryptocurrencies

Although individual crypto shrimps hold relatively small amounts of assets, their collective influence on the crypto market is significant due to their sheer numbers.

As of 2026, the total number of cryptocurrency users exceeded 550 million, accounting for nearly 10% of the world's population. Crypto shrimps make up the overwhelming majority of these users, whose number has increased by more than 30% over the past two years alone.

At the same time, the number of crypto investors with balances exceeding $1 million is estimated at around 241,000, representing only 0.04% of all cryptocurrency holders. This means the number of crypto shrimps exceeds the number of whales by more than 2,300 times. Meanwhile, the number of crypto-owning dollar billionaires worldwide is barely 35.

Analysts note that crypto shrimps tend to enter the market most actively during periods of Bitcoin growth and heightened media attention toward cryptocurrencies. Such periods are often accompanied by a sharp increase in the number of new wallets.

It is important to understand that crypto shrimps form the mass user base of cryptocurrencies, without which widespread adoption of digital assets would be impossible. Crypto shrimps:

Create demand for crypto assets;
Support high liquidity and trading volume in cryptocurrencies;
Accumulate digital assets in wallets, contributing to upward market dynamics amid limited supply.

In addition, crypto shrimps create demand not only through accumulation, but also through regular transactions, including:

Payments for services and products;
Asset exchanges;
Transfers;
Participation in liquidity pools;
Staking (locking cryptocurrencies) and other DeFi (decentralized finance) activities.

Analysts also note that crypto shrimps actively prefer networks with low transaction fees and high transfer speeds. According to Token Terminal, the BNB Chain ecosystem alone has more than 3.9 million active users, while Tron and Solana have around 3.8 million and 2 million, respectively. These blockchains also rank among the leaders in market capitalization and trading volume, clearly demonstrating the large-scale influence of crypto shrimps.

Shrimps are often the primary participants in the DeFi, meme coin, and retail digital asset trading sectors, where entry barriers are lower and even small amounts of capital allow users to participate in numerous operations.

Moreover, analysts consider crypto shrimps one of the key indicators of the digital asset market, helping evaluate and forecast future cryptocurrency trends. Using various analytical tools, researchers monitor shrimp behavior in order to determine their market activity and demand for digital assets:

What crypto shrimps are buying;
How many assets they hold and for how long;
How frequently they deposit to and withdraw from exchanges, and under what conditions.

The behavior of crypto shrimps may signal important changes in market trends, digital asset dynamics, and major phases of growth or correction. For example, if crypto shrimps massively accumulate an asset and withdraw it from exchanges to personal wallets, this may indicate declining available supply and growing long-term confidence in the asset.

For investors, shrimp behavior is considered an important indicator because the accumulation of assets by small holders — combined with other factors such as increasing liquidity, volatility, and exchange inflows — may precede stronger market trends.

Despite the relatively small capital held by each individual participant, crypto shrimps form the broadest and most resilient user base of the cryptocurrency market.