How Crypto Wallets Make Money: Web3 App Monetization

How do crypto wallets make money?

Crypto wallets make money mostly by charging a small fee on activity that happens inside the app: a percentage on token swaps, a partner fee when users buy crypto with a card through an on-ramp provider, and a share of staking rewards. Some add paid premium features or ads, and a few add rewarded offers that pay users in the app’s own points. Each model comes with store and licensing rules, so the right mix depends on whether your wallet is custodial, where you distribute it, and which stores carry it.

Fees, policies and regulatory dates below were checked on October 29, 2026. They change often, so confirm each one before you build on it. This is not legal advice.

Crypto app monetization models compared

The examples are what each company publishes in its own help pages, not industry benchmarks.

Most wallets combine two or three of these. Activity fees scale with your heaviest users, while premium, ads and offers can earn from people who hold small balances and rarely trade. How to monetize an app compares the general app models, and hybrid monetization explains how to mix paid and ad-funded revenue without one cannibalizing the other.

Swap fees: the main wallet revenue line

A swap screen lets users trade one token for another without leaving the wallet. Behind it, the wallet usually routes the order through decentralized exchanges or aggregators and adds its own fee on top of the quote. MetaMask’s Swaps user guide breaks the cost into three parts: the quote rate (the exchange rate for the tokens), the network fee (gas to execute the swap), and a MetaMask fee of 0.875%. The network fee goes to the blockchain, not the wallet, so only the last part is wallet revenue.

Three things decide whether swap fees work for you:

• Show the fee. Put your fee on the quote screen as its own line, separate from the network fee.
• Expect market swings. Swap revenue follows trading activity, which rises and falls with prices. Plan costs around a slow month.
• Check your licensing. Facilitating the exchange of crypto-assets can be a regulated service. Google Play asks crypto exchanges for country licenses, covered below.

On-ramp and off-ramp referral fees

An on-ramp provider lets users buy crypto with a card or bank transfer inside your app, and handles payments and identity checks on its side. Many providers let the app that sends the customer add a fee to each order. MoonPay’s help article on configuring the widget says partners set their own fee on top of MoonPay’s fees under On-ramp or Off-ramp, then Fees in the partner dashboard, per payment method with regional overrides. The fee field has a 5% maximum, and setting fees requires completing Enhanced Verification with MoonPay first.

A few points before you turn it on:

• The user pays your fee on top of the provider’s fee and the network fee. A high partner fee makes your app look expensive next to buying on an exchange directly.
• When you pay users out in crypto yourself, network fees vary a lot between chains. Cheapest crypto for payouts compares them.

Staking fees, without promising yield

Staking lets users lock tokens on a proof-of-stake network and receive protocol rewards. A wallet that runs or routes staking can keep a share of those rewards. MetaMask’s page on Pooled Staking rewards says the MetaMask fee is 15% of staking rewards, so users receive 85% of the rewards returned by the Ethereum network, and the reward rate shown in the app is the pool’s past-week rate minus that fee, annualized.

A rate based on the past week describes history, not the future. Rewards can fall, and staked tokens can lose value.

Premium features and ads

Premium features

Paid extras can include tax exports, price alerts or multi-device sync. On iOS the rule is strict. In section 3.1.1 of the App Review Guidelines, Apple says apps may not use their own mechanisms to open up content or functionality, and names cryptocurrencies and cryptocurrency wallets in its list of examples. So you cannot accept a token payment to switch on a premium feature in the iOS app; digital features sold inside the app go through in-app purchase, with Apple’s commission. How to monetize an app lists the current store fees.

Ads

Ads earn from every user, including the ones who never trade. The risk in a wallet is that a third-party ad sits next to people’s money. A fake token sale or a lookalike wallet ad in your app is a scam with your logo beside it. If you run ads, block financial and crypto ad categories you cannot vet, keep ads off the send, sign and recovery screens, and prefer formats the user chooses to open, such as rewarded placements. Offerwall vs rewarded video compares the two opt-in formats.

Apple and Google Play rules for crypto apps

Summaries checked on October 29, 2026.

Apple App Store: guideline 3.1.5

Section 3.1.5 of Apple’s App Review Guidelines covers cryptocurrencies in five parts:

• (i) Wallets: apps may facilitate virtual currency storage if the developer is enrolled as an organization, not an individual.
• (ii) Mining: no mining on the device; off-device processing such as cloud mining is allowed.
• (iii) Exchanges: apps may facilitate crypto transactions on an approved exchange, only in countries or regions where the app has the right licensing and permissions.
• (iv) ICOs and derivatives: Initial Coin Offerings, crypto futures and other crypto-securities trading must come from established banks, securities firms, futures commission merchants or other approved financial institutions.
• (v) Tasks: “Cryptocurrency apps may not offer currency for completing tasks, such as downloading other apps, encouraging other users to download, posting to social networks, etc.”

Point (v) is the one that matters for rewards. Many offers are app installs, which is Apple’s own example. Offerwall iOS app rules covers Apple’s wider rules on rewarded offers.

Google Play: blockchain-based content and crypto exchange licensing

Google Play’s Blockchain-based Content policy says the purchase, holding or exchange of cryptocurrencies should go through certified services in regulated jurisdictions, bans apps that mine cryptocurrency on devices (remote management of mining is allowed), and requires apps that sell or let users earn tokenized digital assets to declare it on the Financial features declaration form in Play Console. It also says you may not promote or glamorize potential earnings from playing or trading.

The separate page Understanding Google Play’s Cryptocurrency Exchanges and Software Wallets Policy lists license requirements by country. Examples: in the United States, FinCEN registration as a money services business plus state money transmitter status, or a federal or state chartered bank; in the United Kingdom, registration with the FCA; in EU member states, authorization as a crypto-asset service provider (CASP) under MiCA. Developers who lack a local license choose from Additional Options in Play Console, one of which is confirming that the app is a non-custodial software wallet.

Google Play also has rules on incentivized installs in general. Incentivized installs and Google Play policy explains the Android side.

MiCA basics for wallets serving EU users

The EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA), Regulation (EU) 2023/1114, sets uniform EU rules for crypto-assets not covered by other financial services law. From official EU sources:

• Who it covers. The European Commission’s crypto-assets page says MiCA sets requirements for issuers of crypto-assets and for crypto-asset service providers, “such as trading venues or wallets”, and that CASPs covered by MiCA are obliged entities under the EU anti-money laundering framework.
• Timeline. ESMA’s MiCA page says MiCA entered into force in June 2023 and reached full application in December 2024. Under the grandfathering clause in Article 143(3), firms already operating under national law could continue until 1 July 2026 or until they were granted or refused MiCA authorization, so that window has now closed.
• Who is authorized. ESMA publishes an interim MiCA register that includes authorized CASPs and non-compliant entities, updated regularly. Check it for any custody, exchange or on-ramp partner you plan to use in the EU.

Whether your wallet needs its own authorization depends on what you do: holding users’ keys, exchanging assets or transferring them on their behalf is different from software that only lets users sign with keys they hold. Get advice from a lawyer in your main EU market before you add custody, swaps or staking for EU users. One more trap: if you turned your reward points into a token on a blockchain, you could become an issuer of a crypto-asset with MiCA duties. Keep points off-chain.

Where an offerwall fits in a crypto wallet app

An offerwall lets users earn points by completing offers from advertisers, such as trying an app, finishing a game level or answering a survey, and pays you per completed offer. What is an offerwall? covers the basics. In a wallet, it earns from users who rarely trade, and that revenue does not depend on trading volume.

The design that keeps you inside the rules above:

• Pay your own points, not crypto. Users earn points in your app’s currency, with your name and icon. The points are a balance in your database, not a token.
• Points buy app things. Let points pay for premium months, extra price alerts, themes or similar features. Do not let them convert into crypto, and do not market them as an investment or a return.
• Treat iOS separately. Apple’s 3.1.5(v) bars crypto apps from offering currency for completing tasks. Points that convert to crypto clearly look like that, and Apple does not define “currency” in that line. The cautious choice is to keep the offerwall out of your iOS build, or ask App Review before you ship it.
• Declare on Google Play. If anything users earn is a tokenized digital asset, Google requires the Financial features declaration. Keeping points off-chain avoids the question.
• Credit only from the server. Add points when your server receives a signed postback, and remove them on a reversal. Prevent duplicate reward credits shows how.

The offers themselves must be safe for wallet users

In a wallet, an offer that asks for the wrong thing can cost users their funds. An offer placed inside a wallet must never ask anyone to send crypto, connect a wallet to an unknown site, sign a transaction, or type a recovery phrase or private key. Sharklio does not run deceptive financial schemes, get-rich-quick offers, crypto mining offers, or offers that ask users to send money, crypto or gift cards or to hand over credentials or sensitive data; the full list is in what Sharklio does not advertise. If you also want to buy users for your wallet, fintech app user acquisition covers which events to pay for and the promotion rules that apply.

How to add Sharklio to a crypto wallet app

If you add an offerwall, these steps keep it inside the store rules above.

1. Apply as a publisher at sharklio.com. Every application is reviewed by hand, and once you are approved, apps you add are live right away.
2. Add your wallet in the dashboard and set up an off-chain points currency: its name, icon, conversion rate, user split, and wall design.
3. Open the wall as a native screen with the Android SDK, or the Flutter or React Native plugin. Your server requests a single-use session token for each user, so no key ships in the app.
4. Keep the wall out of your iOS build, or ask App Review before you ship it there, because of guideline 3.1.5(v).
5. Credit points only on your server from the signed postback, remove them on a reversal, and run Test your app before launch.
6. Place the earn screen far from the send, sign, and recovery screens. Offerwall placement covers the rest.

Frequently asked questions