The Arc mainnet is expected to launch this summer, and these projects in the ecosystem are worth paying attention to in advance.

Written by: Sanqing, Foresight News

The native public chain of stablecoin Circle, Arc, is currently still in the public testnet phase, with the official mainnet Beta launch window set for summer 2026. During this period, when the mainnet is not yet open, a batch of testnet projects has already gained a certain level of discussion on the X platform, particularly focused on low-barrier categories like NFTs, Launchpads, and Memes. The third-party project directory ArcLens has included 308 projects claiming to be built on Arc.

The following five categories represent community projects that are currently the focus of discussion; the sixth category lists a group of payment infrastructure teams that have been officially named by Circle and have real business data; the seventh category briefly mentions institutional partners listed on Arc's official ecosystem page. Data is accurate as of July 21, 2026, and related information is updated frequently for reference only.

1. Payment Infrastructure Teams Funded by Circle

The following 8 teams are in the first batch of the Circle Developer Grant program for 2026, focusing on markets in Africa and the Global South.

Introduced officially on July 13, 2026, by Arc's official blog, these are among the few projects in the ecosystem that can provide real business data, mainly offering infrastructure services targeting businesses, with limited space for individual user participation. The following are listed in the order they were introduced on the official blog.

Blockradar (@BlockradarHQ) is a wallet-as-a-service infrastructure that provides non-custodial wallet creation, gasless transactions, real-time anti-money laundering review, fund aggregation, and cross-chain liquidity through integrated APIs for fintech companies in emerging markets. According to disclosures by Arc's official blog, it has processed over $600 million in payment volume for fintech clients in Africa and Latin America during its first 12 months of operation, covering 150,000 wallets and 700,000 transactions; its website currently shows real-time data that has grown to approximately $950 million, 182,000 wallets, and 973,000 transactions, which are figures continuously updated by the project team and not yet audited by a third party.

Hurupay (soon to be renamed Kolan, @kolan_xyz) offers dollar account services with real routing numbers for non-US users and businesses, automatically converting funds received into USDC, which users can withdraw as local currency, use for card spending, or hold for interest. Currently, it has over 50,000 active users across Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa, Indonesia, the Philippines, Argentina, Brazil, and other countries, processing over $100 million in transactions within 15 months of launch.

Myaza (@myazahq) is a pan-African payment network that supports a multi-currency wallet with instant transfers in 21 African currencies, driven by cross-border settlements in USDC and EURC, and provides virtual dollar cards, bill payments, and savings account functionalities. It has over 25,000 registered users, with a month-on-month growth of 23% and a cumulative transaction volume of approximately $15 million, having established infrastructure partnerships with Fincra, Yellow Card, and Bridge.

Arrel Technology (DAPL, @ArrelTechnology) has 8 years of institutional-level digital asset infrastructure experience, and its new product USDC Omni-Checkout & Treasury Router is built on Circle CCTP, allowing African merchants to accept USDC/EURC payments without development efforts similar to using Stripe. Targeting the Global South market, it has reached an annual payment volume of $180 million, a year-on-year increase of 128%.

Payrit (@payritHQ) is a cross-border mobile wallet driven by USDC, where users only transact in their local currencies, while USDC exchanges are completed in the background for near real-time settlements. It has processed over 36,000 transactions and more than $1.9 million in cross-border transactions between the UK, Canada, and Africa for Nigerian users, supporting multi-chain wallets such as EVM, Stellar, and Solana.

ViFi Labs (@ViFi_Labs) is a decentralized forex protocol targeting currencies in emerging markets, utilizing an AMM architecture designed for correlated assets to provide near-zero slippage for currency pairs such as the Nigerian Naira, Brazilian Real, and Colombian Peso. It is currently deployed on the Arc testnet and is pushing for mainnet launch, with Arc serving as its main liquidity and forex execution hub.

SFx Money (@usesfxmoneyapp) is a stablecoin digital bank initially serving the remittance needs of Turkish expatriates and African students, now developed into a full-fledged digital bank supporting free transfers between Turkey and more than 16 African countries, as well as the US, UK, and EU. Its user base has grown from about 300 in December 2024 to over 8,800 by July 2026, making it one of the few projects in this batch to receive Circle funding a second time.

Flezpay (@flezpay) targets the African retail scene, using AI-driven smart QR codes to dynamically adjust product prices in real time, integrating fiat and USDC payment processes at the checkout. It has connected 1,613 retail stores, generating over $31,000 in monthly recurring revenue.

2. Other Official Ecosystem Partners

The Arc official website's ecosystem page currently lists over 100 verified institutional and project partners, covering categories such as stablecoin issuance, infrastructure, trading, payment, and financial services.

Among them are heavyweight institutions: BlackRock, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, Deutsche Bank, Standard Chartered, BNP Paribas, BNY Mellon, Mastercard, and Coinbase, as well as crypto-native institutions and infrastructure projects like Kraken, Bybit, Aave, Chainlink, LayerZero, Fireblocks, BitGo, Centrifuge, Morpho, Curve, and MetaMask.

3. Launchpad / DEX Category

TowerExchange is Arc's native stablecoin DEX aggregator, leading in awareness and discussion in this category, and was previously selected for the official Builder Spotlight showcase. In May 2026, it was specifically introduced in a post by the Arc official account, detailing its functionalities and inviting a live demonstration. Participation: The official website allows direct connection to the testnet wallet to experience exchange and liquidity functions.

Radar DEX (formerly ArcDEXScan) is a token market tracking and issuance platform on Arc's mainnet, renamed and launched on its new site radardex.io in July 2026, officially claiming to support Arc's mainnet. Functionally, it can track token prices, market capitalizations, trading volumes, and liquidity, and also includes a token launcher based on Uniswap v3 (liquidity permanently locked), aggregating data from multiple trading channels including Uniswap v2/v3/v4, DyorSwap, Noxa, and LiFi. Participation: Directly visit the official website to connect a wallet, or join its Telegram group to receive bot notifications.

AstraPump is a Launchpad and DEX that focuses on one-click token issuance and trading and ranks highly on the Trending list in the third-party ecosystem directory ArcLens. Its fan base and tweet interactions are relatively prominent among similar projects, primarily attracting meme and testnet player communities.

Lunex is a Curve-style StableSwap AMM focused on low-slippage exchanges for stablecoin pairs like USDC/EURC. It is marked as Established on ArcLens and is one of the few projects that has retained real funding during the testnet phase: currently, its TVL is approximately $1.29 million, with a historical high of $1.38 million, and a cumulative trading volume of approximately $2.59 million. Participation: The official website allows direct wallet connection to experience the exchange functionality.

4. AI / Infrastructure Category

hinkal_protocol is a privacy and confidential settlement protocol, with its testnet launched in March 2026, and the Arc official account has repeatedly shared or mentioned its testnet updates, referring to it as a "Day One Architect". Participation: During the testnet phase, users can try its privacy transfer feature.

5. NFT Category

Orixa (ORIXIANS) is Arc's native NFT trading market, which will release the NFT series ORIXIANS after the mainnet launch. Orixa has not yet clarified whether it will issue tokens. Among similar projects, it has a relatively leading fan base and discussion heat. Participation: Holders of a testnet pass must first authenticate their identity on the official Discord before registering for the whitelist.

Arc_Punks and ArcPunksNFT currently have two independent Punks concept projects on Arc: Arc_Punks claims to be the earliest Punks series on Arc EVM, while ArcPunksNFT is positioned as a genesis collection. The two teams and issuance plans are different, and they are often discussed and compared together in the community. According to currently disclosed information, both plan to open public minting directly after the mainnet launches without needing to enter the whitelist in advance. Participation: Wait for the mainnet launch, at which point public minting can occur directly.

unemployeeonarc is a series of 10,000 "unemployed"-themed NFTs, with an eccentric account style that often uses memes about "layoffs" and "unemployment applications" for updates, making it one of the most distinctive projects in the category. Participation: The whitelist rules have not yet been announced, so it is advisable to follow the official account and website for minting times.

ArcCitizens positions itself as a community-governed, fully on-chain identity NFT. A single whitelist announcement triggered rapid sharing and discussion in a short time, making it the most impactful case of promotion in the NFT category, with verifiable evidence of real user participation (whitelist rules made public, users following the process in practice). Participation: Refer to the official whitelist announcement with the caption "Arc is coming", change your profile picture to one of the official PFPs, and leave your wallet address in the comments. The last round opened up 100 slots, so future rounds need to follow official account announcements.

6. Meme Category

CatBatHatFatRat has 10,000 fans and is a meme project centered on the five words “Cat Bat Hat Fat Rat,” inspired possibly by a video previously shared by the USDC official account. The official website offers a PFP generator, a community message wall, and interactive features like a waitlist/ranking board.

The above information is compiled from the ArcLens ecosystem page, Circle/Arc official channels, and public discussions on the X platform, with specific rules subject to the latest official announcements from the projects. Please assess risks independently before participating.

Safety Reminder: Recently, third-party websites claiming to be "ARC Bridge" (such as onbridge.xyz) have appeared online, with pages claiming "Arc Mainnet live," enticing users to connect their wallets and transfer at least 1,000 USDC to the “Arc Mainnet.” Upon verification, Arc's official block explorer still clearly indicates Testnet, with no official Mainnet explorer or announcement.

Arc ecosystem contributor Panchu recently also posted on X to inform: the underlying chain of the Arc mainnet has indeed begun generating blocks (chain ID 5042, block height exceeding 10.4 million, USDC contract has been deployed), but this is only internal pre-release testing infrastructure within Circle, not yet open to the public.

Since USDC cross-chain relies on CCTP "burn-mint" two-step process, any third-party website claiming it can bridge assets to the Arc mainnet can only complete the burn on the source chain; the mint proof will be unable to be generated due to the mainnet not being officially open, leading to asset disappearance and no returns. He also noted that some have been purchasing so-called "mainnet USDC" at a 30 to 100 times premium.

When the Arc mainnet officially launches, the announcement will be publicly made simultaneously through @arc and Circle's official channels, and will not be leaked through private messages or rumors in advance. Currently, the only meaningful way to participate remains the testnet; please do not use any third-party "mainnet bridges" to transfer assets.

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