Framework
How We Define the Tiers
Every tier on Am I a Whale? is derived from a single consistent metric: your wallet's share of a chain's total supply. The same framework applies to every chain we track, so a Whale on Bitcoin means the same thing as a Whale on XLM.
The Core Principle
Tiers represent stake in the ecosystem, not arbitrary coin counts. A wallet that holds 0.1% of total supply is a meaningful participant in that network, whether the asset is worth $0.10 or $10.00. By anchoring thresholds to percentage of total supply, our tiers retain their meaning regardless of price fluctuations or how many tokens are currently in circulation.
We use total supply, not circulating supply. Circulating supply definitions vary by chain, change as treasury tokens vest or unlock, and can be inconsistently reported across APIs. Total supply is fixed or slow-changing on the chains we track, chain-agnostic, and gives stable thresholds that don't shift as foundation wallets release tokens over time.
Capped vs. uncapped: where a chain has a hard max supply (BTC, LTC, HBAR, XLM, XRP, ALGO, SHX) we anchor to it. Where there is none (ETH, FLR, DOGE, XDC), we anchor to current total supply; for QNT and VELO we anchor to the measured economic/issued supply (total minted minus parked or unissued reserves). Each snapshot re-measures the live supply, and the tier anchors are reviewed against it periodically — so thresholds move in deliberate, documented steps rather than drifting continuously. We treat that as the honest tradeoff, not a flaw.
Formula
Tier = wallet balance ÷ total supply × 100
Why it travels across chains: the same dollars buy a very different slice of each network. $1M is ~0.025% of HBAR but ~0.00008% of Bitcoin, a ~300× difference in ownership for the same money. Anchoring to supply lets you compare, apples to apples, where a meaningful stake is still cheap to acquire.
The Tiers
Same percentage thresholds on every chain; native token amounts are chain-specific. Each tier is 10× the stake below it, orders of magnitude, because crypto holdings follow a power law (a few hold most), not a linear spread.
| Tier | % of Total Supply | Why this level |
|---|---|---|
| 🦑Kraken | ≥1.000% | The apex tier, a wallet holding a full percent or more of the entire supply. On most chains these are exchanges, foundations, and treasuries: the few addresses whose moves the whole market watches. If anyone can shift a chain, it's here. |
| 🐋Blue Whale | 0.100–1.000% | A dominant individual stake, between a tenth and a full percent of all supply. Large by any measure; on most markets a sale would be felt, though the exact impact depends on that chain's liquidity. |
| 🐳Whale | 0.010–0.100% | A significant holding (0.01–0.1% of supply), the kind of position traders and analysts track. Big enough to move thinner order books, depending on the chain's depth. |
| 🦈Shark | 0.001–0.010% | High-conviction holder. A serious position in any portfolio, institutional or individual, with enough weight to matter on the order book. |
| 🐬Dolphin | 0.0001–0.001% | Sophisticated holder with meaningful exposure. Likely an early adopter or high-conviction investor with a deliberate long-term position. |
| 🐟Fish | 0.00001–0.0001% | Committed holder. Enough skin in the game to follow the ecosystem closely. Unlikely to exit on short-term volatility. |
| 🪼Jellyfish | < 0.00001% | Entry-level tracked holder. Starts at our tracking floor, the smallest balance we index per wallet. The floor is a per-chain choice pitched at a meaningful entry-level holding (0.01 BTC, 0.1 ETH, 1 QNT/LTC, 100 XRP/ALGO, 1,000 HBAR/XLM/SHX/FLR/DOGE/VELO/XDC), bounded by how deep we can affordably scan and store. Present, counted, and part of the ecosystem. |
| 🦐Shrimp | Below threshold | Below our tracking floor: small balances, accounts that held temporarily, or addresses not yet active. Most wallet addresses on any network fall here. On most chains the Shrimp count and balance are measured directly from the full ledger; where the source can't do that (HBAR, ALGO) they're estimated from network totals minus tracked holders, and each chain's page says which method it uses. |
Bands are lower-bound inclusive: a wallet sitting exactly on a threshold counts in the higher tier (exactly 0.100% of supply is a Blue Whale, not a Whale).
Two kinds of "Top %"
The site shows percentages on two different axes; they answer different questions, so don't confuse them:
- Tier % (this page): your share of total supply (balance ÷ total supply). A Whale holds 0.01–0.1% of all coins. This measures market weight.
- HODL Ladder & rank search: your share of the wallet population(rank ÷ total wallets). "Top 0.1%" there means 999 of every 1,000 wallets hold less than you. This measures where you stand in the crowd.
The two don't line up: because most wallets hold very little, you can be "Top 0.003% of wallets" by population yet only a "Fish" by supply share. Both are real, they just measure different things.
Chain-Specific Thresholds
One matrix, every chain: the minimum holding for each tier, derived directly from each chain's supply anchor (supply ÷ 100, ÷ 1,000, … ÷ 10,000,000) plus its tracking floor. Values are rounded for readability — the live pages and rank search use exact thresholds.
| Tier | BTC21M | ETH~120.7M | DOGE~155B | LTC84M | XRP100B | XLM50B | HBAR50B | ALGO10B | QNT~14.9M | SHX100B | FLR~106B | VELO~24B | XDC~38B |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🦑Kraken | 210K+ | 1.2M+ | 1.55B+ | 840K+ | 1B+ | 500M+ | 500M+ | 100M+ | 148.8K+ | 1B+ | 1.06B+ | 240M+ | 380M+ |
| 🐋Blue Whale | 21K+ | 120K+ | 155M+ | 84K+ | 100M+ | 50M+ | 50M+ | 10M+ | 14.9K+ | 100M+ | 105.97M+ | 24M+ | 38M+ |
| 🐳Whale | 2,100+ | 12K+ | 15.5M+ | 8,400+ | 10M+ | 5M+ | 5M+ | 1M+ | 1,488+ | 10M+ | 10.6M+ | 2.4M+ | 3.8M+ |
| 🦈Shark | 210+ | 1,200+ | 1.55M+ | 840+ | 1M+ | 500K+ | 500K+ | 100K+ | 148.8+ | 1M+ | 1.06M+ | 240K+ | 380K+ |
| 🐬Dolphin | 21+ | 120+ | 155K+ | 84+ | 100K+ | 50K+ | 50K+ | 10K+ | 14.9+ | 100K+ | 106K+ | 24K+ | 38K+ |
| 🐟Fish | 2.1+ | 12+ | 15.5K+ | 8.4+ | 10K+ | 5,000+ | 5,000+ | 1,000+ | 1.488+ | 10K+ | 10.6K+ | 2,400+ | 3,800+ |
| 🪼Jellyfish | 0.01+ | 0.1+ | 1,000+ | 1+ | 100+ | 1,000+ | 1,000+ | 100+ | 1+ | 1,000+ | 1,000+ | 1,000+ | 1,000+ |
| 🦐Shrimp | < 0.01 | < 0.1 | < 1,000 | < 1 | < 100 | < 1,000 | < 1,000 | < 100 | < 1 | < 1,000 | < 1,000 | < 1,000 | < 1,000 |
Read down a column to see one chain's ladder; read across a row to compare what the same market weight costs on each chain. Supply anchors shown under each ticker (≈ where uncapped or measured).
Honest Limitations
Exchange cold wallets
Some top-tier wallets belong to exchanges holding customer funds, not a single individual. We display what the chain reports. We don't attempt to identify wallet owners.
Foundation and treasury holdings
Large foundation or treasury wallets are included in our tracked data and counted toward their tier, intentionally. Those tokens exist and represent real supply that can reach the market. We flag this as a known characteristic, not a flaw.
Locked & escrowed tokens
A holder is credited for the full amount it controls, including escrowed or time-locked tokens (e.g. XRP escrow), against a total supply that also includes them. You're ranked on what you own out of the whole, with no numerator/denominator mismatch: an entity holding 45B of a 100B supply in escrow ranks as a 45B holder. On most chains the account balance already captures everything; on escrow-heavy chains like XRP we attribute escrowed tokens to the account that controls them, which can be imperfect for conditional or third-party escrows.
% of supply is a proxy, not a direct measure
Actual market impact also depends on order book depth and daily trading volume. A 0.1% holder on a smaller chain moves markets more easily than the same percentage on a deeper market. The % framework is a consistent and defensible approximation across chains.
Data below tracking threshold
We don't track individual wallets below each chain's floor. The Shrimp tier represents all wallets in that range. On most chains its count and balance are measured directly from the full ledger (XLM, ETH, SHX, XRP, QNT, DOGE, LTC, XDC; derived from full-ledger totals on BTC); on HBAR and ALGO they're estimated from network totals minus tracked holders. Each chain's page discloses which method applies.
Per-chain coverage varies
What a 'wallet balance' can even mean differs by chain, so coverage differs too. On ETH, about two-thirds of all ETH is wallet-held (native plus directly-held liquid staking tokens); beacon-staked and DeFi-deposited ETH isn't attributable to individual wallets by anyone. On HBAR, ALGO and FLR the total-account denominator is a published or upper-bound figure, so your rank is computed directly but the displayed percentage is an estimate. Every chain page carries its own note stating exactly what's counted.
One entity, many wallets
We rank addresses, not people. A single holder can split a position across many wallets, and some do, deliberately, which under-tiers them and makes concentration look lower than it really is. We don't attempt to cluster addresses into entities.
Thresholds lag supply changes
Native token thresholds are fixed at calibration. If a chain's total supply changes (e.g. minting or burning), thresholds should be recalibrated. We review quarterly.
Methodology last reviewed July 2026 · Moome LLC
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