TL;DR

Drift Protocol on Solana combines perpetual futures trading, spot markets, lending, and liquid staking within a single system. Users can earn yield by supplying assets to vaults, lending markets, and staking mechanisms, with a wide variety of strategies and supported tokens currently offering some high yields.

When you think of Drift Protocol on Solana, its perps and spot trading features might come to mind first, but the protocol, one of the most well‑established Solana DeFi platforms, also incorporates a range of ways to pick up passive yields, with some high returns on offer.

Under the hood, traders and passive users are interacting within a common layer, and this crossover is where the yield comes from. So, for yield‑focused users, Drift lets you earn without actively making trades yourself, although of course you might want to use it for perps and spot trading too.

In this guide we’ll focus not on the trading parts, but rather on how to use Drift in order to generate returns from deposited assets.

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What Is Drift Protocol?

Launched at the end of 2021 on Solana, Drift has grown since then to combine perps trading, spot markets, lending, and its own token, DRIFT. While traders can use it to take leveraged positions, the protocol is built in a way that allows liquidity providers and lenders to earn from fees and funding rates.

• Total deposits: $614 million

• Cumulative trading volume: $140 billion

• Trades processed: over 19 million

Drift version 3 launched last month, bringing faster execution speed, deeper liquidity and lower slippage for traders, gas‑less transactions, and a UI redesign.

Image: Drift statistics

When it comes to security, Drift has completed three third‑party audits and runs a bug bounty program (see the official documents for details).

Note: As with any DeFi platform, standard risks apply – frontend attacks, smart‑contract vulnerabilities, stablecoin de‑pegs, and high crypto volatility.

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How to Use Drift Protocol

1. Visit the Drift website (https://www.drift.trade/) and click Trade.

2. Connect your wallet and deposit funds.

3. You can then open long or short perpetual positions with leverage (up to 101×, though extreme leverage is not recommended for risk‑averse users).

4. Under the Trade tab you’ll also find the Spot market and a Swap function.

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Strategies to Earn Yield on Drift

Vaults (Insurance Fund Vaults)

• Hover over the Vaults tab and select Insurance Fund Vaults.

• You can stake various assets; for example, USDC currently yields 5.72 % APY (7‑day average).

Image: USDC vault UI

• To find the highest‑yielding stablecoin vault, click the APY column to sort descending. The CASH vault shows a 7‑day APY of 11.26 %. CASH is a stablecoin jointly developed by Phantom, Stripe, and Bridge. Deposit by clicking the relevant Stake button.

Image: List of Drift vaults with APY sorting

(Article continues with additional yield‑generating strategies…)

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