What is Dune Analytics and how to use it?

Dune Analytics launched as a small outfit in 2018. But what started as a two-man team has since been compared to Github for blockchain data. It has also attracted some of the most recognizable investors in the space, including Dragonfly Capital, Binance and Multicoin Capital.

In today’s world of web2, companies of all shapes and sizes, from giants like Amazon and Facebook to boutique media agencies, rely on selling users’ private data as a business model.

So how does web3, more specifically Dune Analytics, challenge this paradigm? And how can you use it to your advantage?

What is Dune Analytics?

© Dune

The “gold” is in the data, so to speak. (Sats, in our case.) And when we talk about blockchain data and analytical tools, several options exist (eg Nansen). But the chosen topics for analysis are subjective, monthly plans can cost a pretty penny, and these “solutions” are centralized.

Enter Dune Analytics.

The company, recently rebranded simply as Dune, takes crypto data on the chain and makes it easy for users to slice, visualize and analyze it – but even that’s an overgeneralized statement that doesn’t do the company justice .

See, Dune took just 3 years to secure unicorn status, with a $1 billion valuation. So what exactly is Dune Analytics, and what makes it so special? And how can it even compare to data giants like Google when its interface looks like this?

© Dune

Yip. The interface leaves a lot to be desired. (Soooo much.)

But UI aside, let’s look at what makes Dune different. First, it introduces a bottom-up model, with its community of analysts. In other words, Dune doesn’t presume to know what its audience wants. Instead, it incentivizes its community with financial rewards for producing dashboards. This means that the platform functions purely on the basis of user-generated content.

Second, Dune uses blockchain data, which web2 companies do not. (More on this later, and why it’s a crucial differentiator.) Examples of the type of data you can pull range from a general overview of Ethereum’s performance, with beautiful data visualization charts, to tracking the top 1000 wallets on Ethereum . As you can probably see, this type of data is highly and immediately actionable, making it extremely valuable in the right hands.

So, are there any other reasons why we might want to use Dune? Well, here’s another one: it’s free. Of course, Dune Pro is available for $390/month if you want all the bells and whistles. (That might sound expensive. But search around, and you’ll quickly find that other data analytics platforms happily charge four figures a month.)

You can skip rows and even run parallel queries as a premium user. You also get privacy options for your dashboards and queries. Finally, you can also export your data as CSV files.

But if you’re just starting out? Stick with the freemium version for now because it has a lot to offer.

History of Dune

© Isaac Smith | Unsplash

Schibsted Media Group is a company in Norway that is almost 200 years old. It boasts 5000+ employees, is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange and has deep pockets. How deep? Well, a few years ago they decided to fund a blockchain team to investigate their viability.

The two team members happened to be Mats Olsen and Fredrik Haga, who would later found Dune. But before the dream, Olsten started as a humble research intern at the company. From there, he moved up to blockchain analyst, where he programmed smart contracts for freight companies. Haga, his future co-founder, was armed with an MA in Economics and paid his bills as a data analyst.

Eventually, the duo realized the media group was too big and too traditional. It would not be able to lean into and leverage blockchains as Mats and Fredrik suggested. So, in 2018, the two friends took a chance and jumped ship, handing in their notices to chase the dream.

But it wasn’t all smooth sailing from there.

As mentioned, it took 3 full years for them to reach unicorn status. But this was not the result of years of steady income building. No, it was a quick windfall.

In other words, they were constantly drowning in rejection after rejection. Then, one day, Binance came along and must have seen their potential. So much so that they were funded with a cool $2 million, which was about the time the tide started to turn.

I’ll spare you the rest of the history lesson, but know that Dune was no overnight success story. Mats and Fredrik took years of iterative feedback implementation and critical brainstorming to get Dune where it is today.

How do Dunes work?

© Dune

We mentioned earlier that Dune differs from other analytics platforms based on several factors. For example, Mario Gabriele of The Generalist points out that traditional companies tend to release their quarterly reports. Compare that to blockchain data, which is instantly available.

What are the implications?

This implies that data that is so readily and immediately available – not to mention continuous – can also be consistently actionable. Let us follow this thought to its natural conclusion. We can see that this interactivity therefore changes the nature and state of the chains based on real-time data action and feedback.

In other words, the blockchain can be thought of as a living, breathing organism that reacts and reacts to user actions based on its data. And those responses and responses are in turn fed back to users as data, thus caught in a continuous feedback loop.

So how can Dune provide all this data anyway?

By concatenating all of it from its supported chains and sorting it into SQL databases. But it is the community’s job to use the data and tools provided. The team leaves it to the data analysts to extrapolate interesting and useful insights for other users. This is Dune’s value proposition.

If we collectively think of Dunes users as a community, we can divide them into different levels on a pyramid. At the very bottom sits the vast majority of users, the casual viewers who like to scroll through specific project dashboards they’re interested in. Query experts and data analysts are in the middle, as they are skilled in data analysis. And squarely at the top sit the “Dune wizards”.

A “Wizard” is Dune’s term for its community of data creators. As a data creator, you can use your skills to showcase your data expertise. You can do this by creating your own project dashboard and maps, and by sharing them with the community.

Dune also runs an abundance program, a way to incentivize wizards to create more dashboards for specific purposes. So, in addition to financial compensation, wizards can build a solid reputation as formidable data analysts.

Although Dune is limited to several chains, it is rapidly expanding from Ethereum and its Layer 2 solutions to Solana and other chains as well. Currently, it also supports Gnosis Chain and Binance Smart Chain. In the future, the Arrakis upgrade will include Dune Engine V2, which is currently in beta. The beta enables access to cross-chain data queries.

How to use Dune

© Dune

Here’s a quick Dune Analytics tutorial for those who don’t know how to speak SQL.

To use Dune and access its full freemium features, you must create an account. Yes, we hear you. It’s web3, so why can’t you just link your wallet address to Dune’s app? Sorry. Dune requires you to sign up by email, at least for now.

Once inside, the best place to start is looking at dashboards that wizards have built. Dune uses a star system to organize the results based on the most popular dashboards.

© Dune

You can also sort by your favorite dashboards or by trending and New dashboards. If your results are too broad, you can use the filter function on the right sidebar to narrow your search results.

You can use the Search field to look up dashboards for a project (eg Uniswap), a specific crypto sector (eg decentralized finance) or even an entire ecosystem (eg Optimism).

Breakdown of dashboards

Now that we’re on the subject, let’s take a look at these 3 types of dashboards and show examples of each.

Project Dashboard example (ie DAO performance of Famous Fox Federation, a blue-chip NFT project on the Solana chain):

© Dune

Sector Dashboard example (ie activity of DeFi users on Ethereum):

© Dune

Ecosystem Dashboard example (ie the state of Ethereum gas fees):

© Dune

Now that you know the three basic types of dashboards, let’s look at dashboards at the individual level.

On the individual dashboard page, you can hover over the charts to uncover additional information. You can also click on any section title to drill down deeper into each section. Drilling down reveals the query data, as well as the output data. (As mentioned earlier, premium users can export this data via CSV.)

You can also repeat queries to refresh the data. How do you rerun a query? It’s simple. All you have to do is open the dashboard, and it will update itself. However, this may take some time as you are added to a queue.

© Dune

The process can take anywhere from a few minutes to hours. You can check how long it takes to refresh a particular section by clicking the check mark in the lower right corner.

By the way, you can also embed a dashboard in your blog. And if you want to dig deeper, it’s worth learning SQL because you can ask other users’ queries. Forking a query simply means taking someone’s dashboard and editing it to suit your needs.

How to Create a Dashboard in Dune

© Dune

If you know SQL, here’s a quick tutorial on how to get a dashboard up and running.

Step 1. Click on “Menu”, and then click on “New Inquiry”.

Step 2. Choose the chain you want to work with. Alternatively, you can choose Dune Engine V2 (currently in beta), which for example works with Solana raw data.

Step 3. You can search the datasets below. For example, clicking on a particular dataset reveals the strings you can use to query the data.

Note: Dune Engine V2 offers more interesting datasets. You can query the raw data, or even go project or sector specific.

© Caspar Camille Rubin | Unsplash

Before we wrap up, I have good news and bad news.

Let me give you the bad news first: Unless you know SQL, you won’t be able to run queries. But the good news? SQL is an easy language to pick up. Even if you have minimal experience in programming, you can lock it in 2 to 3 weeks.

Keep in mind that it’s fine if you’re in love with data but don’t have the time to pick up SQL. You can always reach out to your favorite wizards and see if they’d like to work on a project for you, for a fee of course.

As with any tool, a tool is only as powerful as its user. Just as a paintbrush in hand doesn’t make me a Van Gogh (I draw amazing stick figures), Dune is only as powerful as its user. With that said, I leave this information in your very capable hands.

Happy data mining!

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Valerioshi X

Valerioshi is the 4th president of X+, one of the most exclusive communities in web3, for keepers who keep 10 or more DeGods. Together with the fire team, he led the CryptoPunk fire campaign for DeGods, successfully raising over US$100,000 in less than 30 hours. He runs Degen Reports, and hosts The Degen Hour as well as the X+ Sigma Lounge, both weekly Twitter spaces. Follow the author on Twitter @valerioshi_