Graduation: what happens and what changes
What happens the moment a coin fills its curve, where it goes, and why trading feels different right after.
On this page
Graduation is the moment a coin leaves its bonding curve and gets a real trading pool. People also call it migration, or say the coin bonded. When you hear "it just bonded", it means the curve filled up.
What happens on pump.fun
- The last coins on the curve are bought. In total about 85 SOL has gone in.
- pump.fun takes a graduation fee of 0.015 SOL.
- A new pool opens on PumpSwap, pump.fun's own exchange. The SOL raised and the 206.9 million coins that were held back go into it.
- The pool's LP tokens, the receipt that would let someone withdraw the pool's money, are burned. Nobody can pull that liquidity.
- From now on every trade goes through the pool. The curve is closed for good, and a coin never goes back to it.
Before March 2025, pump.fun coins graduated to Raydium, an older Solana exchange. That is why old guides still say "migrated to Raydium". Other launchpads still send coins elsewhere: coins from Raydium's LaunchLab, such as BONK.fun coins, graduate into Raydium pools, and coins from Meteora's launch tool graduate into Meteora pools.
BOOST: the first five minutes
Since late July 2026, pump.fun runs a mode called BOOST on most new coins. About 17.6 SOL of the SOL raised on a SOL-paired coin is held back from the pool at first. Over roughly the first five minutes after graduation, that SOL buys the coin in its new pool, and the coins it buys are burned. Every buy puts that SOL into the pool, so when BOOST is done the pool holds about 85 SOL, the full amount raised. Creators cannot switch it off.
For a trader this means there is steady buying in the first minutes, and then it stops. After that, only real buyers hold the price up.
What changes after graduation
| What | On the curve | After graduation |
|---|---|---|
| Who you trade with | The curve's code | A pool on PumpSwap |
| Where the coin shows up | Mostly the launchpad and trading apps | Every swap app, aggregator (a tool that finds the best price across pools) and chart site |
| Money behind the price | Only what buyers paid in | The SOL raised, about 85 SOL, which nobody can withdraw |
| Fee per trade (pump.fun) | 1.25% | 1.25% at first, then a sliding scale down to 0.30% for very big coins |
| Creator's cut | 0.30% | 0.30% until a 420 SOL market cap, then 0.95%, falling as the coin grows |
Thin pools move fast
A fresh pool is small. Picture about 85 SOL on one side and about 207 million coins on the other. Every trade changes that balance, and with so little in the pool, even a normal-sized trade moves the price a lot.
How far does one trade move the price?
Rough numbers for a pool right after graduation, before fees. Real pools change with every trade.
- Step 1: Someone buys with 5 SOL. They get about 11.5 million coins, and the price jumps about 12%.
- Step 2: Someone sells 20 million coins. They get about 7.5 SOL, not the 8.2 SOL the coins looked worth, and the price drops about 17%.
- Step 3: A sniper who bought 30 million coins near the start sells all of them at once. They get about 10.8 SOL, and the price drops about 24%.
The gap between the price you see and the price you get is called price impact. In a thin pool it is large, so a big sell from one early holder can wipe out an hour of buying in a single trade.
Graduation is not a finish line
Many coins pump into graduation and dump right after. Early buyers and snipers often use graduation as their exit, because that is when the most new buyers arrive. Plenty of coins barely trade after it. Graduating is a milestone, not a sign of quality.
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This guide is for learning. It is not financial advice. Most memecoins go to zero and most people who trade them lose money. Only ever trade what you can afford to lose.