In brief
- DeFi ecosystem 1inch has unveiled Aqua, a new shared liquidity protocol.
- Aqua enables different strategies to access the same tokens, in a bid to eliminate pain points facing liquidity providers, such as the need to split or lock funds across pools.
- Devs can access Aqua’s software development kit, libraries, and full documentation now, ahead of Aqua’s frontend launch in Q1 2026.
DeFi ecosystem 1inch has unveiled a new shared liquidity protocol—with developers given early access.
Billed as “the foundation for scalable, capital-efficient DeFi,” Aqua aims to eliminate some of the main pain points facing liquidity providers, by enabling different strategies to access the same tokens. Executives say this eliminates the need to split or lock funds across pools, all while ensuring smaller projects can reliably support larger and more efficient transactions.
Although the frontend is due for release in the first quarter of 2026, 1inch says Web3 builders can begin to explore Aqua’s software development kit, libraries and full documentation now. New strategies can be built and tested from scratch, or assembled using a library of instructions available through the SwapVM protocol.
During this early phase of testing, contribution and bug discovery boundaries of up to $100,000 are available.
Aqua has the potential to “transform how capital and yield strategies operate in DeFi,” a spokesperson for 1inch said in a statement shared with Decrypt. Upon launch, multiple strategies will be able to access a user’s balance at the same time—without these funds being removed from wallets or locked into smart contracts for an extended period.
The liquidity protocol marks “the beginning of a new era of shared liquidity and unlimited capital efficiency,” as protocols will no longer need to compete for funds, the spokesperson added. Instead, the vision is to provide deeper liquidity across the industry—and reduce fragmentation.
“Aqua solves liquidity fragmentation for market makers by multiplying effective capital. From now on, the only limit to your capital efficiency is your strategy,” 1inch Co-Founder Anton Bukov said. “Building AMM strategies for Aqua is the hottest opportunity in DeFi today,” he added, calling on liquidity providers to “unleash their potential.”
1inch Co-Founder Sergej Kunz added that Aqua has the potential to “revolutionize DeFi” once again—following in the footsteps of its aggregation protocol in 2019.
“With Aqua, 1inch is once again giving users back the power, empowering them to manage and optimize liquidity on their own terms,” he said.
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