On December 18th, Aster announced that the fifth phase of the airdrop, Stage 5: Crystal, will begin on December 22nd. The airdrop schedule for this phase is as follows:
• Duration: 6 weeks (December 22, 2025 – February 1, 2026)
• Allocation percentage: 1.2% of the total ASTER supply (approximately 96 million ASTER)
• How to claim: You can choose to lock up your funds for 3 months.
In terms of mechanism design, the 1.2% airdrop quota is divided equally into two parts:
• 0.6% base share: Available immediately • 0.6% lock-up reward: Unlocked after 3 months of lock-up
Users can choose their own claiming strategy:
• Claim Now: Receive only the base share; the lock-up reward portion will be destroyed. • Wait for Lock-up to Complete: Receive all shares (base + lock-up reward).
This design provides instant liquidity while strengthening long-term holding incentives and accelerating deflation through the burning of rewards upon early withdrawal. Aster also disclosed the Aster Chain timeline:
Testnet: End of December 2025 mainnet: Q1 2026 Staking & Governance: Q2 2026
Aster points out that launching its own L1 network in the future will give it greater autonomy over fee structures, validator economics, and protocol upgrades, strengthening ASTER token value capture from the underlying infrastructure level.
