APT's early unlock period ended on October 12, 2026. It applied to the token vesting schedule for core contributors and early investors. Those tokens have now been fully released. But "unlock ended" only means this specific group no longer has monthly vested shares entering the market. The network itself continues to produce new APT through staking rewards. Staking is now the main source of new APT. The annual reward rate dropped from 5.19% to 2.6%, but with about 763 million APT staked, roughly 19.8 million new APT are still created each year.
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What the end of unlocking changed, and what it did not
What ended was the release of two allocation lines: 190 million APT allocated to core contributors at genesis and about 134.8 million APT for early investors. Together, that is about 324.8 million APT, or 32.48% of the initial 1 billion tokens. These two batches had a 12-month lockup, followed by monthly releases until month 48. The final payment was made on September 12, 2026. Starting in October, the planned monthly release dropped from about 11.31 million APT to about 4.54 million APT, a decrease of roughly 60%.
What did not change: the community pool and the Aptos Foundation pool still release 1/120 of their remaining balances each month. This continues until 2032. About 331.7 million APT are still locked in these two pools. More importantly, staking rewards keep creating new tokens. This does not depend on "unlocking". It is issuance at the protocol level.
Two paths of new issuance, and one possible offset
Currently, APT's new supply mainly comes from staking rewards. About 63% of the total supply (around 763 million APT) is staked. At a 2.6% annual rate, about 19.8 million APT are minted each year. This number is smaller than the peak unlock period, but it will not stop just because unlocking ended.
Running alongside this is the burn mechanism. All transaction gas fees on Aptos are permanently burned. From launch to mid-September 2026, about 1.9 million APT have been burned. The Foundation increased gas fees tenfold. It also incubated an on-chain perpetual contract exchange called Decibel. Decibel is projected to burn more than 32 million APT per year once it scales up. If that burn level is reached, it could theoretically exceed the roughly 19.8 million APT from staking issuance, turning net supply deflationary. But this is a projection based on Decibel's growth assumptions, not a fact that has already happened. So far, burned amounts are far below that level.
In addition, the Foundation has permanently locked and staked 210 million APT. It promises not to sell or distribute them. This principal does not enter circulation. The supply cap is set at 2.1 billion APT. Genesis minted 1 billion. Staking has produced about 196 million APT cumulatively so far. There is still about 904 million APT of room below the cap.
What to watch, and what not to over-read
"Unlock ended" is a calendar event that has already been fulfilled. Markets usually price unlock schedules in advance. Treating "no more monthly selling by team and investors after October 12" as a benefit that has not yet been digested has weak support. What really affects supply pressure is the net difference between staking issuance and burning, plus the ongoing release of about 4.54 million APT per month from the community and Foundation pools.
There are two specific data points to watch. First, Decibel's actual trading volume and the corresponding APT burn: can it approach the projection of 32 million APT per year? Second, whether the staking rate drops significantly because the reward rate fell. If a large amount of APT is unstaked, it does not directly increase total supply, but it changes the sellable portion in circulation. Unstaking has a maximum waiting period of 14 days, so changes in staked amounts are gradual and observable.
One boundary that is easy to overlook: as of September 30, 2026, APT's circulating supply was about 871 million, and total supply was about 1.2 billion. The end of unlocking reduces "the amount planned to enter circulation in the future", not "the amount already in circulation". The circulating portion does not disappear because unlocking ended. It is still in the market.
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References
- CoinMarketCap·The last Aptos team and investor tokens are out，2026-10-26
- Bitget·Aptos insider vesting ends, cutting APT unlocks by 60%，2026-10-26
- CoinMarketCap·Aptos cuts monthly token release by 60% as early backer vesting ends，2026-10-26
- Gate·Aptos永久锁定2.1亿枚APT，质押奖励减半，2026-10-26
- Yahoo Finance·Aptos ends four-year token unlocks as monthly releases drop 60%，2026-10-26
- Aptos Network·Aptos Tokenomics Update: Moving to Performance-Driven Supply Mechanisms，2026-10-26
- BingX·Aptos ends four-year token unlocks as monthly releases drop 60%，2026-10-26
- CoinMarketCap·Aptos Ends Four-Year Insider Vesting as Monthly Issuance Drops 60%，2026-10-26
