Mantle TVL crossed $450 million, and that happened within seven days of the Aave integration going live. For a network that many sidelined heading into 2026, that’s a number worth taking seriously.
The question now isn’t whether the growth happened. It did. The real question is whether it sticks and what it means for MNT sitting at $0.5773 today.
What the Aave Integration Actually Changed for Mantle TVL
Bringing Aave onto Mantle wasn’t just a partnership announcement to post on X. Aave carries genuine weight in DeFi. It manages over $26 billion in TVL across its V3 deployments and has a track record that institutional liquidity providers trust by default.
When Aave went live on Mantle, it unlocked real utility. Borrowers found competitive rates. Liquidity providers could deploy capital into lending markets without jumping to a different chain. That combination of access and efficiency is exactly what pulls serious money into DeFi.
Mantle TVL responded fast. Capital inflows accelerated within the first 48 hours, and the network crossed $450M before the first week ended. According to DeFiLlama, this represents roughly a 76% TVL jump in a short window, with Aave V3 now sitting as one of the leading protocols on the chain.
Also Read: Aave Governance Vote Sparks Token Equity Tension. Wintermute CEO Weighs In.
What’s Driving the Mantle TVL Explosion
Before the Aave launch, Mantle TVL was climbing but lacked a headline catalyst. Layer 2s live and die by liquidity depth and the protocols they attract. Arbitrum pulled ahead partly because it secured major DeFi integrations early. Mantle is now running that same playbook.
The 450% surge figure reflects cumulative growth from a lower base, which is important to understand. This isn’t Mantle going from $1B to $4.5B overnight. It’s a network building from a modest foundation and now crossing a legitimacy threshold that gets it taken seriously alongside Optimism and Base in DeFi conversations.
Mantle TVL now sits in a range where protocols start making deployment decisions based on existing liquidity rather than promises. That’s a meaningful shift.
Can MNT Hit $1 From Here?
MNT is sitting at $0.5773 right now. To put that in perspective, it touched $2.86 at peak in late 2024 before the broader market unwind dragged it down hard. It’s been grinding lower since, and $1 would actually represent a near 73% recovery from where it trades today.
That’s a big ask. But not an unreasonable one if TVL momentum holds.
Here’s the rough math. With around 3.25 billion tokens in circulation, pushing MNT to $1 means the market cap needs to reach approximately $3.25 billion. It’s currently sitting near $1.87 billion. Doable, but it needs more than one strong week of on-chain data to justify that kind of re-rating.
Also Read: Yield Farming Explained — How to Earn 50%+ APR Safely in 2026
The Aave launch helps on the demand side. Every new protocol that deploys on Mantle creates more reasons for users to hold and use MNT for gas. More activity translates to more fee demand, which supports price structurally. Still, with broader crypto sentiment stuck in fear territory, the realistic window for $1 is probably Q2 or Q3, not February.
What is Mantle TVL?
Short answer: It’s the dollar value of all crypto assets sitting inside Mantle’s smart contracts at any given moment. When it goes up, it generally means more users and capital trust the network enough to put money to work there.
Why did Mantle TVL spike after the Aave launch?
Aave brought trusted lending infrastructure to Mantle. Liquidity providers and borrowers followed, deploying capital quickly into a protocol they already knew and used on other chains.
Also Read: What Are Trustless Protocols And Transactions?
Is MNT a good buy right now?
At $0.5773, MNT is nursing heavy losses from its all-time high. The TVL data is genuinely encouraging but one catalyst rarely sustains a full recovery on its own. Watch whether TVL holds above $400M over the next few weeks before reading too much into the price action.
Where can I track Mantle TVL live?
Head to DeFiLlama’s Mantle page. It breaks the numbers down by individual protocol so you can see exactly where the liquidity is sitting and whether it’s growing or bleeding out.
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Disclaimer:
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