Before diving into Kamino-specific strategies, it helps to understand how airdrop farming works as a concept. This guide covers the fundamentals every farmer should know.

What Is Airdrop Farming?

Airdrop farming is the practice of interacting with DeFi protocols before they launch a token, with the goal of qualifying for a retroactive token distribution. Protocols reward early users with points, NFTs, or direct token allocations based on their on-chain activity.

Unlike traditional investing, farming is about consistent, meaningful usage — not just depositing capital and forgetting about it. The most successful farmers treat it like building a relationship with a protocol over weeks or months.

Key concept

Points are not tokens. They are a scoring mechanism that protocols use to determine your eventual allocation. The conversion rate is usually unknown until the token launch.

How Points Systems Work

Most modern airdrops use a points-based system rather than simple snapshot balances. Points typically accrue based on:

  • Capital deployed — how much you deposit, lend, or provide as collateral
  • Duration — how long you maintain positions
  • Activity type — lending, borrowing, trading, providing liquidity
  • Volume — especially relevant for DEX and perps protocols
  • Referrals & social — some protocols boost points for community participation

How to Evaluate a Farm

Not every airdrop is worth your time and capital. Before committing, ask:

  1. Is the protocol legitimate? Check audits, TVL, team background, and product-market fit.
  2. What's the opportunity cost? Your capital could earn yield elsewhere while farming.
  3. What's the risk? Smart contract risk, liquidation risk, impermanent loss — factor it all in.
  4. How crowded is the farm? More farmers dilutes everyone's allocation.
  5. Is there real yield? The best farms pay you while you wait for the airdrop.
Pro tip

Kamino is attractive because you often earn real yield (lending APY, liquidity fees) while simultaneously farming points. This reduces your opportunity cost compared to zero-yield farms.

Getting Set Up on Solana

To farm Kamino and other Solana protocols, you'll need:

  • A Solana wallet (Phantom, Backpack, or Solflare)
  • SOL for transaction fees (keep ~0.5 SOL as buffer)
  • Stablecoins or blue-chip assets (USDC, SOL, JitoSOL) to deploy
  • A clear strategy — don't scatter capital across too many products

Common Mistakes to Avoid

  • Chasing volume blindly — wash trading and botting often get filtered out
  • Over-leveraging — liquidation wipes out both capital and farming progress
  • Farm hopping — jumping between protocols every week dilutes your position history
  • Ignoring fees — perps and frequent swaps eat into returns quickly
  • Expecting guaranteed returns — airdrops are speculative; never farm with money you can't lose
Risk warning

DeFi protocols can be exploited, governance can change point rules, and airdrops may never materialize. Only deploy capital you are comfortable losing entirely.

Next Steps

Once you understand the basics, move on to our Kamino-specific guides. Kamino is one of the most comprehensive DeFi suites on Solana, making it an excellent primary farm with multiple product lines to diversify your activity.