How to buy meme coins on Solana
This is the process, start to finish, as it works with us: get an account, fund the wallet, set the controls once, send the order, then keep track of what you hold. It is scoped to the Solana buy flow — we cover other chains too, and their mechanics differ.
We publish this page, so it describes our own flow rather than surveying every way to do this.
Step 1: an account
Our docs describe signing up with email, Google or Phantom, and our own screens carry those three options. Signing up gives you a wallet in your account, which is the wallet the next step funds.
Step 2: fund the wallet with SOL
Our deposit screen shows a Deposit Address and names the network it expects — the warning reads "Only deposit SOL through the Solana network." Send SOL on Solana, to the address shown in your own account. There is also an option to buy through Onramper if you do not already hold SOL.
Two things need funding and it helps to keep them apart. Network fees on Solana are paid in SOL, so the wallet needs SOL regardless of what you are buying — see Solana's fee structure docs. The trade itself can be denominated in something else: our settings describe trading in USDC while SOL still pays gas. "I have USDC" and "I can pay network fees" are separate questions.
If a trade is ever refused for a shortfall, we have written up exactly what that message itemises in why we say insufficient SOL balance to cover priority fee and bribe fee.
Step 3: set the controls once
Buy Settings and Sell Settings hold your priority fee, bribe, slippage and MEV Mode, separately for buying and selling. You set them once rather than retyping them on every order. Four controls, and what each one is:
- Priority fee, under PRIORITY — a payment that raises a transaction's scheduling priority on Solana.
- Bribe, under BRIBE and tied to MEV Mode — a tip amount set separately from the priority fee.
- Slippage — the execution-price range you are willing to accept.
- MEV Mode — three options. Our own tooltip describes the tradeoff: Off sends trades as fast as possible to all Solana validators; Reduced avoids blacklisted validators; Secure, marked BETA, sends only to whitelisted validators and "can be slow."
There is also Auto Fee, a switch in the same place. Our own tooltip describes it as automatically adjusting priority and bribe fees based on network conditions, and locked once a limit order is created.
We have written up how the priority fee and the bribe differ, so this page does not re-teach it: see what "insufficient SOL balance to cover priority fee and bribe fee" means.
Where it stops. Saved settings make your inputs consistent. They do not make an outcome. No fee setting controls the price you get.
Step 4: open the token and send the order
Searching brings up matching tokens, and selecting a result opens that token's own page, where the price chart sits alongside the trade form. Different tokens can share a name and a ticker, so the mint address is what identifies the one you mean — copy it from the token page and compare it with any address shared elsewhere before you trade.
The trade form offers two order types. A Market order is the one you send to execute against the market as it is. A Limit order is the other option, and selecting it does not guarantee execution.
There is also an Instant Trade panel on the token page, which you can open and close, with its own settings. It is the same trade, reachable without leaving what you are looking at.
Where it stops. A quote reflects market state when it was made. Between quote and execution other trades can change the pool, so the price you get can differ, within whatever slippage limit applies, or the trade can fail. Support is not universal either: a trade can be refused before it is sent, and the refusal names the reason — a pool we cannot trade right now, a venue that is sell-only, or a quote token the venue cannot trade.
Step 5: keep track of it
Add to watchlist on the token page saves a token you want to return to. The Portfolio page shows balances and active positions for what you already hold.
The tradeoffs
Worth being plain about, because these are the parts the steps do not change.
- Slippage pulls both ways. A wider tolerance permits more adverse price movement before a trade is rejected, which allows a worse fill. A tighter one limits how far the price can move against you, and makes a rejection more likely when it does move.
- Fees are not an outcome. Higher priority fees or tips do not guarantee that a transaction lands, how fast it lands, or the price you get. Base and priority fees can be charged when a processed transaction fails.
- MEV Mode trades reach for protection. Our own tooltip says Secure can be slow. That is the shape of the choice, not a recommendation of one setting.
- New tokens are high risk. Completing these steps correctly says nothing about whether a token holds its value. A new token can lose most or all of it quickly.
To run through these steps against a live market, with the limits on this page in mind: Trade on Axiom
Crypto trading is high risk and you can lose everything you put in. Nothing here is financial advice.