How to buy meme coins
The quickest way to buy a meme coin is a memecoin app that takes a card or Apple Pay directly, such as fomo or Moonshot or pump.fun: no separate wallet or exchange needed. If you already hold SOL in a wallet like Phantom, you can swap inside it. Active traders use a terminal like Axiom or GMGN for lower fees and faster fills.
Route 1: you have no crypto yet — use a memecoin app
Apps that take a card or Apple Pay and create the wallet for you are the fewest steps from zero to a first trade.
fomo
fomo is a social, multichain crypto trading app from FOMO Labs, Inc. on iOS, Android and web. It offers gasless memecoin swaps, a trader feed and leaderboards, and Hyperliquid perps outside the US.
Fee: 0.50% per trade, with a $0.95 minimum on Solana, and gas is covered by fomo. Perps cost 0.05% per transaction plus protocol fees. Terms say the fee varies by size, token and routing and is shown before you confirm. · card / on-ramp supported · US: partial
Open fomo — 10% off feesMoonshot
Moonshot is a mobile app for buying memecoins, tokenized stocks and leveraged positions on Solana, with a Create tab for launching coins. It describes itself as a self-custodial wallet that routes swaps through the Jupiter aggregator.
Fee: Moonshot charges 2.5% per trade on $2-$100 trades (about $0.99 minimum) and 1% per trade on $100+ trades, plus a separate crypto fee for network and routing costs. Round trip on a $100+ trade is 2%. · card / on-ramp supported · US: partial
Open Moonshotpump.fun
pump.fun is a memecoin launchpad where anyone can create a coin that trades on a bonding curve and graduates to its own AMM, PumpSwap. It runs on Solana and Robinhood Chain through a web app and iOS/Android apps, and also offers perpetuals routed to Hyperliquid.
Fee: From 2026-10-17, trades in the pump.fun web and mobile apps pay a 0.45% Platform Fee, or 0.40% with another user's referral code. It is not charged on Terminal or third-party interfaces. On top of that, bonding-curve trades pay 1.25% (0.30% creator, 0.95% protocol), and graduated coins pay PumpSwap pool fees that fall from 1.25% to 0.30% as market cap rises. · US: partial
Open pump.fun — 11% off feesRoute 2: you already have SOL in a wallet
Wallets like these let you paste a token's contract address and swap in-app. Convenient, but in-wallet swap fees are often higher than a terminal's.
- Phantom — 0.85% Phantom fee on most swaps (including cross-chain swaps), plus network fees and price impact. Swapping supported stablecoins (USDC, USDT, USDG, PYUSD) into the Cash account is free. Perps cost 0.095% per position operation (0.05% Phantom + 0.045% Hyperliquid).
- Solflare — Solflare's terms say fees may be charged on token swaps, but no swap-fee percentage is published on its help center, site or terms (checked 2026-10-16); quotes in-app include any fee. Perps through Solflare cost up to 0.085% per side, with Solana network fees sponsored.
- Backpack — Backpack Wallet charges a flat 0.85% fee on swaps, already included in displayed rates, plus network and DEX fees. Backpack Exchange (separate product) charges 0.08% maker / 0.10% taker on spot and 0.02% / 0.05% on futures at Tier 1.
Route 3: you'll trade often — use a terminal
Terminals charge lower fees than most apps and wallets, show new launches as they happen, and add limit orders, wallet tracking and copy trading.
- Axiom — 2% round trip, 10% discount on trading fees when signing up through a referral link via referral
- GMGN — 2% round trip
- Padre — — round trip
- Trojan — 2% round trip, 10% off trading fees via referral
Ranked: best Solana trading terminals →
Before you buy any coin
- Get the exact contract address from the project's own X account or site — copycat tokens with the same name are common.
- Check liquidity and holders. If a few wallets hold most of the supply, or the liquidity is tiny, one sell can crash the price. Why market cap isn't liquidity.
- Check the token can be sold and the mint/freeze authority is revoked. What mint authority means.
- Start small and set slippage carefully. Slippage explained.
What it costs
Three layers: the venue's platform fee on the buy and on the sell, the pool fee of the DEX the trade routes through (Pump.fun's bonding curve is 1.25%), and network fees. Card payments add an on-ramp fee. Compare venues on the fee sheet, or run your numbers in the memecoin calculator.
FAQ
What is the easiest way to buy meme coins?
The quickest way to buy a meme coin is a memecoin app that takes a card or Apple Pay directly, such as fomo or Moonshot or pump.fun: no separate wallet or exchange needed. If you already hold SOL in a wallet like Phantom, you can swap inside it. Active traders use a terminal like Axiom or GMGN for lower fees and faster fills.
Do I need a crypto wallet to buy meme coins?
Not always. Several memecoin apps create a wallet for you inside the app (an embedded wallet) and let you pay with a card. You can usually export it later.
How much does it cost to buy a meme coin?
Expect a platform fee of roughly 0.4–1% each way, plus a card/on-ramp fee if you pay with a card, plus tiny Solana network fees. See the fee sheet for exact numbers per venue.
Are meme coins safe?
No. Most new memecoins lose most of their value, and many are rugs. Only use money you can lose entirely, check a coin's contract before buying, and never share your seed phrase.
Buttons are DexSheet referral links. Disclosure.