Base launches mainnet bridge UI for end users, sets Aug. 9 for official launch
Coinbase’s Base network has released a user interface (UI) for its official bridge, allowing end users to onboard for the first time without relying on developer tools, according to an Aug. 3 announcement. The team has set Aug. 9 as Base’s “official” release date. The team will award over 100 Ether worth approximately $184,000, in grants to developers and content creators as part of a month-long launch event called the “Onchain Summer.”
The Base mainnet launched for builders on July 13, but it lacked a functioning UI for its bridge from Ethereum. At the time, the only way to use the network was to employ command-line developer tools to bridge ETH from Ethereum’s layer 1.
In the Aug. 3 announcement, the team said the bridge UI is now running. End users can start using the network immediately without waiting for the official launch; however, some of Base’s initial Web3 apps may not be available until the official launch on Aug. 9.
The team also announced a month-long “Onchain Summer” celebration. Each day, builders will “be bringing you something fun to do onchain, highlighting art, music, gaming, advocacy, and more,” the announcement stated. The team will award ETH grants to individuals or groups that create Base-related websites, art and videos or who deploy new protocols to the network between Aug. 9 and Sept. 13. The team will hand out Base-related nonfungible tokens and ETH to users who bridge to the network or complete educational “quests.”
Some investors lost millions of dollars worth of crypto on Base while trying to use it when it was “launched for builders” and not publicly available. The Pond0x (PNDX) memecoin was launched for Base on July 28, and tech-savvy investors who knew how to bridge without a UI poured over $2 million into the project, only to have the token collapse to near zero in price as a bug in its transfer function was found. Another Base memecoin, Bald (BALD), resulted in losses of approximately $1.9 million when the developer pulled liquidity from the exchange it was trading on.
