DeFi Education Fund Poll Finds 22% of US Adults Have Used Crypto

1,545 Adults Polled on Finance

The DeFi Education Fund, a crypto policy advocacy organization, released on Tuesday a national survey of American attitudes toward money and digital assets, conducted with the pollster Ipsos. The study was fielded from September 8 to 16 among 1,545 US adults aged 18 and over, with a margin of error of ±2.8 percentage points. Its headline finding: 22% of American adults have owned or used cryptocurrency, up from 18% in 2025. Active usage tells a flatter story. Only 13% of respondents reported using crypto in the past twelve months, unchanged from the previous year, which means the rise in lifetime exposure came mostly from lapsed users, a group that doubled from 5% to 11% of adults. Forward intent barely moved, with 17% saying they might hold crypto in the future against 16% a year earlier. Among those who did try it, curiosity was the most common motivation at 34%. The knowledge gap is wide: 16% of Americans want to learn about crypto, but only 9% consider themselves knowledgeable, and 35% admit they could not explain it to someone else. The fund's published key data from the survey, titled The State and Future of Finance, is available on its research portal. For regional comparison, the Japan Cryptoasset Trading Business Association counted roughly 8.98 million active accounts and 14.47 million opened accounts as of the end of August 2026.

Exchanges Rank Below Banks on Trust

Trust is where the survey turns sharply negative. Only 19% of respondents consider the US financial system safe, and 63% say it must be upgraded to counter new threats such as cybercrime and artificial intelligence. Demand for control runs through the answers: 74% prioritize financial privacy, 80% want a system that gives individuals freer control over personal data, 74% want more autonomy over their funds, and 66% want access to their money at any time. Confidence in traditional institutions is softening too. Credit unions rank highest at 48%, down five points from 53% a year earlier, followed by major national banks at 42% and regional or community banks at 41%. Centralized fintech firms sit at 21% and online-only banks at 18%. Crypto platforms rank lower still: just 4% of respondents place high trust in centralized exchanges, 53% say they do not trust them at all, and DeFi platforms fare barely better at 5%. The wording of the question itself changed the result. Asked whether candidates in the 2026 US midterm elections should support building next-generation financial technology in America, 35% called it important; when the same question instead named blockchain, crypto or DeFi, support fell to 13%. Commenting on the findings, journalist Eleanor Terrett described crypto as still carrying a branding problem in 2026, pointing to Andreessen Horowitz's decision to rebrand its a16z Crypto fund as a16z Frontier and widen its mandate toward AI and other frontier technologies. Where DeFi does spark interest, the use cases are practical. Of respondents open to trying it, 40% would do so if it were accessible, with 10% expressing very high intent. Savings appeal to 85% of that group, up from 77% in 2025, domestic transfers to friends and family to 82%, up from 73%, earning interest on deposits to 82%, and receiving salaries, retirement benefits or government payments to 69%, up from 58%.

Support Falls to 13% When Crypto Is Named

The most actionable number in the release is the wording test. Support for financial modernization drops twenty-two points the moment crypto-specific vocabulary enters the question, which points to language and trust, not a shortage of latent demand, as the sector's real obstacle. The usage data supports that reading: lifetime exposure rose four points while active use stayed flat at 13%, so the industry is mostly recapturing former users rather than converting new ones. The 40% who say they would try DeFi, concentrated in savings and earning deposit interest, the core promise of yield farming, represent a reachable audience, but only if trust in the platforms hosting those services climbs from its current 5%.