Delisting activity across major centralized exchanges has settled at 400 to 500 tokens per quarter throughout 2026, well above the 67 recorded in Q1 2024 but below the record 786 seen in Q2 2025. A single exchange, Gate, accounts for the majority of this activity, and the tokens it and other exchanges have removed cluster heavily in the same speculative categories, DeFi, GameFi, and Meme, that defined the previous market cycle.

Quarterly delistings have increased sharply over the past two years. After rising from just 67 in Q1 2024 to a record 786 in Q2 2025, a spike driven largely by Gate’s mass token removals, delisting activity has stabilized at around 400–500 tokens per quarter throughout 2026.

Top CEXs by Delistings (H1 2026)

Gate dominates CEX delisting activity. The exchange removed 573 tokens in H1 2026, accounting for nearly 60% of all delistings across major CEXs. In Q2 2026 alone, Gate delisted 221 tokens—more than every other tracked exchange combined. By contrast, OKX did not delist a single token during the first half of 2026, although the exchange has also been relatively conservative in adding new listings.

Gate’s aggressive delisting activity began before the 2025 crypto market peak. The categories it cut most in 2026 were DeFi, GameFi and Meme — the hype sectors of the previous cycle

Delistings concentrate in the categories that saw the most listings in the previous cycle. In H1 2026, DeFi was the most delisted category (207), followed by GameFi (141) and Meme (98). DeFi’s position at the top partly reflects that it was also the most-listed category in 2025.

Most Delisted Token Categories in H1 2026

GameFi stands out among the leading delisting categories. While new GameFi listings have fallen to their lowest level since Q3 2023, the sector remains the second most-delisted category in H1 2026. Exchanges are not only listing fewer GameFi projects – they are also actively removing existing ones.

The Shortest-Lived Tokens on Major CEXs

Some tokens lasted only a few weeks or even a single day before being delisted. The table below highlights the ten shortest-lived tokens across major CEXs, ranked by the number of days between listing and delisting. 

It’s worth noting that this list is made up almost entirely of the more speculative corners of the market, memecoins, NFTs and GameFi tokens, which tend to launch on hype and fade quickly. Bitget accounts for half of the entries here, though this likely says more about how quickly a given exchange reacts than about the tokens themselves. In several cases the same token stayed listed much longer elsewhere, and was removed only months later on other exchanges, or even still trading today.

Conclusion

The concentration of both delisting volume and the shortest token lifespans in Meme, GameFi, and NFT categories indicates that exchanges treat these listings as disposable by design, adding them quickly during periods of hype and removing them just as fast once attention moves elsewhere. Bitget’s outsized share of the shortest-lived tokens likely reflects a faster internal review cycle rather than worse token selection, since several of the same tokens remained listed on other exchanges for months longer. The more durable question is whether Gate’s removal pace, still far ahead of every other tracked exchange, represents a one-time cleanup of legacy listings or a permanent shift toward stricter ongoing review.