What is Pudgy Penguins PENGU crypto?

PENGU is the cryptocurrency of Pudgy Penguins, one of the best-known NFT brands. It is a token on the Solana blockchain, while the original penguin pictures are NFTs on Ethereum. PENGU launched in December 2024 and was handed out to NFT holders and several other crypto communities in an airdrop.

What is Pudgy Penguins crypto?

Pudgy Penguins started as a collection of 8,888 cartoon penguin NFTs released in July 2021 by four pseudonymous developers, according to a 2025 SEC filing by fund manager Canary Capital. The pictures are ERC-721 tokens, the standard format for unique items on Ethereum. In early 2022, the filing says, the community pushed out the original founders and a new team led by Luca Netz took over.

Under Netz, Pudgy Penguins grew into a consumer brand. The Block reports that its Pudgy Toys plushies are sold at Walmart and Target and link to an online world called Pudgy World. The company behind the project is Igloo Inc., which Decrypt says is also building Abstract, an Ethereum layer 2 network aimed at consumers. Related collections include Lil Pudgys and Pudgy Rogs.

What does PENGU crypto do?

Not much in a technical sense. The Canary filing calls PENGU a utility token but states that Pudgy Penguins has announced no particular use for it and no benefits for holders beyond closer association with the community. It also notes that PENGU has no blockchain of its own. With no defined function, it is closer to a meme coin, whose appeal rests on attention and community, than to a token that powers a product.

Netz described the token to Decrypt as a way to create alignment between the brand and its fans. Canary Capital filed in March 2025 to launch a US exchange-traded fund that would hold mostly PENGU plus some Pudgy Penguins NFTs.

What chain is PENGU on?

PENGU is an SPL token, the standard token format on Solana. At launch, The Block reported that support for Ethereum and Abstract would come later, with a bridge built on LayerZero to carry PENGU to Abstract once that network went live. The NFTs themselves remain on Ethereum.

How was PENGU distributed?

The total supply is 88,888,888,888 tokens. Decrypt lists the main shares:

• 25.9% to the Pudgy community, including holders of Pudgy Penguins, Lil Pudgys and Pudgy Rogs.
• 24.12% to other communities, including holders of other NFT collections.
• 17.8% to the Pudgy Penguins team, locked for a year and then released over three years.
• 12.35% for liquidity pools.
• 11.48% to the company, on the same lock-up.
• Smaller shares for public goods, wider promotion and FTT holders.

The Block said claimers needed to connect both a Solana and an Ethereum wallet. The original window was 88 days, with unclaimed tokens to be burned, and Decrypt reported that the team later shortened it.