Aerodrome and Velodrome merge into Aero: AERO and VELO conversion dates and steps

The Aerodrome Velodrome merger goes live on 22 October 2026 at 00:00 UTC (8:00 PM on 21 October, US Eastern time). From that moment the two decentralized exchanges built by Dromos Labs become a single exchange called Aero, and their tokens fold into one new AERO token on Base. Holders of AERO keep the same number of tokens, while 1 VELO becomes 0.044 new AERO, according to the official Aero Upgrade and Launch Hub. Binance and Coinbase have both confirmed the same ratios and will convert balances for their users.

Anyone holding the tokens in their own wallet has more to do. “Nothing converts automatically,” the Aero hub says. Self-custody holders must upgrade by hand on aerodrome.finance or velodrome.finance once the portals open, and the upgrade cannot be undone.

Aero merger dates: what happens on 22 October

Aero confirmed the final date in a post titled “Aero Launch Update: All Systems Go” on 25 September 2026. Four things happen at the same minute on 22 October, 00:00 UTC: the Aero app opens, emissions on the old Aerodrome and Velodrome contracts stop, emissions of the new AERO begin and the upgrade portals go live. An hour later, at 01:00 UTC, vote-escrow positions (veNFTs) that voted in the final epoch become eligible to upgrade. The first Autopilot allocation follows at 16:00 UTC.

Aero will run on seven networks at launch: Base, Ethereum Mainnet, OP Mainnet, Arc, Ink, Robinhood Chain and Arbitrum. The token itself lives on Base. Velodrome keeps working for swaps and deposits on Celo, Fraxtal, Soneium and Unichain, but without its own token economy.

AERO and VELO conversion ratios and new supply

The ownership split favours the larger of the two venues. Aerodrome holders receive 94.5% of the new supply and Velodrome holders 5.5%. Some media report that the split follows each protocol’s revenue over the 52 weeks before the announcement; no official Aero page we read confirms that basis. The supply figures below are projections published on the Aero hub, and they may still move.

In practice, 10,000 VELO becomes 440 new AERO. The roughly 117 million AERO created for the Velodrome side lift total supply by about 6%.

Tokens on Binance or Coinbase: the exchange converts

If your AERO or VELO sits on an exchange account, you do not need to touch the upgrade portals. In its 16 October announcement, Binance said it “will handle all technical requirements for users who are involved in these events”. Binance lists VELO under the ticker VELODROME, and that ticker is going away. The cut-off times matter for anyone using margin, loans, futures or Earn products:

• 20 October, 06:00 UTC: margin borrowing suspended.
• 28 October, 03:00 to 10:00 UTC: VELODROME loans closed, no new VELODROMEUSDT perpetual positions from 08:30, perpetuals settled at 09:00, VELODROME removed from margin at 10:00.
• 30 October, 07:00 UTC: removed from Binance Pay.
• 2 November: removed from Convert Low-Value Assets and Buy & Sell Crypto at 02:00 UTC, from Spot Copy Trading at 03:00 UTC; Simple Earn Flexible positions auto-redeemed to Spot at 07:00 UTC.
• 3 November, 03:00 UTC: VELODROME/USDT spot pair delisted. At 03:30 UTC, VELODROME and AERO deposits and withdrawals are suspended. VELODROME will not reopen.
• 6 November, 08:00 UTC: converted AERO resubscribed to Simple Earn.

AERO spot pairs on Binance keep trading throughout. Binance has not yet given the date when AERO deposits and withdrawals reopen; a separate notice will follow.

Coinbase posted its terms on its Exchange status page on 1 October 2026. Conversion is automatic, at the same ratios, with no transaction fee. Sends and receives of AERO and VELO are disabled from 2 to 4 November 2026. VELO order books switch to limit-only before VELO trading ends on 2 November, while AERO trading is unaffected. After the migration Coinbase stops supporting deposits and withdrawals of the legacy AERO token and warns that legacy AERO sent to a deposit address “may not be recoverable”. Customers who prefer to upgrade themselves can move their tokens to a self-custody wallet before 2 November; Coinbase notes that tax consequences may apply.

This page tracks the window until 4 November 2026, 23:59 UTC, the close of the Coinbase conversion window and the last exchange date in the official notices. It is not a deadline for wallet holders. Our Binance review and Coinbase review cover each platform in more detail.

How to upgrade AERO, VELO and veNFTs from a wallet

Holders in self-custody use the portal on aerodrome.finance for AERO and veAERO, or on velodrome.finance for VELO and veVELO. Aero also points to guides at aerodrome.finance/docs/upgrade and velodrome.finance/docs/upgrade. You need a small amount of ETH for gas: on Base for Aerodrome, on OP Mainnet for Velodrome.

1. Reset the votes on each veNFT and claim pending rewards before upgrading (the portal walks you through the claim). Aero is blunt about it: “A veNFT with active votes cannot be upgraded.”
2. By 20 October, withdraw veNFTs from Relays and other vaults back to your own wallet.
3. Bring xVELO back to OP Mainnet. Aero asked holders on chains other than OP Mainnet and Ink to bridge by 15 October; xVELO on Ink must be bridged before launch. Anyone who missed the date should check the hub for current guidance.
4. Keep ETH for gas on the right network.
5. From 22 October, 00:00 UTC, open aerodrome.finance or velodrome.finance by typing the address yourself, connect your wallet and follow the upgrade portal.
6. Check the new AERO contract address against Aero’s official sources before adding it to your wallet or trading it.

Multisig users must name a destination wallet, and it has to support Base. Liquidity providers in pools that have no matching 1:1 pool on Aero will need to withdraw manually. Aero also asks users to pull any deposits on Lisk by 31 October.

veAERO and veVELO become sAERO

Every vote-escrow lock turns into a new sAERO staking position, and the old veNFT ID is retired. The time left on the lock carries over, rounded up to the next full week. Permanent locks convert to sAERO at the Maximum Stake Duration. Rewards that were not claimed before the upgrade cannot be recovered afterwards.

The cross-chain step for VELO

Velodrome positions start on OP Mainnet but the new token lives on Base. VELO and veVELO therefore upgrade on OP Mainnet and arrive on Base, and this cross-chain transfer carries a fee paid in ETH. Make sure your wallet supports Base before you start.

“There is no set deadline,” the hub says. Both old front ends stay live after launch to handle upgrades, but Aero adds that they “may be shut down at a later date” and that tokens never upgraded “will never reach circulation”. Waiting costs nothing today. It could cost convenience later.

No contract address yet: take it only from aero.xyz

Aero has not published the new AERO contract address. It says the address will be made public before the migration opens on 22 October and shared through official Aero channels on launch day, with all contract addresses listed in Aero’s public GitHub repositories and then on a security page in the Aero docs. Until then, any “new AERO” address circulating on social media, in Telegram groups or in sponsored search results is unverified. Fake migration sites are the obvious trap here: a page that copies the portal and asks for a wallet signature can drain a wallet in one transaction. Take the address only from those official sources, reached from aero.xyz, and type the portal addresses yourself. Our guide on how to avoid crypto scams explains the usual phishing patterns.

Risk score: 3 out of 5

We rate this event 3 out of 5. It stays below 4 because the protocol is well known, Binance and Coinbase confirm the official ratios, and exchange users have nothing to do. It sits above 2 because of what wallet holders face: a manual, irreversible upgrade, a contract address not yet public at a time when fake portals are likely, and an extra cross-chain fee for VELO. Supply also grows by about 6%, on projected figures.

Tax treatment is a separate question. Swapping one token for another may count as a taxable disposal in some countries, so check your local rules before you upgrade. No country is listed as excluded on aero.xyz, although Binance notes that its products may not be available in every region. We found no MiCA white paper for the new AERO, so its status in the EU is unclear.

Background: from two DEXs to one

Velodrome is the older ve(3,3) decentralized exchange on Optimism. Aerodrome launched in August 2023 on Coinbase’s Base network as a fork of Velodrome V2, with an airdrop aimed at veVELO holders, and became the largest DEX on Base. Both are developed by Dromos Labs.

The merger was announced on X on 12 November 2025, with a second-quarter 2026 target. In July 2026 Aero moved the launch to September after a security review and a public audit contest held from 24 August to 11 September. A lighter version, Aero Lite, went live on Arc on 16 September. On 25 September the team set the final date and added Robinhood Chain and Arbitrum to the launch list. Aero says the chains its two DEXs serve account for “about 17% of EVM spot trading volume”.

Other exchanges are a gap. Aero says it worked with “all major exchanges” but names none, and as of 16 October we had seen no official notice from Kraken, Bybit or OKX.

Next dates to watch

20 October is the last day to pull veNFTs out of Relays, and Binance stops margin borrowing that morning. Final votes close at 22:59 UTC on 21 October, an hour before launch. After that the calendar belongs to the exchanges: Binance winds down VELODROME products on 28 October and delists the spot pair on 3 November, while Coinbase converts balances from 2 to 4 November. Two dates are still missing: Binance’s reopening of AERO transfers and the shutdown of the legacy front ends.