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Best Liquid Restaking Protocols · Rank 03 of 8
Cross-chain restaking exposure
Last verified August 18, 20264 scored axes
Self-reported only
Renzo scores 7.7 out of 10 and ranks #3 of 8 in the best liquid restaking protocols table, strongest on slashing exposure (7.8) and weakest on exit design (7.4).
Widest multi-chain footprint in the category, which is useful and was also the source of its most instructive incident: an April 2024 depeg on Uniswap caused by thin secondary liquidity rather than any protocol failure. The lesson about exit design stuck.
4 axes, weighted as published in the table’s methodology. Each score below is read from the fact printed under it.
7.8/ 35% of the score
Publishes secured-service exposure; on 24 April 2024 ezETH traded down to about $688 on Uniswap after the season-one airdrop ended — a secondary-market liquidity event rather than a protocol failure — and the peg recovered within hours.
7.6/ 25% of the score
Operators are selected by the protocol under published criteria, with delegations recorded on-chain.
7.4/ 20% of the score
Withdrawals live; the 2024 event demonstrated that thin secondary liquidity, not the redemption queue, sets the exit price — the drop liquidated leveraged holders on Gearbox and Morpho.
7.8/ 20% of the score
Yield is staking rewards plus points and incentives; fee income from secured services is small.
ezETH traded down to about $688 on Uniswap after the season-one airdrop ended and holders headed for the exit at once. The protocol was not broken and the peg recovered within hours, but leveraged holders were liquidated on Gearbox and Morpho on the way down. The lesson stuck across the whole category: for a wrapped asset, the exit price is set by secondary liquidity, not by the redemption queue you were promised.
Renzo has the broadest multi-chain availability of any liquid restaking token, which makes it the practical option on L2s where competitors have not deployed. Each additional deployment is another liquidity pool that has to be deep enough to matter, and 2024 showed what happens when one is not.
Secured-service exposure is published and operators are selected under published criteria with delegations recorded on-chain. Yield is staking rewards plus points and incentives; fee income from secured services is small.
On the chain where its liquidity actually is, and unleveraged. The 2024 episode did not hurt holders who could wait; it destroyed positions that were borrowed against, on chains where the pool was too thin to absorb a rush.
Restakers who need the token on an L2 where the alternatives have not deployed, sized so that redemption rather than a market sale is an acceptable exit.
Because the season-one airdrop ended and holders sold into pools that were too thin to absorb them, dropping the price to about $688 on Uniswap. The protocol did not fail and the peg recovered within hours, but leveraged positions were liquidated first.
Its disclosures and operator process are in line with the category, and no protocol failure appears on its record. The structural risk it demonstrated — thin secondary liquidity on secondary chains — has not disappeared.
Across more chains and L2s than any other liquid restaking token, which is the protocol's main advantage and the source of its liquidity fragmentation.
8 services in best liquid restaking protocols