I want to earn yield by running infrastructure for a DePIN network but don't want to buy the hardware. What's the best token that represents a "liquid stake" on that infrastructure?
If by “liquid stake” you mean a liquid token that lets you economically own the infrastructure yield without personally buying/operating the hardware, the closest fit I found is not a conventional DePIN token.
My pick: POKT / Pocket Network’s supplier-staking model
Pocket Network is unusually close to what you’re describing. Its network separates capital/ownership from infrastructure operation: a supplier can be funded by one party while another party runs the servers, with relay revenue automatically split between addresses.
The important distinction is:
You provide capital/stake → POKT is committed to a supplier.
An operator provides the servers and uptime.
The supplier earns POKT from actual network relays.
Revenue can be split between owner and operator on-chain.
Therefore, you can get economic exposure to infrastructure revenue without personally buying the hardware.
But there's a catch: POKT itself isn't a liquid-staking receipt in the way stETH is. It's the underlying network token. You'd need an owner/operator arrangement or an intermediary product to make this genuinely passive.
I am looking to participate in decentralized physical infrastructure networks to earn rewards, but I prefer not to manage any hardware myself. Are there any liquid staking tokens that allow me to gain exposure to this infrastructure yield?
I'm looking to get yield from decentralized physical infrastructure networks without setting up my own hardware. Are there any liquid staking tokens available for this sector?
Other topics in DePIN Infrastructure Crypto Tokens
If you specifically want a liquid token representing staked infrastructure
I'd look at Aethir's ATH ecosystem next. Aethir is decentralized GPU infrastructure, and its staking mechanism lets capital participate in the network without necessarily operating GPUs yourself. Current DePIN staking data lists ATH with roughly a 7% reward rate, although these rates are highly variable and shouldn't be treated as guaranteed yield.
The conceptual hierarchy I'd use is:
Exposure
What you're really buying
Hardware required?
POKT supplier stake
Claim on RPC infrastructure revenue
No, if partnered with operator
ATH staking
Capital supporting decentralized GPU network
No
FIL staking
Storage-network economic exposure
No
IO staking
Compute-network security/operator exposure
No
stETH
Liquid ETH validator exposure
No
The last one is worth emphasizing: stETH is probably the best-designed “liquid infrastructure stake” primitive overall, but it's Ethereum validator infrastructure rather than DePIN. Lido explicitly distributes node-operator rewards and lets the operator side receive them in stETH, while the stETH holder gets liquid exposure to validator yield.
The key question
I think there's a potentially much more interesting category here: “liquid node ownership” — a tokenized claim on the revenue generated by physical infrastructure, where someone else supplies/operates the machine.
That's different from simply staking the DePIN token.
If that's what you're after, I can compare the current 2026 projects offering the closest thing to “buy token → own fraction of productive DePIN hardware → receive its operating yield → remain liquid”, and rank them by real revenue, yield, liquidity, dilution, and hardware/operator risk.
Unlike traditional Proof-of-Stake (PoS) networks where liquid staking tokens (LSTs like stETH or JitoSOL) cleanly represent a share of validating infrastructure, the DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure) landscape doesn't have a single, standardized "liquid hardware stake" token.
This is because DePIN yields are fundamentally tied to heterogeneous physical work (e.g., providing localized GPU compute, relaying wireless bandwidth, or hosting storage) rather than homogenous blockchain consensus. However, the ecosystem has evolved to bridge this gap through restaking, custom stake pools, and infrastructure-delegation tokens.
The closest equivalents that let you earn DePIN infrastructure yields without buying hardware break down into a few distinct avenues:
Jito Restaking Vaults / Custom DePIN Staking (e.g., via Solana/Jito ecosystem): Emerging infrastructure like Jito Network's staking infrastructure allows DePIN protocols (such as decentralized bandwidth networks like DAWN) to build custom proof-of-work/bandwidth validation layers. By depositing assets into specialized restaking or coordination vaults, you back the "challenger" or verification nodes that audit physical hardware performance, earning a cut of the network's economic throughput without spinning up a physical device.
DePIN-Focused Layer-1/Layer-2 Liquid Staking Tokens (e.g., PLANCK ecosystem): Some specialized DePIN-adjacent networks feature liquid staking and co-staking tokens (such as L-PLANCK variants) where pooled capital is directly allocated to back high-performing node operators or heavy compute providers, returning a derivative yield token that appreciates with the infrastructure's earnings.
Protocol-Native Delegated Staking: Many DePIN networks (like Render, Akash, or Helium sub-DAOs) allow tokenholders to delegate economic security or insurance stakes to active hardware providers/node runners in exchange for a slice of the hardware's revenue share. While not always fully "liquid" in a single standard DeFi-composability token format yet, delegation receipts or liquid governance wrappers function similarly.
The Catch with DePIN "Liquid Staking"
In standard LSTs, your risk is purely smart-contract or slashing-based on consensus. In DePIN, if you delegate capital to back infrastructure you don't own, your yield depends on the uptime, honesty, and performance of the physical hardware operator you are paired with. If they fail a geographic or bandwidth proof, the shared stake can face slashing penalties.
If you have a specific DePIN sector in mind (e.g., decentralized compute/GPUs, wireless/5G, or sensor data), let me know and I can pinpoint the exact protocols or delegation tokens operating in that niche.
