Meme coin launch checklist: 43 items from a week before to the end of launch day

A meme coin launch takes a minute and fails in an hour, and the cause is nearly always a decision that was made at minute zero that should have been made a week earlier. This checklist puts every decision in time order, from a week out to the end of launch day, with a line on what 'done' means and a link to the detailed guide where one exists. It is written for a creator launching on any EVM chain, with notes on where a launch race changes a step. Print it, or copy it into a note, and tick things off; the point is that nothing is discovered while the clock is running.

A week before: identity

1. Name chosen and passed the six tests: sayable, typeable, no live coin with the same name, no trademark, suggests a picture, repeated by someone without explanation. Guide: how to name a meme coin.
2. Ticker chosen, 3 to 6 uppercase letters, no live collision on any chain you will launch on, no cashtag traffic, typed correctly by two testers. Guide: how to choose a meme coin ticker.
3. Logo generated, square, at least 512 pixels, solid background, no text, passes the thumbnail, chart-header and dark-background tests. Guide: meme coin logo with AI.
4. X header and two or three post images made from the same subject and style as the logo.
5. Decided whether the coin is a one-day joke or something you intend to support for weeks. This changes the first-buy size, the fee choice and how much of the rest of this list matters.

A week before: accounts and audience

1. X account exists, has the name, logo and header, and is posting in the meme's voice daily. A new account on launch day reads as a scam.
2. A group chat (Telegram or Discord) exists if you intend to run one, with at least one other person who can moderate during the first hour while you post.
3. A list of the specific accounts, chats and communities where the first 50 buyers will come from, written down. If the list is empty, the launch is a week early.
4. Decided who, if anyone, knows the launch time in advance. Everyone who knows is a potential first-block buyer, and first-block buyers are what buyers check.
5. The creator wallet that will be public is chosen, funded if you need gas on the chain, and has nothing in its history you would not want screenshotted.

The day before: chain and format

1. Chain decided, or the decision deliberately handed to buyers. Single-chain launches are compared in best chains to launch a meme coin; a sasa race opens Base, BNB Chain, Arc and Robinhood Chain at once and lets the five minutes decide.
2. Launch format decided: bonding curve, direct DEX pool or race. The trade-offs are in how meme coin launchpads work.
3. If direct DEX pool: liquidity amount decided, enough that a $200 sell moves the price by single digits, and the lock or burn method chosen and tested on a dry run with a throwaway token.
4. If launchpad or race: the platform's fee page read, the creator fee or buyback-and-burn choice made. On sasa the creator takes 30% of trading fees forever or chooses buyback-and-burn instead.
5. Token settings: no sell tax, no mint, no blacklist, no pause, ownership renounced or never held. If the platform sets these for you, confirm on the platform's security page what buyers will see.

The day before: money

1. First-buy size calculated: a share of supply between 2% and 5%, converted to a dollar amount for the pool size, rounded to a number that looks like a decision. Guide: how big should your first buy be. On sasa the first buy is made on each chain, and we recommend $5 or more per chain.
2. Funds for the first buy in the right asset in the right wallet. ETH on Base or Robinhood Chain, BNB on BNB Chain, USDC on Arc for a direct launch; USDC in your sasa balance for a race.
3. Gas buffer for at least three extra transactions if you are using your own wallet. On a sasa account, network fees come out of your USDC balance, so keep a few cents of extra USDC instead of a gas token.
4. Decided in writing that you will not sell any of the first buy on launch day, and what you will say if asked.
5. No second wallet funded from the creator wallet for a hidden buy. Funding-source checks on the first buyers find it within minutes.

The day before: content

1. Launch post drafted: one line of the meme, ticker as cashtag, chains named, placeholder for the contract address, logo attached. Guide: how to announce a coin launch on X.
2. First reply drafted: address placeholder, coin page link placeholder, creator share in text.
3. Replies for minute 10, 30 and 60 outlined with the numbers you will fill in: holder count, chart, holder map with creator share.
4. One-line answers prepared for the five questions every thread asks: address, chain, is liquidity locked, what does the creator hold, where to buy.
5. Bio updated with the ticker and a placeholder for the address.

Launch minute

1. Pick the hour for the audience. BNB Chain crowds are heavily in Asian time zones; Base crowds skew to US and European hours. A race reaches all four chains, so pick the hour your own list from the week before is awake.
2. Create the coin. On a direct pool: deploy, create pool, add liquidity, lock. On sasa: the Create page takes the name, ticker, image and first-buy amount in one step and opens all four pools at the same contract address.
3. First buy from the public creator wallet, before anything is posted. On sasa the first buy is part of creation.
4. Copy the contract address from the coin page. Paste it into the drafted post and the drafted first reply. Check the first four and last four characters against the page.
5. Post. Reply with the first reply. Pin the post. Like your own first reply. Update the bio with the address.
6. For a race: a second reply at minute two or three with which chain is leading, because buyers on the trailing chains can still swing it before minute five.

The first hour

1. Minute 10: holder count and chart, as a reply. Real numbers only.
2. Minute 30: holder map screenshot with the creator's share in text. Guide to what you are showing: how to read a holder map.
3. Minute 60: summary line and the best community reply quoted.
4. Answer the five questions once each with links, then point repeat askers at those replies.
5. Watch the first block's buyers. If there is a bundle you did not create, say so with the map; silence reads as complicity.
6. Do not sell. Do not post price targets. Do not delete the post. Do not go quiet during the first drop.

The rest of launch day

1. Confirm the coin appears on screeners such as DexScreener and in bot feeds under the right name and image. Coins whose pools are native ETH, BNB or USDC pairs on the main DEXs show on DexScreener, GMGN and trading bots as soon as the pool exists; on a direct launch, submit the token profile if the screener needs one.
2. Check the lock is visible to buyers: the locker or burn address on the explorer for a direct pool; for a race, the winner's pool is locked by the protocol at minute five.
3. Reply cadence drops to every few hours with the same rule: numbers and community content, nothing invented.
4. If the coin dies, say so in one post and leave the thread intact. Creators who delete dead coins do not get a crowd for the next one; creators who leave them up do.
5. If it survives, write down what the second wave came from. That source is the first line of the audience list for your next launch.
6. Fee income, if your format pays one, starts with the first trades on the locked pool. Decide now how you will use it, before the first withdrawal.

What this checklist does not cover

It does not tell you whether the meme is good, which is the thing that matters most and the thing nobody can check in advance. It does not cover sniping defenses beyond the first-buy order, since on a public chain the first block is always contested. And it does not cover the legal side of launching a token in your jurisdiction, which varies and which no checklist replaces. What it does is remove the failures that are not about the meme: a colliding ticker, a logo that vanishes at 32 pixels, an address posted before the pool existed, a creator who sold at minute 40. Those are the deaths that were decided before launch, and they are the ones this list is for.