The Solana (SOL) blockchain was launched in 2020 by Solana Labs founders Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal. It is a layer–one blockchain designed to handle smart contracts, decentralized apps (dApps), NFTs, and DeFi.
It’s a permissionless network that's become known for quick transaction speeds and relatively low fees. One of the technologies credited for that speed is something called Proof of History (PoH), a kind of built-in clock that uses a sequence of cryptographic hashes to timestamp transactions on–chain. This setup helps the network run efficiently without depending on external time sources.
Over the past couple of years, Solana has also become a popular platform for meme coins, with low costs and fast processing attracting active communities.
This next-gen modular layer-one network focuses solely on storing data, making sure it’s accessible, and allowing anyone to check that the information is accurate.
Celestia founder Mustafa Al-Bassam first made headlines as a teenager for his involvement with the hacker group LulzSec.
While pursuing a Ph.D. at the University of College London, he published a paper in 2019 called LazyLedger, which introduced the idea of modular blockchains. This white paper later became the foundation for the Celestia blockchain. To launch the project he teamed up with two other co-founders: Ismail Khoffi, a developer known for his work in the Cosmos ecosystem, and John Adler, a research engineer formerly with ConsenSys.
The Celestia mainnet went live in October 2023 and is one of the newer blockchains carving out a new purpose within the sector.
Born from a falling out between Jed McCaleb and his Ripple co-founder, Stellar aims to advance one of the Bitcoin community’s founding ideas: democratizing finance, something that isn’t feasible on Bitcoin due to block space limits and higher transaction fees. Alongside co-founder Joyce Kim, the network seeks to make international money transfers affordable and convenient using a digital ledger.
The chain offers transactions for under a cent.
The network’s native token, Lumen (XLM), covers transaction fees and enables currency conversions. To allow real-world use, Stellar works with trusted financial partners known as anchors that bridge crypto and traditional currencies. When you deposit fiat with an anchor, you receive a digital version of that currency on Stellar, allowing businesses to accept payments in multiple currencies without relying on traditional banking infrastructure.
This layer one open source blockchain brings some personality to the platform with its snowy theme.
Launched by Ava Labs also known as "Team Rocket," in 2020, Avalanche was built to support almost instant finality, at low costs to transact on the environmentally friendly blockchain. The native token AVAX has 3 primary utilities. One use of AVAX is to pay network fees, another is to stake and help secure the ledger, and a third is to vote on the chain’s governance decisions.
It works with Ethereum Virtual Machine(EVM), so it can run the same dApps and tools developers already use on Ethereum. Developers can alsobuild their own custom blockchains, similar to making mini native Avalanche networks for custom projects while benefiting from decentralized ledger security and horizontal scalability.
Charlie Lee, once an engineer at Google, built Litecoin by taking Bitcoin’s code and adjusting it to form a separate blockchain. This type of split is called a fork. It is like taking the same foundation and building a different version of the project. This layer one was launched to complement Bitcoin, and aims to be the symbolic digital equivalent of silver to Bitcoin’s gold.
It shares many of Bitcoin’s features but can process peer-to-peer transactions quicker and with lower fees.
LTC can be divided into smaller units, similar to Bitcoin (BTC). The smallest unit of Litecoin is called a "litoshi".
What’s a fork? It’s when developers copy the code of an existing blockchain and change it to launch a new chain with different features.
USD Coin (USDC) is a stablecoin fully backed by US dollar reserves and maintained at a 1:1 ratio. It began in 2018 under the CENTRE Consortium founded by Circle and Coinbase, which defines its technical and compliance framework. The dollar peg enables steady pricing for payments, trading and DeFi.
Note: Fiat currency is issued by governments and not secured by physical commodities such as gold. USDC’s peg can vary slightly under certain market or settlement conditions.
Ondo Finance launched the ONDO token in 2022. Former Goldman Sachs alum Nathan Allman founded the decentralized finance (DeFi) platform. Built on the Ethereum blockchain using the ERC-20 standard, the ONDO token supports governance within the Ondo decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). Its sole utility is allowing token holders to vote on protocol decisions.
Ondo Finance focuses on tokenizing real-world assets, such as the U.S. Treasuries, and is uniting traditional and decentralized finance. Like ETH can be divided into wei, Ondo is also divisible into smaller micro units, allowing for flexible transactions within Ethereum’s ecosystem. Unlike ETH and BTC these fractional units do not have a designated name.
Ripple Labs, was founded by Chris Larsen, Jed McCaleb, and Arthur Britto in 2012.The team launched XRP Ledger, a layer-one blockchain built to process transactions quickly while using little energy.
This positions the chain as an option for financial institutions and payment providers looking to build on platforms where they can take advantage of low-cost transfers for cross-border payments.
Like many other tokens XRP is divisible into smaller units that are called drops. One drop equals 0.000001 XRP, which allows for micro-transactions and versatile applications in digital markets.
Uniswap is a decentralized exchange (DEX) built on the Ethereum blockchain that allows users to trade ETH-based tokens directly through smart contracts. The peer-to-peer platform uses liquidity pools instead of order books to facilitate transactions.
Uniswap operates as an automated market maker (AMM), where liquidity providers can contribute to pools and earn fees based on trading activity.
For more detailed information consider reviewing the Uniswap whitepaper.
Cardano (ADA) was launched in 2017 by Canadian Charles Hoskinson along with the software developers at Input Output Global (IOG).
It is a permissionless layer-one blockchain that was named after mathematician Ada Lovelace. Known for its research-driven approach, the chain relies on peer-reviewed academic papers to guide its development. ADA, is the native token used for transactions and staking.
The network’s layered design supports decentralized applications (dApps), smart contracts, and decentralized finance (DeFi). Governance is shared with the Cardano Foundation, allowing ADA holders to vote on protocol updates.
The Solana (SOL) blockchain was launched in 2020 by Solana Labs founders Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal. It is a layer–one blockchain designed to handle smart contracts, decentralized apps (dApps), NFTs, and DeFi.
It’s a permissionless network that's become known for quick transaction speeds and relatively low fees. One of the technologies credited for that speed is something called Proof of History (PoH), a kind of built-in clock that uses a sequence of cryptographic hashes to timestamp transactions on–chain. This setup helps the network run efficiently without depending on external time sources.
Over the past couple of years, Solana has also become a popular platform for meme coins, with low costs and fast processing attracting active communities.
In 2015, a Canadian by the name of Vitalik Buterin along with five co-founders, Gavin Wood, Charles Hoskinson, Anthony Di Iorio, and Joseph Lubin launched Ethereum. They launched Ethereum with a shared goal: to build the world’s decentralized computer, often called decentralized compute. The blockchain is a permissionless layer-one known for its use of smart contracts.
These digital contracts are automated programs that decentralized applications (dApps) run on. ETH is currently the second-largest blockchain measured by market cap after Bitcoin. Its native token is Ether (ETH) and it is used to pay for transactions on the network.
ETH is divisible into wei, allowing for micro-transactions. The chain reached consensus and in 2022 it transitioned from the energy-intensive proof-of-work model to proof-of-stake through an event known as The Merge. This upgrade improved scalability and significantly reduced energy consumption.
Bitcoin (BTC) is the world’s first digital asset and remains the most well-known cryptocurrency both in Canada and globally.
BTC was either launched by an individual or possibly a group in 2009 under the pseudonym Satoshi. Based on the message hard-coded onto the first block, it was designed to serve as a decentralized digital currency, enabling peer-to-peer transactions without the need for a central bank or government. One can infer this because the newspaper title selected reads, “The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks”.
Bitcoin can be divided into smaller units called satoshis, with one satoshi equal to 0.00000001 BTC, allowing for micro-transactions and flexible use across global markets. It was intentionally created with a capped supply; there will only be 21 Million BTC.
Read more about Bitcoin or check out the full details in the original Whitepaper.
Solana is a high-throughput blockchain optimized for speed, using novel timestamping and parallel execution. The development community has a shared goal of increasing bandwidth and reducing latency. The SOL supply is not capped like Bitcoin, this means new tokens can continue to be issued over time.
The chain uses a combination of both Proof-of-History (PoH) and Proof-of-Stake (PoS). PoH acts as a high-speed cryptographic clock that helps order transactions efficiently, while PoS allows validators to secure the network by holding and staking SOL tokens. This hybrid setup supports high throughput, with estimates suggesting Solana can process up to 65,000 transactions per second (TPS), though actual performance depends on network conditions.
Solana is built for speed and scalability. It uses Sealevel, a parallel processing engine that enables multiple smart contracts to run simultaneously/ Additional components such as Turbine, which breaks data into smaller packets for efficient distribution, and Gulf Stream, which forwards transactions before previous blocks are confirmed, help to increase overall throughput. This architecture supports use cases that require frequent and fast transactions, such as decentralized finance (DeFi) and gaming.
Tower BFT (Byzantine Fault Tolerance), is an algorithm optimized for PoH that helps reach consensus quickly and confirm blocks securely. Each block is cryptographically linked to the previous one, creating an immutable ledger. The network’s infrastructure requires relatively powerful hardware and has been the topic of ongoing debates surrounding decentralization. SOL’s was designed to maintain network integrity and responsiveness under high transaction loads yet it has suffered some downtime since its launch.
The Solana Foundation’s 2022 Energy Use Report, revealed that the network consumes approximately 0.00051 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per transaction. Energy metrics can vary depending on methodology and measurement practices.
Solana’s fees, often less than a penny, make transactions affordable. Solana offers pseudonymity, with transactions linked to wallet addresses, not personal identities, ensuring user privacy. Its SPL (Solana Program Library) token standard powers an ecosystem of decentralized finance (DeFi) apps, stablecoins, and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
This modular setup uses data availability sampling (DAS), allowing nodes to check a random sample of data instead of the entire chain history. By serving purely as a data availability layer, it supports rol-lups and layer 2 solutions in scaling more efficiently. The team went with a low-fee model, betting that affordable data will help drive real decentralization. TIA, the native token, launched with a 1 billion supply and has no hard cap due to ~8% annual inflation.
Celestia runs on a proof-of-stake (PoS) system, where users can earn rewards by staking their TIA tokens and supporting the network’s transaction data availability and consensus process. Some critics have suggested that modular blockchains like Celestia offer lower security may have reduced security compared to monolithic chains due to reliance on external layers.
The blockchain does not execute, settle, or validate transactions. Its sole purpose is to make transaction data available for anyone to access and verify. This allows rollups and layer 2 blockchains solutions, which process transactions, to connect to Celestia and publish their data there.
Security relies on its PoS consensus and data availability sampling. Validators stake TIA to ensure honest behavior, and DAS ensures that data is available without requiring nodes to store the entire blockchain. However, the modular design means security depends partly on the integrity of connected rollups or layer 2 solutions. The ledger is optimized for data storage and accessibility, not computation.
No transaction consumption or emission data is widely available and peer reviewed. Proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchains are, in general, energy-efficient compared to proof-of-work systems (PoW).
Developers can build their own rollups with full control over how they operate and govern them, while using the Celestia blockchain to handle their projects' data storage. This setup helps rollups scale without sacrificing decentralization. By separating the data layer, Celestia allows connected layer 2 solutions to process more transactions. To catch the attention of developers the network provides tools like application programming interfaces (APIs) and software development kits (SDKs), so developers don’t have to build everything from scratch.
This blockchain acts as a payment and currency exchange network. Stellar handles millions of transactions each month, particularly in emerging markets such as Africa and Southeast Asia. The original tokenomics had a capped supply of 100 billion Lumens (XLM) in circulation, but in 2019 the Stellar Development Foundation burned half of them, reducing the total supply to 50 billion XLM and paused the ~1% inflation rate, stabilizing the supply. The Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) manages development and drives adoption, working with partners such as IBM on World Wire and various fintech firms worldwide.
The Stellar Consensus Protocol (SCP) adopts a proof or agreement governance process with
Its node operators maintain the ledger. It uses a federated Byzantine agreement, balancing decentralization with trust-based validation, distinct from both proof-of-work (PoW) or proof-of-stake (PoS). Since any entity can run a validator node, major institutions like IBM and Franklin Templeton node operators.
Stellar can handle 1,000 transactions per second (TPS) and settles payments in under five seconds. Anyone willing to identify themselves to the network can become a node operator. This is because validators form groups called quorums, and they need to identify one another to determine who to include or exclude. Transactions typically take about five seconds to validate. Protocol 20 (2024) enhances the network's throughput via Soroban smart contracts.
Stellar’s SCP removes the risk of 51 percent attacks because it does not depend on computing power. Proof-of-work and proof-of-stake systems can be vulnerable if an entity or group controls more than half of the network’s computing resources, allowing them to take over consensus, rewrite or reverse transactions, or ri.sk double spending.The ledger is publicly verifiable, ensuring transparency and immutability.
The proof of agreement consensus mechanism involves computer power when nod operators send messages to one another but there is no mining or specialized hardware making this one of the energy efficient chains. Each transaction consumes 0.00022 kWh
The chain can support multiple assets beyond its native XLM token, including stablecoins, cryptocurrencies, and tokenized assets. This feature adds a convenience factor for users who can send USD and have it received as EUR, BTC, or a stablecoins. Soroban, Stellar’s smart contract platform, enables DeFi, tokenized securities, and complex financial applications. The KYC/AML integration via anchors is appealing to regulated entities wanting to participate in the blockchain space.
Avalanche uses a proof-of-stake system to keep the network secure and running efficiently. Instead of having every computer check each network transaction, a random small group of validators check each other’s work until they all agree. This makes the network fast, able to handle lots of activity, and secure even if up to 80 percent of participants try to cheat. Avalanche’s native token, AVAX, has a fixed supply of 720 million. Each time someone pays a transaction fee, those tokens are burned, which means they are permanently removed from circulation and the supply decreases over time.
Named after snowy peaks, its consensus system includes Slush, Snowflake, and Snowman. The frosty theme reflects its design and helps deliver near-instant transaction finality, which is a major advantage in the blockchain world.The proof-of-stake-based consensus protocol relies on random subsampling and probabilistic validation. This setup allows the network to process large volumes of activity quickly and reliably, with resilience against up to 80 percent of nodes acting maliciously. Over 1,600 validators work together to help secure the ledger. They stake at least 2,000 AVAX to participate, although custom networks known as subnets can set their own rules. All data is securely linked, and anyone who attempts to cheat risks losing their staked tokens, which makes attacks expensive and unlikely. Blocks are cryptographically linked, and slashing penalties discourage attacks by making them economically impractical.
Avalanche can process up to 4,500 transactions per second (TPS) on the primary network. Real-world usage typically averages 7 to 10 TPS, with peaks above 400. Finality generally happens in under two seconds. Smart contracts run on the C-Chain using the EVM, while the X-Chain uses the Avalanche Virtual Machine (AVM). Cross-chain communication and parallel processing improve speed and efficiency throughout the network.
The ledger is immutable, with cryptographically linked blocks preserving data integrity. Validators maintain decentralization by continuously verifying transactions and participating in subnet governance. The P-Chain manages validator sets and supports the creation and operation of subnets without relying on a central authority.
The network consumes around 0.01 TWh per year which is equal to about 0.0005 percent of Bitcoin’s energy usage. Since validation only requires consumer-grade hardware it makes participation in the chain accessible, encouraging decentralization and environmentally sustainable.
Blockchain developers can create subnets, which are independent but run alongside the main network. Each subnet can have its own rules, virtual machine, token, and validator set, giving developers the flexibility to build applications for specific needs such as DeFi platforms, blockchain games, or enterprise systems. The C-Chain is fully compatible with Ethereum, enabling seamless migration of applications and integration with tools like MetaMask. It supports both ERC-20 tokens and NFTs. The X-Chain, P-Chain, and C-Chain work together through Avalanche Warp Messaging, enabling transfers and data sharing across the ecosystem.
Users can send money directly to one another without relying on a bank or financial middleman. It works a lot like Bitcoin, but uses a different mining protocol that makes transactions quicker and fees are usually lower. Like Bitcoin, Litecoin (LTC) also has a capped supply of 84M LTC. It’s compatible with numerous wallets and exchanges enabling users to buy goods, transfer money globally, or hold coins.
The network uses a proof-of-work consensus mechanism that is powered by the Scrypt algorithm. Miners compete to solve puzzles to process transactions and are rewarded with LTC and transaction fees. The Scrypt algorithm is easier on hardware requirements compared to SHA-256 Bitcoin miners run making the network open to a wider range of people, not just those with specialized gear. The intended result is a more decentralized network with stronger protection against control by a small group.
Litecoin transactions are processed with new blocks added to the chain approximately every 2.5 minutes, enabling confirmations in a quarter of Bitcoin’s time. When a user initiates a transaction, it’s broadcast to the network, where miners verify and group it into a block by solving Scrypt puzzles. Once validated, the transaction is recorded on the digital ledger.
The proof-of-work system ensures that altering a transaction requires controlling over 51% of the network’s mining power, a feat that is computationally and economically challenging. All transactions are recorded on a transparent, immutable public ledger, accessible to anyone, which ensures trust and prevents tampering. The use of Scrypt further enhances decentralization by allowing more participants to mine, mitigating the likelihood of centralized control and strengthening the network’s overall security.
Since it is not competitive in the energy efficient space exact energy consumption figures are not widely reported, its smaller network scale and hardware accessibility suggest a lower impact than Bitcoin but exact data is not known at the time of publication.
Segregated Witness (SegWit) a 2017 upgrade made transactions more efficient by freeing up space in each block. This helped lower fees and strengthened network security. The chain also supports the Lightning Network, which allows people to send fast, low-cost payments.
USDC tokens are minted when users deposit their US dollars with regulated financial institutions. Subsequently tokens are burned when they redeem tokens for US dollars. Reserves are held in regulated accounts and audited by accounting firms such as Deloitte and Grant Thornton. USDC is compatible with multiple blockchains.
USDC transactions rely on the consensus protocols of each host blockchain. The validators on those networks confirm and record transactions.
Transactions settle on the underlying blockchain. On Ethereum, settlement can take 15–30 seconds with gas fees varying by network demand. Solana transactions settle in under a second with minimal fees. Users authorize transfers by signing with private keys and nodes validate transactions according to the protocol.
Security is provided by each blockchain’s decentralized validator set and cryptographic safeguards. Transactions are recorded on immutable public ledgers. CENTRE’s framework and monthly reserve attestations ensure that all USDC tokens remain fully backed.
The energy footprint of USDC transactions matches the host blockchain’s consensus model.
USDC is used in DeFi for lending and yield farming on platforms such as Aave and Compound. Its support for multiple blockchains lets users move their tokens across networks via bridges. Smart contracts enable automated services. CENTRE’s governance and regular audits provide transparency for both retail and institutional users.
The ONDO token is powered by the Ethereum blockchain, using the ERC-20 token standard. It relies on Ethereum’s infrastructure and has a total supply of 10 billion.
Users sign ONDO transactions with private keys and send them to Ethereum’s network of nodes. Ethereum validators include these transactions in blocks, confirming them in approximately 12 to 15 seconds. Ondo transactions achieve finality after about 13 confirmations, typically within 3 to 5 minutes, unlike Bitcoin’s 60-minute finality with 6 confirmations.This supports reliable transaction processing for ONDO’s governance and asset tokenization.
Ondo’s security is provided by Ethereum’s proof-of-stake network, where validators stake ETH to ensure integrity. Transactions are recorded on Ethereum’s immutable public ledger, similar to Bitcoin’s cryptographically linked blocks, preventing tampering without infeasible computational effort. ONDO’s ERC-20 smart contracts adhere to Ethereum’s standards, and leverage the chain's trust factor.
Ondo benefits from Ethereum’s proof-of-stake consensus, which consumes an estimated 0.0026 terawatt-hours annually across the network, per Ethereum Foundation data. Ondo’s transactions contribute a negligible fraction of Ethereum’s roughly 1,100 metric tons of annual CO2 emissions. This efficiency aligns with growing demand for sustainable blockchain solutions in DeFi.
To date the ONDO token has had a governance focus with its utility allowing holders to vote and influence protocol decisions.
This blockchain was created for speed, efficiency, and scalability to facilitate the processing of financial transactions.The design allows XRP to offer global payments, currency exchanges, and financial settlements to both institutional and retail use cases for minimal transaction fees with a fixed supply of 100 billion.
Validators on the Unique Node List operate based on the Ripple Protocol Consensus Algorithm (RPCA) These validators are run by independent entities such as Ripple Labs, financial institutions, and universities, working together to verify the validity and order of transactions. Every 3 to 5 seconds they reach an agreement, recording transactions on a distributed ledger without grouping them into blocks. This approach ensures rapid transaction processing, low latency.
Transactions settle in approximately three to five seconds, incurring minimal fees, often less than a fraction of a cent, such as 0.00001 XRP per transaction. Users initiate transactions by signing them with private keys, which are then validated by the network of nodes and confirmed through the consensus protocol. The XRP Ledger is designed to handle high transaction volumes, prioritizing accuracy, agreement, and continuous progress to support efficient cross-border payments and other financial operations.
Cryptographic validation and a decentralized network of validators maintain network security. The transactions are recorded on an immutable public ledger to ensure transparency and resistance to tampering.
This is an energy-efficient chain that according to Ripple Labs’ reports, consumes an estimated 0.0079 terawatt-hours of electricity annually, equating to approximately 400 to 500 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions every year. The low environmental footprint positions XRP among its peers as one of the sustainable options for blockchain-based financial transactions.
There is a built-in decentralized exchange (DEX) for trading digital assets, escrow functionality to securely manage timed releases of XRP, and multi-signature support to improve transaction security. XRP is partially managed by Ripple Labs through escrow, the ledger ensures predictable issuance and supports liquidity for both institutional and retail financial applications.
Uniswap is a decentralized protocol that allows users to trade ERC-20 tokens directly through smart contracts. There are no intermediaries. The platform is governed by UNI token holders, who participate in the decision-making process.
Uniswap uses token-based governance rather than traditional consensus models such as Proof of Work or Proof of Stake. Token holders can delegate their vote(s). Proposals must meet a minimum threshold of delegated UNI before they can proceed to a vote.
Uniswap processes trades through an automated market maker (AMM) smart contracts using liquidity pools. Transactions typically settle in 10-30 seconds. This depends on Ethereum network congestion and gas fees. Uniswap v4’s optimized contracts improve gas efficiency by up to 20% compared to v3.
Governance actions and trade data are recorded on the Ethereum blockchain, ensuring transparency and immutability. Ethereum’s Proof of Stake consensus, securing the network since 2022, protects Uniswap’s operations. Anyone can audit governance history or verify trades using tools like Etherscan, fostering accountability.
Uniswap v4, launched in 2023, introduced customizable liquidity pools via “hooks,” enabling developers to implement dynamic fees, custom logic, or other pool-specific behaviors. Governance sets protocol-wide parameters, while pools can tailor features. Safety mechanisms, like a 48-hour timelock for executed proposals and a 40 million UNI quorum requirement, mitigate governance risks and ensure deliberate decision-making.
Using a two-layer architecture network separates transaction processing from smart contract execution. The Cardano Settlement Layer (CSL) handles ADA transactions, while the Cardano Computation Layer (CCL) runs smart contracts and dApps. The token supply is capped at 45 billion, with new tokens released through staking rewards. Its structured development process prioritizes scalability and sustainability for global financial and governance applications.
Cardano uses a proof-of-stake consensus model called Ouroboros. ADA holders stake tokens to participate in block validation, selecting slot leaders to propose blocks. Validators earn rewards for honest participation, while malicious or offline behavior risks stake penalties. This incentivizes network security and efficiency, requiring minimal energy compared to proof-of-work systems.
The CSL processes ADA transfers between addresses, while the CCL executes smart contract logic for dApps. Cardano handles approximately 10-20 transactions per second (TPS), with transactions typically confirmed in between 20-30 seconds. Full economic finality, ensuring near-irreversible transactions, is achieved in about 20 minutes, verified by stake-based slot leaders.
Blocks are cryptographically linked to prior blocks, ensuring ledger immutability. Altering past records requires controlling over 51% of staked ADA, which is economically impractical due to staking penalties and validator costs. Peer verification by thousands of stake pools maintains trust and security without a central authority.
The network consumes approximately 0.006 TWh of electricity annually. ADA is meeting its sustainable and eco-friendly operational goals and is an energy-efficient chain.
The governance model lets ADA holders vote on protocol changes and funding proposals. Its layered architecture enhances scalability and flexibility for DeFi, NFTs, and tokenized assets. The network supports native tokens, allowing custom assets without smart contracts, and its Plutus platform enables secure, scalable dApp development.
Solana is a high-throughput blockchain optimized for speed, using novel timestamping and parallel execution. The development community has a shared goal of increasing bandwidth and reducing latency. The SOL supply is not capped like Bitcoin, this means new tokens can continue to be issued over time.
The chain uses a combination of both Proof-of-History (PoH) and Proof-of-Stake (PoS). PoH acts as a high-speed cryptographic clock that helps order transactions efficiently, while PoS allows validators to secure the network by holding and staking SOL tokens. This hybrid setup supports high throughput, with estimates suggesting Solana can process up to 65,000 transactions per second (TPS), though actual performance depends on network conditions.
Solana is built for speed and scalability. It uses Sealevel, a parallel processing engine that enables multiple smart contracts to run simultaneously/ Additional components such as Turbine, which breaks data into smaller packets for efficient distribution, and Gulf Stream, which forwards transactions before previous blocks are confirmed, help to increase overall throughput. This architecture supports use cases that require frequent and fast transactions, such as decentralized finance (DeFi) and gaming.
Tower BFT (Byzantine Fault Tolerance), is an algorithm optimized for PoH that helps reach consensus quickly and confirm blocks securely. Each block is cryptographically linked to the previous one, creating an immutable ledger. The network’s infrastructure requires relatively powerful hardware and has been the topic of ongoing debates surrounding decentralization. SOL’s was designed to maintain network integrity and responsiveness under high transaction loads yet it has suffered some downtime since its launch.
The Solana Foundation’s 2022 Energy Use Report, revealed that the network consumes approximately 0.00051 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per transaction. Energy metrics can vary depending on methodology and measurement practices.
Solana’s fees, often less than a penny, make transactions affordable. Solana offers pseudonymity, with transactions linked to wallet addresses, not personal identities, ensuring user privacy. Its SPL (Solana Program Library) token standard powers an ecosystem of decentralized finance (DeFi) apps, stablecoins, and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
Ethereum is a popular blockchain with developers who create and deploy smart contracts for their decentralized applications (dApps). These contracts are executed on-chain thus creating a secure and verifiable trusted ledger. The ETH supply is not capped like Bitcoin, this means new Ether (ETH) can continue to be issued over time.
ETH uses a proof-of-stake consensus model, where validators must stake 32 tokens to propose and attest to the new blocks. They earn rewards for following the rules and staying active. If they act dishonestly or remain offline too long, they may be penalized through slashing, which reduces their staked ETH. This system encourages reliable participation and helps keep the network secure.
The Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) is a system running on each validator node, updating account balances and smart contract data. Ethereum handles approximately 15-30 transactions per second (TPS), with transactions typically confirmed in about 12-24 seconds. Full economic finality, ensuring transactions are nearly irreversible, is achieved in between 12-15 minutes.
Blocks are cryptographically linked to prior blocks, making the ledger immutable. Altering past records requires controlling over 51% of staked ETH, an economically infeasible task due to slashing penalties and validator costs. Peer verification by approximately 7,000 validators ensures trust and security without a central authority.
Post-2022 Merge the network consumes around 0.02 TWh of electricity annually. This is a 99.95% reduction from its prior proof-of-work system making Ethereum significantly more environmentally efficient since the upgrade.
Gas fees regulate transaction costs, prioritizing efficiency. Ethereum offers pseudonymity, with transactions tied to public addresses, not real identities. The ERC-20 and ERC-721 token standards support the network’s decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem, as well as stablecoins and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
Bitcoin combines cryptography, peer-to-peer networking and economic incentives into a decentralized system.
Miners use Proof of Work by competing to solve SHA-256 puzzles roughly every ten minutes to add new blocks and earn BTC rewards.
Users sign transactions with private keys, broadcast them to nodes, and once verified, transactions are grouped into blocks and appended to the chain.
Each block links cryptographically to its predecessor, making past records immutable and requiring enormous compute power to alter.
Bitcoin’s supply is capped at 21 million coins, halving miner rewards every 210,000 blocks to enforce predictable scarcity.
