Yesterday, on 19th June 2021, the Lightning Network (LN) observed an increase in capacity to over 1500 BTC. The Lightning Network (LN) has undergone massive expansion after it was adopted by the bitcoin community in the last year.
The surge in capacity shows that the users are comfortable in using the Lightning Network (LN). They can confidently and securely pull off off-chain transactions through the bitcoin adopted network. Just this year, the bitcoin-backed network LN saw an increase of around 42% in the amount of BTC available on the network. In addition to that, there are now about 45 thousand pay channels that are handled by over twelve thousand nodes.
Ever since it was launched, the main struggles that bitcoin has faced with the blockchain system are the high fee. The high fee dilemma is associated with the increased number of transactions. The main reason why bitcoin adopted LN was that it can help them reduce the congestion created by the influx of transactions. Hence the Lightning Network would also reduce the transaction fees.
The Lightning Network is necessary for users using microtransactions as a payment protocol of the second level. BTC will not be recognized as an attractive method of payment for the layman if it doesn’t offer this feature of microtransactions. Because of bitcoin’s infamous slow transaction speed and high transaction speeds.
The main purpose of introducing bitcoin was to provide an alternative to the use of fiat currencies as money. However, it will not be possible to use bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency as a regular payment method. This would happen if attempts are not made to maintain and further provide the opportunity to make smaller transactions such as microtransactions. Bitcoin payments are being accepted in more and more places every day. The scalability that LN provides to the blockchain-based cryptocurrencies is important as the technology is no longer just to use for traditional investments. But rather as a replacement or equivalent of fiat currencies.
Bitrefill announced that the total number of daily transactions made through the platform increased to more than 10,000 daily after El Salvador announced a legal tender in Bitcoin. Almost two full blocks on the blockchain technology were saved by the large number of transactions on the Lightning Network.
