Ethereum’s onchain fees have been significantly lower since The Merge. However, the combined transaction volume on the second layer (L2) chains of Arbitrum and Optimism exceeded Ethereum’s onchain transaction output. On Saturday, January 14, 2023, Ethereum completed 1.10 million onchain transactions, while the combined transactions on Arbitrum and Optimism reached 1.32 million on the same day.
L2 Scaling Solutions Arbitrum and the Rise of Optimism
Onchain transaction fees have decreased significantly since the first week of August 2022 and the blockchain transitioned from a proof-of-work (PoW) blockchain to a proof-of-stake (PoS) network on September 15, 2022. Data from etherscan.io’s gas tracker shows that the highest-priority onchain ether transaction was worth an estimated $0.75, or 23 gwei, at 5:00 PM ET on Sunday afternoon.
As of Sunday, January 15, 2023, the average Arbitrum transaction is approximately $0.101 per transfer, while the Optimism transaction is $0.1410 per transfer. L2-scale solutions have become increasingly popular since 2020, with options like Polygon Hermez, Zksync, Boba, and Starknet in addition to Optimism and Arbitrum.
These solutions enable faster and cheaper transactions by reducing the computational workload on the main blockchain network (Ethereum) or layer one (L1). Arbitrum and Optimism transactions are periodically “rolled” and recorded on Ethereum using an optimistic pool or an optimistic virtual machine. Statistics from Dune Analytics show that both L2 networks, Arbitrum and Optimism have seen a significant increase in daily transactions.
For example, “Optimism” recorded 737,191 transactions on January 14, and “Arbitrum” recorded 586,745 transactions on the same day. As of January 10, 2023, the total number of transactions on both Arbitrum and Optimism directly exceeded the number of Ethereum onchain transfers. For example, on January 10, the number of combined transactions for both L2 scale networks was about 1.12 million, while Ethereum processed 1.06 million on-chain transfers.
According to data from Dune Analytics on January 14, 2023, the number of transactions combined for both L2 networks was approximately 1.32 million transactions compared to 1.10 million transactions calculated on the Ethereum chain. Ethereum still has a significant number of transactions per day compared to most blockchains. As of June 17, 2020, Ethereum typically handles over one million transactions per day. However, several other cryptocurrency networks handle more transactions than Ethereum, such as XRP and Polygon.
On January 14, Polygon recorded 3.10 million transactions, and XRP saw 1.25 million transactions that day. L2 chains Arbitrum and Optimism have seen significant growth over the past 12 months, although they have not outpaced Ethereum, XRP or Polygon transactions on their own.
For example, on January 15, 2022, Ethereum made 1.17 million transactions that day, Arbitrum made 21,734 transfers per day, and Optimism made 30,430 transactions per day. The data shows that Arbitrum’s daily transactions have grown by 2,599% over the past 12 months, and Optimism’s L2 scale solution has seen a 2,322% daily transfer since January 2022.
What impact do you think L2-scale solutions will have on the future of blockchain technology and its adoption? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section below.
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