According to Cointelegraph: The Ordinals inscriptions frenzy is causing a significant increase in blockchain network transaction fees, as demand for blockspace grows. Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) chains' inscriptions witnessed a weekend boom, leading to a spike in gas fees.
According to data from Dune Analytics, the gas spent on inscriptions on December 16 surged to a record sum of $8.3 million. Avalanche network led these expenses, accounting for over $5.6 million in gas spent in a single day. Arbitrum One followed in second place with $2.1 million.
In the last 24 hours, 58% of Avalanche's network gas fees and 48% of zkSync Era's gas fees were spent on EVM inscriptions. Likewise, BNB Chain allocated 73% of its transactions to inscriptions.
The surge in EVM inscriptions on the Arbitrum One network significantly impacted its performance, even causing a 78-minute outage on December 15.
EVM inscriptions are akin to Ordinals in the Bitcoin network, with both embedding information in transaction call data to generate unique on-chain nonfungible tokens (NFTs). Bitcoin's network has also been grappling with an upsurge in inscriptions, resulting in an escalated demand for block space and transaction fees. Consequently, the current count of unconfirmed transactions stands close to 280,000.
Bitcoin's transaction fees have escalated to an unaffordable high of $37 for many users, shifting its practical application away from peer-to-peer digital money. Adam Back, Bitcoin pioneer and cryptographer, argues that this tension will likely spur the adoption of Layer-2 solutions and foster innovation.
Interestingly, despite escalating transaction costs, certain NFT collections have seen an explosive increase in volume traded over the past 24 hours, with inscriptions on the Bitcoin Frogs Ordinals collection reaching a market capitalization of $182 million.
