Solana is an open-source blockchain project whose native cryptocurrency is called Solana (SOL), which functionally is a utility token.
In various spaces, such as NFT creation, Solana is becoming the preferred option.
The data you should know about Solana:
It is an open-source blockchain.
Its native cryptocurrency is SOL.
It was born in 2017.
Its goal is to improve the processing speed of transactions.
It uses the PoS consensus protocol combined with PoH.
It is one of the favorite blockchains for DApp, NFT, and DeFi project development.
In May 2023, the sale of their Solana Saga phone was launched.
At the end of 2023, the sale of SOL skyrocketed significantly.
Brief history
The Solana project (Solana labs) is a relatively young blockchain project, born in 2017, and its creator was Anatoly Yakovenko, who was joined by Greg Firtzgerald, Anatoly's colleague at Qualcomm. Anatoly's idea was to improve, with his experience, the crypto ecosystem, fundamentally the speed of processing in transactions. For its financing, an ICO was launched in 2017, and in 2018 the company Solana Labs was launched by the Solana Foundation. The project's name comes from a beach in California with the same name where Yakovenko spent much of his life.
Technical characteristics
Yakovenko sought, among other things, to improve transaction processing speed, and he succeeded. Solana, at the time of publishing this article, has a speed of 65,000 transactions per second (tps); according to Yakovenko, this figure can be much higher (his White Paper sets this figure at 710,000 tps), but right now the limitation is the hardware; the equipment that processes the information cannot reach the speed at which they could actually operate. Solana is currently the fastest blockchain with the greatest scalability in the market.
This processing speed has been achieved thanks to the technology that Solana uses, the PoS consensus protocol along with the Proof of History (PoH) technology. PoH is not a proper consensus protocol; it is a mechanism that records transactions within a block differently than has been done until now. With PoH, transactions are ordered with a timestamp, which significantly reduces the waiting time that nodes have to validate each block.
Solana also has Turbine, a block propagation protocol that facilitates the delivery of information to nodes. It does this by dividing the information of the blocks and transferring it across the network; this information will then be reconstructed at each node. If you are interested, you can find more information in English about Turbine here.
Solana, DApps, NFTs, and DeFi
Given Solana's great scalability, it has become the preferred blockchain for DApp development and DeFi projects.
NFT projects based on Solana are experiencing significant growth and demand. Ethereum is the blockchain primarily chosen for the creation of these projects, but it is not prepared for a high number of transactions, and the network easily gets congested. Solana is gaining ground but still lags behind Ethereum in terms of NFT creation, although during 2023 it surpassed Ethereum in this aspect in December.
Following Solana's foray into DeFi and NFTs, its price skyrocketed in 2021, making it part of the top 10 in the cryptocurrency ranking. In September of that same year, Solana made its debut in the world of NFTs with Degenerate Ape Academy, a collection of cartoon ape images that sold out in just 10 minutes from its launch. By the end of 2022, after experiencing numerous ups and downs, SOL is among the top 20 cryptocurrencies in various rankings.
In November 2022, the partnership between Google Cloud and the Solana ecosystem was announced, which will allow Google to build a Solana validator to participate and validate the network.
If you are curious to learn more about DApps, DeFi projects, or NFTs created on Solana, you can check this link where you can find information about all existing projects today.
SOL Issuance
The issuance of the cryptocurrency SOL is one of the most controversial issues surrounding Solana. Initially, the issuance was 500 million, the community eliminated 11.4 million after a wallet that suspiciously held 13 million was discovered (here we leave you an article in English about this issue written by Anatoly Yakovenko). After distributing among founders, investors, the Solana Foundation, and reserves for the community, 1.6 million were left for the general public.
At the end of 2023, the sale of SOL skyrocketed, reaching $80 for the first time since 2022. By the end of December of that same year, it reached $100. This increase was motivated by various factors, including the announcement of the airdrop of the memecoin BONK on Solana phones, and the increased use of the Solana blockchain once the congestion problems it was experiencing were resolved.
Solana Saga Phone
At the end of 2022, Solana launched the pre-sale of its announced Solana Saga phone, created by Solana Mobile. Its sale finally occurred in May 2023 for a price of $1000. The goal of this phone, in addition to performing the usual functions of a mobile phone, is to bring the blockchain and Web3 ecosystem closer to the user.
The phones, which initially did not have much success, sold out quickly in December 2023, when they announced that each device came with an airdrop of 30 units of the memecoin BONK.
In January 2024, the pre-sale of the new Solana Saga Chapter 2 phone has already been launched, with a delivery forecast for the first half of 2025.
Drawbacks
Solana has cutting-edge technology, the number of users, like its price, grows over time, but it also has some drawbacks:
Lack of transparency. The fact that the Solana Foundation manages a high number of SOL cryptocurrencies generates distrust among many users; for many, this matter does not seem very transparent.
Network outages. The Solana blockchain has experienced some outages that have generated a certain distrust among its users.
Security. This aspect is always fundamental to achieving user trust, but on some occasions and in different projects, security has been compromised. Not to mention, in August 2022, there was an attack on more than 8,000 wallets operating on the Solana blockchain, resulting in theft.
of more than $5 million.