BNB Chain: New Roadmap with Faster, More Decentralized Transactions
Recently, a new roadmap for the BNB Chain was launched, which aims to increase the support provided to project developers on the blockchain by improving the transaction speed as well as the level of decentralization. This news comes after reports of high-gas fees on the Ethereum blockchain have suggested that the most popular blockchain for dapps might slowly be losing its dominance, thus creating a void that the BNB Chain wants to fill.
Changes to the Roadmap
An announcement was recently made about new changes to the BNB Chain, which would improve on the current infrastructure and attempt to help developers build dapps that can handle high-volume transactions. This would not only make the blockchain more popular with developers who wish to build scalable applications but would also in turn increase the level of decentralization. Currently, most of the popular blockchains are facing scalability issues, as they are unable to handle high transaction volumes without charging exorbitant gas fees or suffering from congestion.
This has led to problems for developers, who are now in search of a blockchain that could enable them to build decentralized applications (dapps) without facing these issues. The BNB Chain, which was launched by the Binance cryptocurrency exchange and was formerly known as the Binance Smart Chain), is trying to become THE blockchain for dapps, and this is a meaningful step in that direction.
Based on the updated roadmap, the dapps will offer “increased capacity, faster transactions, increased decentralization, network security, and stability to the consumers”. It will also aim to bring together the forces of transaction speeds and decentralization, two factors that are often considered to be incompatible in the industry. Most blockchains in the past that have attempted to improve transaction speeds have done so by reducing the degree of decentralization, which makes them less attractive to dapp developers.
The team at BNB Chain is planning to get around the problem of transaction speeds by increasing the Block Gas Capacity to 200 million According to the BNB Chain team, however, faster and cheaper transactions will be brought about by increasing Block Gas Capacity to 200 million. This will ensure a flawless dApp experience even during times when there is a lot of traffic on the blockchain.
On the other hand, the problem of decentralization will be solved by increasing the number of validators from 21 to 41 on the blockchain. This will result in a more competitive consensus mechanism. This is in contrast to the current system in most blockchains that have a lower number of validators, which means that small candidate validators often have a very low chance of getting validation rewards. By increasing the number of validators to 41, BNB seeks to level the playing field to some extent and improve the chances of smaller validators. The strategy announcement said, “Decentralization is “a core element” of BNB Chain’s strategy”.
The War To Beat Ethereum
Ethereum has long since been the most popular blockchain for NFT projects and DAOs alike, with reports stating that the blockchain has around 1-1.5 million transactions a day. This has also led the blockchain’s native token, ETH, to become the second-largest cryptocurrency in the world by market capitalization, with an all-time high value of over $250 billion. However, the blockchain can only handle around 15 transactions a second, which means that as the volume of transactions increases, so does the gas fees associated with each transaction. This includes NFT purchases, wallet transfers, as well as the trading of cryptocurrencies. While this problem will be fixed to a large extent by the introduction of ETH2.0, the release date for it is nowhere near confirmed.
Therefore, as the gas fees for Ethereum transactions began to rise, developers and investors alike began to search for alternatives. The next-most popular blockchain network in this regard is the BNB Chain, which had an all-time high market capitalization of over $100 million, the 5th highest in the world. This figure currently stands at $52 million. Other blockchains that have grown in popularity by positioning themselves as a better alternative to Ethereum include Solana, Cardano, and Tezos.
Comments by The Binance Team
The Executive Director of the BNB Foundation, Uri Ferrucio, said that the roadmap was the culmination of months of hard work put in by the whole team and that the entire community has “been hard at work” to prepare the roadmap and put the blockchain on track to deliver on the commitments made deliver the technological achievements shared in the roadmap. He added, “While we recognize that there’s still a lot to do, this is a testament to the competence of the buidlers of this ecosystem”.
Released on Tuesday at the BNB Chain Revelation Summit, the roadmap has been described as one of the most comprehensive development programs ever released by the blockchain. The Summit, which is a virtual event held for the members of the BNB Community, also showcased other notable developments, such as the introduction of mainnet BNB Application sidechains, which would include META Apes and the Metaverse World.
I'm a second year Accounting and Finance student at the University of Warwick, in addition to being the COO at Pierpoint Ventures. I've been a trader and investor for 4 years, and am deeply passionate about the cryptocurrency markets. I am also an incoming Trading Analyst at Morgan Stanley.
