Solana is a high-speed, decentralized, open-source, public blockchain built with smart contract execution to host dApps with high scalability, throughput, efficiency, and low transaction costs. It is one of the fastest blockchain networks in the crypto market as of 2022 and supports several leading decentralized apps (dApps) across decentralized finance (DeFi), gaming, NFTs, and Web3.
SOL is the native token of the Solana ecosystem and features among the top cryptocurrencies by market cap. Its value has skyrocketed since 2021 on account of the rising adoption of the Solana blockchain by dApps. In addition, some of the dApps running on the Solana network have gone on to garner several users, increasing the on-chain activity of the blockchain and driving the Solana price and market cap higher.
Solana claims a block time of 400 milliseconds which is expected to reduce even further as its infrastructure becomes more powerful with time. In addition to the high speed on offer, transactions on the Solana network are extremely cheap, with low fees under $0.01, making it an attractive alternative to Ethereum which continues to experience scalability issues because of high gas fees.
These factors have made Solana one of the most attractive ‘Ethereum killers’ in the market, driving more developers to build dApps on its platform that operate with higher efficiency. In addition, it boasts a network of thousands of nodes spread across the globe, which makes the Solana blockchain censorship-resistant and guarantees high security to data and assets.