The number of transactions outputs and inputs on the Bitcoin network have risen to a near all-time high recently, even though the cryptocurrency’s price is down about 40% from its all-time high.
According to Bitcoin Visuals data, there were around 860,000 transaction inputs on the first day of July, a figure close to a high of 885,000 seen in January of 2018, before the bear market saw bitcoin’s price drop over 80%.
Source: Bitcoin Visuals
Similarly, bitcoin transaction outputs have recently gotten close to their all-time high of little over a million in late 2017, when bitcoin was at its all-time high of nearly $20,000. While the charts show some activity in mid-2015, it can be attributed to tests related to the scaling debate.
Source: Bitcoin Visuals
The data was first spotted by TrustNodes, which noted the charts show “about one million what you’d more plainly call a bitcoin transaction.” Put simply, a bitcoin transaction can have more than one recipient, meaning one single transaction can send funds to various addresses.
This, as one single bitcoin transaction can have various inputs and outputs – various addresses can send funds to various addresses in one single transaction.
Taking this into account, usage of the Bitcoin network is clearly getting close to a new all-time high. While simply looking at a chart showing us the number of bitcoin transactions shows a similar picture, if we zoom in on it transaction counts appear to be static since April, while actual usage has grown.
TrustNodes adds that if we take the one million transactions number and compare it to that of other top decentralized cryptocurrencies, we see the Bitcoin network is the most used one, even though Ethereum has a higher number of transactions per day.
We also need to take into account its layer-two scaling solution, the lightning network. 1ML data shows the network currently has a capacity of nearly 940 BTC ($10.68 million), and nearly 9,000 nodes. Its usage may soon grow even more, as popular bitcoin wallet Electrum is set to add lightning network support.
