Ethereum processed 4.5 times more transactions than Visa in 2021

The smart contract blockchain par excellence, Ethereum, processed 4.5 times more transactions than Visa in 2021. 

The second-largest crypto by market capitalization has overtaken the global leader in digital payments. 

Ethereum processed 4.5x more transactions than Visa in 2021 

Ethereum has overtaken Visa in 2021, processing 4.5x more transactions than the digital payments giant. 

“FUN FACT: Ethereum processed 4.5x times more transactions than Visa in 2021”.

Overall, the smart contract blockchain par excellence handled the equivalent of nearly $12 trillion in transactions in 2021, while Visa processed around $10.4 trillion in transactions. 

This is a staggering performance when considering that Ethereum’s L1 was able to process over 1.2 million transactions per day. This is equivalent to 15 transactions per second. 

Ethereum overtook Visa in transactions in 2021

And yet, although Ethereum surpassed Visa last year in terms of the number of transactions it handled, 2021 was not exactly an easy year. 

In fact, the platform has faced numerous challenges such as its scalability issues, the arrival of competitors in the smart contract market and more. 

The London hard-fork EIP-1559 upgrade in August 2021 took place, which resulted in 4500 ETH burning in 24 hours at 2 ETH per minute. And this has helped reduce gas fees. 

By implementing Layer 2 scaling solutions, Ethereum has also lifted its network from congestion and increased the number of transactions per second. The developments are one of the main reasons why Ethereum has gained such a high transaction volume.

Not only that, 2021 was also the year of the Non-Fungible Token (NFT) boom and this made Ethereum invariably the leading player in such a scenario. 

One and a half million more addresses every month

Recently, the number of Ethereum addresses with positive ETH balances were also calculated and the result is an increase of 18.36 million. This is a monthly average of 1.53 million. 

A week ago, there were a total of 70.4 million, compared to 52.04 million at the end of 2020, thanks to a 35% growth in just one year. 

Other recent news from the second-largest crypto by market capitalization is that the famous social network of crypto-lovers, Twitter, has announced that it will add Ethereum (ETH) payments for “tips”, which until now have only been available in BTC.