Bitcoin SV‘s (BSV) Scaling Test Network (STN) hit a new record this week, processing over 9,000 transactions per second at one point on January 26. Its previous record was ~6,500 tps in December 2019. Despite being a testing network, the STN shares most of its technical capabilities with the BSV mainnet—once again disproving the notion that Bitcoin can’t scale on-chain.
To put that into perspective, the BTC network (which many still incorrectly insist on referring to as “Bitcoin”) limits its block sizes to 1-4MB, permitting a maximum 7 transactions per second (it’s more like 3-4). That’s not seven thousand… but seven. No blockchain asset has a hope of gaining use as a world currency, global payment settlement layer or for everyday payments at such a low capacity, and it can cost over $10 or even $20 to send a single BTC transaction of any amount.
How did the Scaling Test Network achieve the new record?
STN Operations Manager Brad Kristensen told CoinGeek that his team thinks over 2,000 tps is sustainable on the STN, going by the data they’ve collected. Just recently they observed an average of around 1.9 ktps (or 1,900 tps) over an eight-hour period. You can monitor STN statistics yourself at this site.