How Teranode will leave the competition in the dust

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As we approach 2025, the blockchain space stands on the verge of a major technological revolution. For years, BSV’s Teranode has been on-again-off-again in-development limbo, but after a total reorganization of the team, it is now in Beta testing at GorillaPool and Taal as of September 2024.

With a target of processing 1 million transactions per second (TPS) without reliance on Layer 2 solutions, rollups, oracles, or any of the complex patchwork that other blockchains require, Teranode is poised to push BSV up to the top of the heap as the first truly scalable, public, general-purpose blockchain.

And if that seems like a lot of qualifiers, it is, but “scalable,” “public,” and “general-purpose” might be the real blockchain trilemma that never got solved until now! It should also be noted that BSV’s current implementation is capable of around 10,000 TPS today without any compromises that plague other blockchains, but that isn’t for today’s conversation.

In stark contrast, many of today’s so-called scalable blockchains—like Solana, Ethereum 2.0, and Avalanche—are bogged down by limitations that prevent them from ever reaching true mass adoption. As we look ahead, it becomes clear that these networks, even in 2025, will be stuck at least five years behind BSV in terms of scalability. More concerning for them is the fact that their architectures rely heavily on (often vaporware) Layer 2, workarounds, and compromises that create inefficiencies and centralization (security) risks. Let’s break down how Teranode outpaces the competition and highlight the shortcomings of these “next-gen” blockchains claiming to lead to scalability.

Solana: The overhyped speedster

Solana has long marketed itself as a high-performance blockchain with theoretical speeds of up to 65,000 TPS. However, in real-world conditions, Solana typically processes between 2,000 and 3,000 TPS, and much of this activity (up to 90%) consists of internal consensus-related transactions rather than public-facing activity. Solana has also faced repeated network outages during high-demand periods, underscoring its scalability limitations. Since the network was able to be rebooted, it begs the question of whether it is even a publicly distributed system. To their credit, they persist in continuing to work out their kinks, but the fundamentals of the network are clearly flawed in the long term.

Scalable? Not practically
Public? Arguably not
General Purpose? Yes

In contrast, Teranode’s 1 million TPS is not just theoretical. It is designed to be sustained under real-world conditions, allowing for global, high-velocity commerce on the blockchain without crashing under pressure or requiring more than one transaction related to consensus-finding, and that’s the coinbase reward.

By not needing consensus-related transactions to clutter block space, BSV enables businesses to leverage the blockchain for real economic activity rather than simply maintaining the network. Also, even under attack, the system persists as long as a single node maintains the truth, showing the power of honest nodes on a public network.

Ethereum 2.0: Layer 2 dependencies and centralization risks

Ethereum 2.0, while promising on paper, has a TPS ceiling of around 100,000 under ideal conditions and when using Layer 2 rollups—which are largely trust-based compromises.

Also, its base Layer 1 continues to struggle with limited throughput (around 100 TPS) and high transaction fees under load. To achieve scalability, Ethereum relies on Layer 2 solutions like Optimistic and ZK-Rollups, creating a fragmented ecosystem where most users interact through second layers that inherit Ethereum’s security in some cases, but not others and also heavily complicate the user experience.

Scalable? No.
Public? L1 is debatable. L2 is not.
General Purpose? Yes 

On the other hand, Teranode eliminates the need for Layer 2 entirely, as all scalability is achieved directly on Layer 1 among competing peers. This means no fragmented liquidity, no additional trust assumptions, no insecure bridges, and no complicated rollups to maintain the security of the network. Smart contracts, tokenization, and even complex applications can all run on-chain without the performance bottlenecks or fee spikes that plague Ethereum and its thousands of derivatives.

Avalanche: High TPS, low decentralization

Avalanche touts a respectable 4,500 TPS, but this comes at the cost of decentralization. Its reliance on subnets and their validators to achieve scalability raises concerns about centralization, as a small number of validators could gain outsized influence over the network. Additionally, as the network scales, so too must the number of validators, which could exacerbate centralization risks.

The problem is essentially a tug-of-war between altruism and competition where incentives limit the scalability of the network despite it being a scalable network in theory. 

Public? Debatable.
Scalable? Not in practical terms.
General Purpose? Yes.

By comparison, Teranode on BSV is designed to scale without sacrificing the decentralization created by competition. The network maintains the integrity of proof-of-work (PoW), ensuring that scaling is achieved through economic incentives rather than a reliance on trusted validators. BSV’s architecture enables massive scaling without introducing new points of centralization, preserving the original vision of a decentralized, permissionless network. Critics will argue that there are currently too few “nodes” on BSV, but they are welcome to join the network and compete at any time, and they will be compensated economically if they are good at it. A truly open system.

Fantom, Algorand, and the DAG contingency

Fantom and Algorand represent two more examples of “scalable” blockchains still hamstrung by design limitations. Fantom uses a Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) structure to boost its TPS to around 25,000, but it requires a large stake to find consensus (creating centralization and regulatory issues). Similarly, Algorand boasts up to 6,000 TPS with similar consensus-finding systems, but uses an Algrand Foundation-operated relay node system, keeping it far from being a true competitor as a public blockchain.

Scalable? Algo: Sort of. Fantom: Pretty good!
Public? Depends on how you feel about proof of stake systems and relays run by a foundation.
General purpose? Yes

By contrast, Teranode is designed to handle complex smart contracts natively in Bitcoin Script, along with a thriving ecosystem of tokens and decentralized applications. With BSV, businesses can rely on an infinitely scalable Layer 1 to build the same kind of DeFi, tokenization, and Web3 services that other blockchains promise, but with the confidence that they will scale to global usage and no stakers or foundation to disappear overnight with the state of the network in the balance!

Cardano, Polygon, and Near: Theoretical highs, real-world lows

Cardano’s long-promised Hydra scaling solution is said to theoretically enable 1 million TPS, but as of 2025, it remains theoretical and requires another hard fork upgrade. Cardano’s actual throughput record remains at 83 TPS, a far cry from its lofty aspirations. Polygon, a Layer 2 sidechain solution for Ethereum, achieves up to 7,000 TPS on its own network but inherits Ethereum’s security risks, particularly when bridging assets back and forth. Near Protocol, meanwhile, boasts impressive scalability through sharding, with a potential of 100,000 TPS, but real-world testing has been limited, and the current limit is around 10,000 TPS—which doesn’t put it in the lead for anything in particular.

Scalable? Meh…
Public? Cardano: Yes, but PoS. Polygon: Not really. Near: Also PoS, so again, it depends.
General Purpose: With mixed limitations, yes.

In contrast, Teranode achieves scalability without the need for speculative, theoretical solutions. It delivers real, provable TPS on Layer 1 without compromising security or decentralization. As businesses worldwide adopt blockchain technology, they can trust Teranode’s ability to handle the demands of global commerce without the need for rollups, sharding, or sidechains or giving up on the need for using a scalable, public, general-purpose blockchain.

The Future is here: Teranode and the BSV advantage

In 2025, Teranode will launch as the most advanced blockchain scalability solution in existence. Capable of 1 million TPS, it will outperform every competitor on the market by at least two orders of magnitude in the real world, not just in raw speed but in usability and efficiency. Teranode’s key advantage lies in its simplicity—scaling is achieved directly on Layer 1, with no need for the complex, convoluted solutions that other blockchains have adopted out of necessity.

While Solana, Ethereum 2.0, Avalanche, and others still wrestle with centralization concerns, fee spikes, and limited throughput, Teranode is built to handle global commerce, complex smart contracts, and high-velocity transactions with ease. Its ability to scale without fragmentation creates a blockchain ecosystem that is simpler, faster, and more powerful than anything else on the horizon.

As the blockchain world enters 2025, the networks that once touted themselves as the future of scalability will find themselves several generations behind BSV. The era of rollups, sidechains, and half-measures is ending. With Teranode, the future of blockchain scalability is finally here, and it’s leaving the competition in the dust.

Watch: Teranode is the future of the Bitcoin network