Solana, the high-performance blockchain known for its fast transaction speeds and low fees, has recently been grappling with network congestion issues that have led to increased transaction failures and delayed launches for several crypto projects built on the platform. However, the Solana community is actively working on solutions to address these challenges and improve the network’s overall performance.
TLDR
- Solana validators voted 98% in favor of a “Timely Vote Credits” proposal to decrease latency of consensus votes and speed up transactions.
- Solana is currently facing network congestion issues due to an implementation bug related to the QUIC protocol, with a fix scheduled for April 15.
- The congestion has led to increased transaction failures and forced several crypto projects on Solana to delay their launches.
- Solana’s cheap fees have made it attractive to arbitrage bots, which are flooding the network with transactions and causing issues for regular users.
- Solana developers are working on solutions, including incorporating priority fees and reducing reliance on QUIC, to alleviate the congestion and improve the network’s performance.
One of the key developments in this regard is the recent passage of the “Timely Vote Credits” proposal by Solana validators, with an overwhelming 98% of votes in favor. This proposal aims to decrease the latency of consensus votes, which are crucial for confirming transactions on the blockchain.
By incentivizing validators to submit their votes more quickly, the Timely Vote Credits mechanism is expected to speed up transaction confirmation times and enhance the network’s efficiency.
Solana developers have identified an implementation bug related to the QUIC protocol as the root cause of the ongoing network congestion. QUIC, a data transfer protocol developed by Google, is used by Solana to keep all nodes informed about the current state of the network.
The bug fix, which involves reconfiguring QUIC, is slated for deployment on April 15, provided no additional issues arise during testing.
The impact of the network congestion has been felt by various crypto projects built on Solana, with several of them forced to postpone their launches indefinitely.
Surge Finance, a staking rewards platform, delayed the launch of its native token, citing the need for improved market conditions to ensure successful transactions. Similarly, real-world asset platform Sky Hause and identity platform myBID have also postponed their launches due to the congestion issues.
Solana sees traffic and demand that no other network has ever come close to — it’s a stress test of the whole system. These are exactly the type of stress tests you cannot model in simulation, you have to just see how stuff works in prod and adapt.
The scaling and bug squashing…
— Austin Federa | ???????? (@Austin_Federa) April 6, 2024
One of the factors contributing to Solana’s network congestion is the platform’s popularity among arbitrage bots, which are attracted by its low transaction fees. These bots flood the network with transactions, attempting to profit from price discrepancies in memecoins across different decentralized exchanges (DEXs).
The combination of low, fragmented liquidity and high hype surrounding memecoins like BONK and WIF has exacerbated the issue, making it difficult for regular users to have their transactions processed in a timely manner.
To combat this problem, Solana developers are encouraging more app developers to incorporate priority fees, which would help price out some of the bot activity.
The upcoming Solana version 1.18, expected to hit the mainnet on April 15, is anticipated to alleviate congestion by modifying how transactions with priority fees are handled. However, the actual impact of this update will only be known once it is deployed and tested under real-world conditions.
Solana developers are also working on reducing the network’s reliance on QUIC. Jump Crypto’s proposed validator software, Firedancer, is expected to be the client that facilitates this transition.
By improving Solana’s networking layer and how apps and users communicate with the underlying infrastructure, developers hope to pave the way for a more effective fee model overhaul in the future.
