4,000 BTC is used to charge the Bitcoin Lightning Network’s capacity.

The layer-2 system, which is based on Bitcoin, now has 4,000 bitcoins (or $120 million) locked up, enabling for near-instant payments all around the world. The world’s most valuable cryptocurrency has reason to rejoice. The Lightning Network has reached a public capacity of 4,000 Bitcoin (BTC), indicating that $120 million in value is ready for peer-to-peer payments. In August 2020, the Lightning Network broke the 1,000 BTC barrier, and in July 2021, it broke the 2,000 BTC barrier. In just 18 months, the capacity has doubled. “We had gradual and steady growth with Lightning capacity to begin with,” CoinCorner CEO Daniel Scott told Cointelegraph, “but the spike has been considerable from January[uary] 2021.” Lightning Network capacity “certainly passed 4K a long time ago with private channel stats not being publicly available,” according to Danny Brewster, CEO of UK-based Bitcoin exchange Fast Bitcoins. “With that being said, the constant growth has been a great start for the Lightning Network and I foresee it continuing into the future, as long as all stakeholders, from developers to entrepreneurs building businesses continue to push forward.” The Lightning Network is a layer-2 payment mechanism based on Bitcoin’s foundation layer that allows for near-instant transaction completion. Paco de la India, a Bitcoin-powered global traveler, uses the Lightning Network to acquire a pair of shorts from Jorge, a Bitcoiner from Mozambique: https://twitter.com/RunwithBitcoin?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1532835249821982720%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fcointelegraph.com%2Fnews%2Fbitcoin-lightning-network-capacity-charges-through-4-000-btc Lead on-chain analyst for Glassnode, James Check, told Cointelegraph, “The expansion of Bitcoin’s Lightning Network appears to be transitioning out of the “reckless” phase, and into proper experimentation by early adopters.” “As wallet designs and user experience improve, more kinks can be worked out, and the network will mature. The persistent growth of public Lightning capacity and channel count is a reflection of this vote of growing confidence and growing utilization,” he said. Scott agreed, sharing that the positive trend is likely to continue “as more companies adopt Lightning and we see more use cases come to fruition.” “The influence of El Salvador adopting Bitcoin seems to have been an inflection point for Lightning, giving it confidence and proving a real-world use case.” According to data from 1ML, the average and median transaction costs for sending Satoshis (Bitcoin’s smallest denomination) over Lightning are substantially under $0.01, demonstrating its utility as a payment method. According to Brewster, it’s a “amazing start but a long way to go.” It’s still very early!”