A Complete Guide to Solana in 2024

The Solana blockchain is one of the most significant players in the web3 ecosystem – and for good reason!

With its high-speed transactions, low fees and rabid community, Solana ($SOL) has garnered widespread attention as the leading Layer-1 competitor to Ethereum. It’s user-first ethos, combined with an emphasis on scalability, has made it a leading choice for developers and enthusiasts alike – and in 2024, Solana is stronger than ever.

What makes Solana different? Who are its biggest players? Why is it so important? Let’s dive in, as we present our complete guide to the Solana blockchain in 2024.

What is Solana?

Solana is a decentralized Layer-1 blockchain. Conceived as an alternative to Ethereum, Solana was developed to address some of Ethereum’s issues, and to create a blockchain that is high-speed, low-cost, secure and scalable.

The Solana blockchain has it’s own native token $SOL, which serves as a means of transaction, facilitates staking, and powers the Solana ecosystem as a whole.

Solana is the home of a variety of popular projects, features and trends, including:

Decentralized Exchanges (DEXs): Solana is home to a variety of popular DEXs, including Jupiter, Raydium, Orca, and many moreWallets: Solana has a variety of third-party wallet solutions, with two of the most popular being Phantom and SolflareNFTs and Inscriptions: Solana has a storied history with NFTs and Inscriptions, being – at numerous points in time – home to collections such as DeGods, Mad Lads and CryptoUndeadsMarketplaces: Solana is one of the leading blockchains for NFT activity, with Magic Eden the focus of NFT trading on Solana – although other Solana-supported NFT marketplaces are available, such as TensorMemecoins: The prolific rise of altcoins on Solana in 2023 and 2024 brought renewed interest in the blockchain, with coins such as dogwifhat and Bonk gaining significant attentionSolana Blinks: Introduced in summer 2024, Solana Blinks allow Solana-based applications to be embedded as web apps, allowing for the trading of Solana-based NFTs and cryptocurrencies across the internet – including on leading social media platforms

How Solana Works

Solana utilises a unique consensus mechanism, combining its native Proof-of-History (PoH) protocol with traditional Proof-of-Stake (PoS) methods, essentially allowing Solana to timestamp transactions before they are processed. As of writing, this enables Solana to achieve an incredibly high throughput of up to 65,000 transactions per second (TPS), whilst allowing for transaction fees as low as $0.01.

This scalability makes Solana an attractive platform for developers looking to build high-performance dApps and smart contracts that require fast, affordable transactions – such as DEXs, games and other apps with high user numbers.

Smart contracts on Solana are often written in Rust, a programming language known for its security and performance, although other languages like C and C++ are also supported. This flexibility has contributed to the rapid growth of dApps on Solana, allowing web2 developers to more easily transfer into coding blockchain-based products.

The History of Solana

Solana was founded in 2017 by Anatoly Yakovenko, a former Qualcomm engineer, when he published the whitepaper for Solana’s Proof-of-History protocol, laying the foundations for the Solana blockchain.

The Solana mainnet officially launched in March 2020, and the blockchain has been through several ups and downs so far:

Exploits: Especially in its formative years, Solana fell victim to a number of exploits, leading to thousands of compromised wallets and millions of dollars in lost fundsReliability: It its early years, Solana struggled to maintain 100% uptime, and often had long periods of downtime or unreliable service – although today, this seems to be much less of an issueRapid growth: Solana has experienced two significant growth spikes, with the first in 2022, and the second across 2023/24, bringing thousands of developers and hundreds of thousands of players, users and community members to the Solana ecosystemDeGods and y00ts: DeGods and y00ts were two of the most high-profile NFT collections on Solana, until they migrated to Ethereum and Polygon in 2022 – a big blow to Solana that some saw as unrecoverable, but in hindsight was a minor blip for the blockchainThe rise of altcoins: Memecoin culture hit Solana in late 2023 and 2024, bringing with it swathes of new investors and community members, with notable examples such as dogwifhat and Bonk drawing significant attentionSolana Blinks: As mentioned, the recently introduced Solana Blinks herald a new era – not just for the Solana blockchain, but for how users experience web3 in general

Solana’s rapid ascent is thanks in large part to solid foundations – high speed, low costs, and a powerful community.

It’s undergone a variety of trials and tribulations to date, but today, Solana is well-positioned as the leading Layer-1 alternative to Ethereum. As its technology continues to evolve, further innovations, initiatives and trends will no doubt play a critical role in the future of Solana, as the blockchain looks set to become a mainstay of the industry for years to come.

Whether you’re a developer, an investor, or a user, Solana is a fantastic blockchain to explore – and with a wealth of opportunities at hand, there’s no better time than now to dive in.