Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin is great for storing value, but when it comes to small payments, high fees and slow confirmation times can be a problem. That’s why the Lightning Network (LN) was created — to make Bitcoin transactions faster and cheaper.

But adoption is still not as high as many hoped. For example:

Only a limited number of exchanges and wallets support Lightning.

Setting it up can still be confusing for new users.

Many people prefer using stablecoins or other crypto for quick transfers.


I think Lightning has a lot of promise, but maybe the ecosystem isn’t ready yet.

👉 What do you think? Have you used Lightning, and was it easy or difficult?

I don't remember in what year Lightning Network become a thing. But from what I see, there isn't much progress in adoption. From all people here, I'm wondering how many of you are actually using LN. And by saying "actually using", I mean that you haven't just tried it for test purpposes.
From my perspective I can answer that I'm not using it, I just don't see many places where I can use. Number of services that support LN isn't growing significantly.

1) This is very likely an AI post that you are responding to.
2) LN adoption is widespread. These days there are even Bitcoin ATMs that natively support LN. Just because you are not involved with this it does not mean that the adoption is not there. Compared to a few years ago, these days LN works pretty flawlessly.

Absolutely not true.

1) Yeah, it's likely. There is way too much of this shit here.
2) Maybe, I don't argue or pretend to be right. It's just my experience and I haven't faced much LN adoption. Like Bitcoin ATM with LN support - this is new thing for me. While there is no Bitcoin ATM in whole my country, I don't even talk about LN support.


If I was wrong, I'm just glad to hear it

Well you did say "from what you see" but that can also be indicative of a general view of the LN situation and not a local view. Actually this is probably the more common understanding of those words. You would have to be a bit more precise if you want to refer it to your area. If you don't have any BTC ATMs at all where you live then the likelihood of LN accepting businesses is extremely low. There are definitely places in the world where adoption is very high but you won't hear about it that often in global news because they are small cities or communities comparatively speaking.

It is a supply and demand thing. Usually supply appears after demand is clear unless there are pioneers who provide a supply very early. If you want LN to be adopted where you live, you or other Bitcoiners around you must make it happen. That is pretty much how it happened in any place that I am aware of. People got together and started red pilling business owners and helping them set up LN. These days accepting LN if you accept Bitcoin anyway is very trivial. There may be some difficulties on the accounting side depending on local laws, but those difficulties are equally applicable to on-chain and LN Bitcoin.

I think that this perception depends greatly on the region.
While I expect that in most Western countries and especially in US the number of LN services grow significantly, I have 100$ in my LN wallet and I was unable to spend a dime of that during this year's holiday (both inside my country and abroad, but not in capital cities).
So yeah, if it covers "the others" but not yourself, it kinda sux...

In reality there were a lot of good news about LN in the last few years. Several large exchanges now support it, also several small swap services. So it's not longer a problem to swap LN coins to on-chain BTC or fiat, if it ever was.

The security against the Replacement Cycle Attack, which was seen as a potential big problem when it was discovered in 2023, seem to have improved with recent updates too.

However node and channel statistics (https://bitcoinvisuals.com/lightning) are still a bit disappointing as they basically stagnate, even if in the last month there seems to have been a slight increase (around 2%) which may hint that the tendency is changing. On the other hand, the value of the coins locked in LN channels has hit several ATHs in 2025 (now it's a bit below the ATHs, but that's because Bitcoin price has decreased a little bit).

Currently onchain transaction fees are however very low, and also the "currency" use is stagnating as still speculative/store-of-value use prevails. These two factors are imo holding LN back right now.

Sure, I don't mean to reject that statement. I merely ask posters to be more precise. You can't make general statements regarding the global state of something based off of your local experiences. In most cases you will have to look for LN accepting places in advance and actively go to them. It is not likely that you will find them by chance wherever you decided to go. The people who live in a LN accepting environment are the lucky ones.

As I said, if you want to see the adoption you need to help it happen. In any case you can use LN for online things whenever you have so you get to at least have a taste of the experience.

It is, but perhaps this is not primarily a problem that comes from LN itself but rather from the overall lowered rate of participation in the market by retail. I see that that current sentiment is very low. On chain activity everywhere is extremely low. For shitcoin chains to get the real picture you have to subtract most or all automated systems such as on-chain bots. Once you do that you will see just how bad retail participation is right now.  :P Nevertheless, the difficulty in setting up a node and LN in general plays a role. To be honest, I think it is perfectly fine to tell people to simply use mobile wallets that manage this for you. Since for LN we are talking about small amounts of Bitcoin it should not be an issue.

We should not let perfection cause friction for adoption in this case. LN nodes are not as important as on chain nodes. 

If I must be frank, then I will say you talk too weird, almost as scary as how crypto users will be forced to use a particular network and I hope it is never the best option neither is it as a core in the blockchain.
I don't use the lighting network but yet transactions seem to be very efficient in my side using other network providers. A lot has also not cared about the transactions because they are hodling. Although regular traders who are sending smaller amounts of might suffer it.

There are many lightning transaction indeed, it's just they never show because the transaction happens offchain. It gives the illusion as if lightning network adoption isn't surfacing but these people are mistaken.

Even many CEX accept sending bitcoin through lightning network these days, something that most of people never truly understand that it's a hint for the existing demands.

You don't need to remember it, just search and find what you need.

Visit the Bitcoin Lightning Network Dashboard (https://bitcoinvisuals.com/lightning) and get some charts for basic information on Bitcoin Lightning Network growth with time.
Lightning Network Nodes: https://bitcoinvisuals.com/ln-nodes
Lightning Network Channels: https://bitcoinvisuals.com/ln-channels

From stats on nodes and channels, the Bitcoin Lightning Network adoption began to be bigger considerably since 2019.

Last year, there were concerns on security of Bitcoin Lightning Network and the adoption on it declined a lot since then as you can see on two above charts as well.

There are developments of Bitcoin side-chains that can be future solutions for Bitcoin users if they don't like Bitcoin on-chain and Bitcoin Lightning Network.
Sidechain Observer - Bitcoin L2 Projects & current state of development (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5496743.0)

Check out the BTCMap website https://btcmap.org/ (https://btcmap.org/)  you might find merchants in your area that accept Bitcoin Lightning. BTCMap tracks all kinds of businesses worldwide, including stores, restaurants, cafés, pizzerias, hotels, motels, and more other business, that accept Bitcoin.

If you also run a business that accepts Bitcoin, you can add it to the map for free. By adding your business to BTCMap, you have the opportunity to attract new customers and get free publicity.

I use the Lightning Network almost daily, not for physical stores but online. I use Bitrefill to pay with Lightning for gas vouchers, Amazon vouchers, and supermarket vouchers. I keep around 150,000 sats per month on Zeus, connected to my own node, to pay with LN. Physical stores in my area are still very few, and although some do exist, I’ve never tried them yet

Yeah, in my vicinity, as I've already knew, there are pretty much only Bitcoin ATMs.
Not that useful, I already have bitcoin card if I want to exchange and actually spend fiat.

https://talkimg.com/images/2025/09/26/UQYb3H.png (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqREM62cAqk)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqREM62cAqk

you are right while it provides fast & cheap transaction, its growth has been slower than expected. Whatever, for your kind information, in early 2025 public Lightning capacity surpassed 5000 BTC! ! reflecting around 384 % increase since 2020! You really don't see any significant development in this, huh?

Adoption is not widespread because many things like liquidity challenges, user experience issues &  regulatory concerns often stand in the way. If you look at countries like El Salvador, they have already prevail over these hitch, they can conduct daily transactions through LN without any govt butting in. I have also heard of some region like Kibera slums in Nairobi, where LN is helping to upgrade economic inclusion, stream the above video.

so despite the challenges LN is evolving day by day & dont think that just because you & I dont use it, so its stalled. For your question, yeah i already used LN in Binance app &  if I find any shop that accepts payment through LN, I will definitely try that too.

There are no high fees on bitcoin blockchain for a long time, you can even send transactions with 1 sat/vB most of the times, or even less.
It's normal to wait some time for confirmation and we don't to change that in any way.

I don't liuke lightning network at all, it is not decentralized like people say, it's based mostly on cloud servers and it's not easy for newbies.
If some wallets are easy for newbies than they are custodial, and many times fees on lightning can be higher than on mainnet.

Thanks for sharing these links, I've looked into it. Charts of nodes and channels looks more or less stable recently. It's neither falling or growing, but it's way behind it's peak.

Well, this map proves what I was thinking - LN adoption in my region is very low. There is maybe 10 services in whole country. Services that I hear for the first time and nothing in city. While in some regions LN adoption is really significant.

The LN is mostly seen as a good alternative during when the Bitcoin fee is high. But currently, the Bitcoin network is not over flooded with transactions that could make everything go high again. For the privacy aspect, I think since LN is off chain the privacy level is preferably and faster than on chain transactions. Once the transaction is recorded on the blockchain, it send a signal to watchers and bots that are always actively checking through transactions and wallets to know where funds is coming from and where it's going. Although LN has it own lapses just like on chain transactions but I still prefer it as a good alternative.

Some people use lightning transaction not because the fee is high, right now the transaction fee is low, we have some mempool that do accept transaction with less than a sat per vbytes, like you can pay less than a cent for a transaction and it will go through but the people that are using lightning hasn't stop for one day to close their channels. I think it's more convenient for them to pay some tiny sats through channel instead of sending transaction through the main layer.

We need to have people that think Bitcoin lightning is for daily use and not when the transaction fee on the main layer is high, it's going to become a normal use for people instead of having to rely on it when Bitcoin transaction fee is higher. Imagine if you have all your channels connected to all the place you spend money daily, where you eat, where you shop, where you get an hair cut and where you get services, lightning is going to be bigger than the way it's right now.

lightning network has flaws and bugs, even lightning dev's admit to it..
what would be needed is a new 'start from scratch' subnetwork for micro-transactions.

many people over the last 8 years have tried LN and found its headaches, bottlenecks, bugs and issues.. and LN devs cant/wont fix them for many reasons
so if people want mass adoption of a subnetwork for micro transactions a new one needs to be designed and made well, instead of the games currently played with empty promises that "LN is the future".. sorry its not

On of the major draw drawbacks that is stopping lightening network from gaining adoption is due to its complex setup process, the majority of those who will be using the lightening network in their business places and companies are not savvy in crypto currency, let alone gaining the knowledge of setting up a lighting network.

I personally believe that if the lightening network was or came as a feature which can easily be tuned on and off inside a bitcoin wallet (doesn't matter the type of wallet), it would have gained more adoption and those who are running their personal business and shops must have adopted it, there would have been much more users of the
Lightening network than what are currency seeing.

I think there is some room for readjustment and fixes on the Lightening Network, cause having seen a chart for the records of transactions done as from the year the LN was integrated back then in 2018, there is still some signs that the reduction is average transactions fees didn't drop that much, but rather by the below chart, showed significant increase in transactions fees.
https://www.talkimg.com/images/2025/09/27/UQcwqT.jpeg

As for the parts of Bitcoin ATMs, I have no idea on that, cause in my country, there's none, and don't know when that will be put into consideration, as the country has not fully embraced the legal use of Bitcoin and crypto related assets.

The only places that accept lightning near me are all Bitcoin ATMs, but no businesses that sell physical goods. These ATMs typically charge very high fees and require KYC, so it is not something I would even use. According to a recent lawsuit (https://oag.dc.gov/release/attorney-general-schwalb-sues-crypto-atm-operator) against the largest Bticoin ATM provider in the US, most usage is coming from old people getting scammed.

Lightning might be fast and cheap, but the user experience is still inferior to onchain BTC and altcoins. Over the years we have also seen Bitcoin gain a lot more traction as an investment rather than as something used for payments. With so many institutions and corporations trying to get involved with stablecoin payments, it’s hard to see Lightning growing beyond its small niche.

This is not directly related to any issues with LN. Whether people want to adopt it or not is up to them. There is different kind of on chain demand that can't be satisfied with LN. An example would be the Ordinals spam. LN is not directly supposed to lower on chain fees, but instead it should provide people with an alternative for conducting transactions where the fee is too expensive in relation to the transferred amount. If you have a fair amount of value in Bitcoin it is good to have a couple hundred or a couple thousand of dollars ready in an LN wallet.

You can open a channel when fees are low and then you are not affected by on-chain fees being high for any small transactions.

This is nonsense. How many places accept your random shitcoin? Even fewer than Lightning. The LN experience is best, better than on chain and better than any shitcoin. If you have never used it and especially if you are unable to make an objective review and assessment then you should keep your mouth shut. How can you say anything about the user experience if you haven't done this?

One has nothing to do with the other. With so many people wanting to eat fruit, it is hard to see vegetables growing beyond its niche?  ::)

For businesses that appeal to the average user, VPNs, domain registrars, gift cards providers, casinos, NSFW sites, ad networks, I have rarely come across one that didn’t accept USDT or USDC. Even without stablecoins in your wallet, most of the well-known payment providers allow you to pay with almost any token and it gets swapped in the background.


I have used the Lightning Network ever since Lightning Labs released their Lightning App wallet, back in 2018. I’ve also used Zap wallet, Breez, Blixt and Marina. I’ve used the Lightning Network far more extensively than at least 90% of users on this forum. I was a proponent of Lightning since the beginning and have been in numerous arguments with supporters of Dash, BCH and XMR who make exaggerated claims of having meaningfully greater adoption than LN.

It is because of my experience that I became disillusioned. After all these years, there are still shortcomings that make it less than optimal for mass adoption.


I doubt this is an objective assessment based on first hand experience with altcoin chains. Regardless, you are free to express your opinion. I won’t tell you to shut your mouth because I disagree with you.

Altcoins and onchain BTC don’t require channel and liquidity management. You don’t have to worry about your funds getting stuck and force closing your channels when trying to pay certain kinds of invoices (https://www.talkimg.com/image/UQc5ha).

You might have your own preference, but it doesn’t mean that it is the objectively better choice for most users. When given the option to pay with anything other than Lightning, data from BitPay, Coingate, Coincards, ShopinBit and other merchants shows that Lightning use is still quite small in comparison to stablecoins, onchain BTC, and a handful of other popular altcoins. Even when LN is used, a significant portion is from custodial wallets.

Lightning Network is great technical solution to make Bitcoin fast and cheap but its growth is slow because of poor user experience and low support. This is due to three main issues not enough exchanges or big companies use it and setup is too confusing for most people because of technical terms and stablecoins are easier and faster option for quick payments. For Lightning to be successful it needs one simple easy to use wallet that hides all complex details because right now system is simply not ready for everyone to use it widely.

Am quite surprised why the adoption is this slow because lightning network is very fast and efficient although I also had the same misconception about the network and it's complexity base on the use but it's not all that hard to use and the good part is that the fee is almost as free unlike the on chain network transactions we make everyday. I believe the idea of the lightning network was to solve the issue of hyper fees due to the congestion of the mempool and runes being inscripted into the Bitcoin and this has happened on many occasions last and the lightning network is the perfect means to escape high payments of fees in such situation but the situation with the high congestion is something that's last the adoption of the lightning network has been slow because if it's only the company, I think a lot of exchanges and wallets now support lightning network transactions even CEX too.

Kinda agree with the confusing UX for lightning, maybe there needed a solution to simplify lightning so the non tech people could understand how to use it like as you said.

Although if i'm being honest it's only confusing the first time we are using and it will be very smooth once we get used to it, still we can't ignore that there are people who just don't wanna learn and better UX is where it will come at play to help them to use lightning.

Lightning is still at the very beginning. It can feel complicated at first, but once you get the hang of it and gain some experience, it’s easier than it seems. With USDT coming onto the Lightning Network and the release of new, more user-friendly apps, I think in the coming years we’ll see greater adoption of LN among people

Lightning network is a huge waste of resources and funds due to fundamental flaws in it's design. Moreover it's a protocol that is not secure and exposes users to various risk that the underlying layer never could.

So while lightning network advertises itself as being built on bitcoin, it has nothing to do with the base layer other than acting as an intermediary. No security, no immutability. Nothing of the original features. So it's actually quite deceptive. To give up all the decentralisation for supposed speed is nuts. Especially while even core Devs have called to ditch the technology.

Moving the goalpost, newbie fallacy. You were talking about local businesses, what you wrote now is irrelevant. You have been proven to be incorrect.

There is not a single shortcoming except the need to open a channel, another lie.

Most users will never encounter any issues. As if issues do not happen all the time with altcoin wallets or even complete blockchain halts. Another lie.

You are posting lies, fuck off back to Palestinian terrorists. You are in the wrong section.

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It is pretty much mostly people who have contributed nothing to Bitcoin that are shit talking LN. Might as well join Roger Ver, you are not any better turds than he is.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

People might be using it on a daily note but that does not mean that it doesn't have lapses just like some of us would complain that their Bitcoin transactions is taking too long to be confirmed. LN has it own flaws and it's not even easy to operate or use because you can get rigged when you are not adequately enlighteed. People use the LN more during the time when their is congestion on the blockchain, taking longer than necessary for transactions to be approved especially when you use small fee to send Bitcoin. People are not using the LN like the way it was then when transaction fee was very high and sloghish because it was seen as a good alternative.

In my own country, I haven't encountered the Lightning Network in payments. Most people prefer stablecoins, and for larger amounts, Litecoin or Monero are actively used in addition to Bitcoin. Ethereum's L2 solutions enable low-cost transactions. Therefore, the Ethereum ecosystem has won this battle.

I have used lighting, but it is not that hard as it seems, only the people don't want to do anything by themselves at all, everyone wants every thing to be prepared in front of them, and to be honest, there is nothing to prepare even, it is just a small confusion in mind that everyone can have about setting this up.

Although you are right about the adoption and the confusion many newbies have about LN, they think it is not for them, it can be tricky, and they avoid it, only if they use it they will know what it is, they prefer stable currencies and other sources because they are cost effective, and eventually the ecosystem of bitcoin will grow as well, the adoption of LN on exchanges is already increasing and in wallets too.

According to this website Litecoin is not really active, its growth has stagnated a long time ago. https://bitinfocharts.com/comparison/litecoin-transactions.html. I also don't get your claim about using a less secure network like Litecoin for larger amounts? For smaller amounts it makes sense. As for Monero, comparing it to LN does not make sense. They serve entirely different purposes. Making Monero transactions is very slow compared to LN's instant speed.

ETH L2s are shit. It is one of the worst things to happen to it. Instead of a single decentralized L2 as we have with BTC there are many centralized L2s with master keys in ETH. The way that you draw a conclusion, let me do the same. Therefore, because of this post you are declared medically retarded.

I haven't used lightning network since the inception because the one time I tried to use it, it was super buggy and it wasn't even easy to setup per se. I saw this thread and thought maybe maybe the tech has improved but going through the replies, it seems not to be the case. I don't know the full story behind LN but I tend to think LN and other bitcoin development stuff like sidechains. Non-Ethereum Bitcoin layer 2s, etc haven't found much success is because bitcoin is not a full fledged smart contract platform.

But then again, Ethereum is a full fledged smart contract platform yet suffers from the same issues as Bitcoin especially when it comes to micro payments.

The replies that are negative are by shitposters and parasites. The LN stack at the time of writing is excellent. It could not be easier to setup. There are wallets do everything for you.

No. The reason why they don't exist as much is that it is harder to scam. Most ETH L2s or even all of them are a money grabbing scam.

The part you quoted in your previous reply was a general statement about Lightning user experience, the remark about local businesses was a separate criticism. Either way, locally or worldwide on the internet, adoption is still quite low and there is a healthy amount of skepticism and even disdain towards it. That is a common sentiment on many platforms, not just among “parasites and shitposters” on Bitcointalk — not that it really matters, since you aren’t at all interested in rational discourse and will just dismiss opposing perspectives with sophisms, unnecessary hostility and denial of others’ personal experiences.

This unhinged zealotry has become to much of a nuisance that I will be following the example of others and ignoring you from now on. You can continue crashing out over every minor disagreement, real or imagined, I won’t engage further.

Anybody still using Lightning, I hope it continues to work well for you and improvements are made. For me it has not lived up to the promise I thought it had.

What do we think? Even LN developers admitted that Bitcoin Lightning Network is a failure. So, it's not the future of Bitcoin Payments and I'll tell you why: It's too complicated to use for an average user. It requires liquidity and managing channels, you can only receive as much as others have locked in channel with you and so on. Simply download Electrum and play with it, you'll quickly understand why it's not adopted and massively used.
When Bitcoin transaction fees are high, using altcoins is much better solution in terms of easiness and speed.

We got it already, go away inbred parasite.

Stop repeating this nonsense. They are lies. It is very easy to use and it is very similar to the normal crypto experience.

Managing channels? Most users don't need to do anything after opening 1 good channel and that is assuming they use a manually managed wallet.
Managing liquidity ~= managing wallet balances for traditional L1 use. How do people even use this as an argument?

These days there are wallets that do everything for you, all you need to do is send BTC to a BTC address in the wallet. I guess that is too hard for people like yourself. There is very little left that could be done to make it easier to use than it already is.

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If you use LN for what it is supposed to be used, you will encounter no issues regarding liquidity. If you use it beyond its intended purpose then you are consciously accepting the extra work needed to make it work. It is not an inherent downside, it is a consequence of your use.

Why is this a nonsense or a lie? Prove me wrong. Let someone sit on a computer (someone not tech-savvy), give them a test Electrum wallet and ask them to make a transaction via Lighting Network.
There is a reason why Lighting Network isn't adopted and widespread, isn't it true? It has been around for 7 years. In case of on-chain Bitcoin transaction, you simply open the wallet, paste address, type amount, click on send and that's it, it's extremely intuitive while LN isn't that intuitive and needs some tutorial/guidence. It might be easy for you and me but we are a tiny percentage, there are lots of people who find it hard to use. If it was easy, as I said, it would be adopted and widely used and people wouldn't look for altcoins to make a transaction.

I also see more done with stables than with BTC itself, especially on its own chain, imo.

L2s are just the pick for the most because it's the most convenient way.

I explained it in the middle part of the post.

The Electcrum UI is blame, not LN. Using LN on many mobile wallets is as easy as using any L1 chain or at times even easier. Whatever step you think is complicated or extra, a version of this step exists when you are onboarding somebody to crypto for the first time. Onboarding someone first time to Bitcoin/other L1 chains or directly to LN is equally difficult in terms of complexity to use. Minimal difference. There are wallets where all you need to do to start using LN is to deposit Bitcoin. It is hard if your brain is an empty shell. ::)

The adoption thing does not provide points in favor of your argument. You are simplifying a complex topic.

Electrum wallet provides feature for Lightning Network but it is not a wallet that only works on Lightning Network. If you want something really designed only for Lightning Network, its feature and UI would be more friendly and better than Electrum wallet.

Just find wallet choices and pick one you like.
The best Bitcoin Lightning wallets. (https://coincodex.com/article/28405/bitcoin-lightning-wallet/)

LN is not a system that just pays the destined recipient. it relies on sharing balance of others along a path to destination

the whole concept/design means the more popular it gets the more the popular routes get balance bottlenecks due to fund depletion of routes.
this then means people need more channels to have more route possibilities which means less funds per route as the funds need to be spread over many channels. OR hand funds over to hub/managers(banks) to manage the payments on their own paths. which both lead to less control of your own funds.

the whole point of LN was that middlemen could not make profit from relaying payments on mainnet bitcoin, so they had to create a problem for mainnet bitcoin to then offer a altnetwork(LN) "promising" to solve the issues.. which they then create more problems on the altnet(LN) to then make profit from users

by requiring the IOU unsettled balance game of route paths. just recreates the old traditional banking system and moves away from the whole point of bitcoin

..
again the more popular LN gets the more issues that become apparent. and the only way around it is a whole new network with a different payment system/mechanism between spender and recipient

LN is not the solution that will succeed as it gets more adoption, things are and will get worse the more popular it gets