[Jun 2026]Mempool empty, Consolidate your small inputs @0.53 sat/vbyte

[NotATether]

The mean transaction volume is almost the same, so there’s no collapse, although some spikes are visible during 2024–2026.

~

So in my view, this shows that the main factor influencing the daily transaction count is the fixed blockspace rather than the fee level. During periods of high fees some transactions remained in the mempool for many days before being confirmed. Now there is almost no congestion.

Nice, so it means the fractional sat fees really helped incentivice people to spend less on their transactions.

I expect the chart would be different thing it it exclude ordinals, runes and other TX that only add arbitrary data.

Which leads me to the question, how many txes per year are we seeing with ordinals? At least in 2025 or in the past 12 months.

[LoyceV]

I have been wondering... these low fees are great, but is the transaction volume the same, or much lower than when we had high fees?

Look at Mempool Goggles, click "Data". About 60% of the next block is just data spam. About a year ago, I've seen 80% or even higher. Most blocks are still completely full, so Bitcoin is at it's maximum capacity, but I don't think many people use it for actual payments.

Which leads me to the question, how many txes per year are we seeing with ordinals? At least in 2025 or in the past 12 months.

Let's look at block 947756: 5458 transactions, and the very large majority of them are "Runestone". I checked a few more recent blocks, and I think 3000 "ordinal" transactions per block is a conservative estimate. Let's say it's half a million per day, say 100-250 million in a year. And for what? Just because someone convinced someone else to throw money at it to make the creator very, very rich?

[joker_josue]

I have been wondering... these low fees are great, but is the transaction volume the same, or much lower than when we had high fees?

Look at Mempool Goggles, click "Data". About 60% of the next block is just data spam. About a year ago, I've seen 80% or even higher. Most blocks are still completely full, so Bitcoin is at it's maximum capacity, but I don't think many people use it for actual payments.

Which leads me to the question, how many txes per year are we seeing with ordinals? At least in 2025 or in the past 12 months.

Let's look at block 947756: 5458 transactions, and the very large majority of them are "Runestone". I checked a few more recent blocks, and I think 3000 "ordinal" transactions per block is a conservative estimate. Let's say it's half a million per day, say 100-250 million in a year. And for what? Just because someone convinced someone else to throw money at it to make the creator very, very rich?

They spend BTC on those things, but if you tell them to use BTC to buy personal goods, for everyday use, they say no because that's wasting BTC since it will be worth more tomorrow.

How are we supposed to understand the minds of these people? It's complicated.

[LoyceV]

They spend BTC on those things, but if you tell them to use BTC to buy personal goods, for everyday use, they say no because that's wasting BTC since it will be worth more tomorrow.

Someone made them believe their ordinal crap will go up in price faster. Remember NFTs? Yeah, me neither

[LoyceV]

Most blocks are now full with transactions paying 1 sat/vbyte or more, but once in a while there's some space left for lower fees. It's good to see the competition is now working under 1 sat/vbyte too: fees are slowly rising, without increasing a lot. This block had transactions paying 0.28 sat/vbyte, and about 5 blocks into the future fees will still be 0.25 sat/vbyte.

A month later, fees under 1 sat/vbyte have reached around 0.65 sat/vbyte. Fees have been steadily climbing.

[LoyceV]

Fees are dropping a bit again, and it looks like 0.42 sat/vbyte might get confirmed in 2 blocks now.

[joker_josue]

Fees are dropping a bit again, and it looks like 0.42 sat/vbyte might get confirmed in 2 blocks now.

It's interesting to see that even with prices falling, interest rates have remained low.

Why is that? Very interesting indeed.

[LoyceV]

Mempool.space shows that 0.53 sat/vbyte is 2 blocks away from being confirmed. Literally all low-fee transactions I checked are either "Runstone" or "Inscription", and when I check 1.01 sat/vbyte it's the same pattern.

[TheButterZone]

F it, 0.1 sat/vbyte on the kinds of Electrum servers that allow it when I consolidate next. First, will have to check if Mandacaru is similarly unrestrictive, in what it allows the paired Electrum app to actually construct & broadcast. Hell, I'll try for 0 first & work up from there.

[LoyceV]

F it, 0.1 sat/vbyte on the kinds of Electrum servers that allow it when I consolidate next.

It's been a while since fees actually got that low. When I made a very low fee transaction end of last year, it took more than a month to confirm. But for consolidating, time shouldn't really matter anyway so go for it

[Pmalek]

I have some consolidation transactions that I have been putting off for some time and waiting for the fees to drop lower. My target range is between 0.2 and 0.3 sat/vByte, but it's been a while since I last saw those types of transactions getting confirmed. The 0.2 sat/vByte range is currently around 15 vMB large and about 9 vMB away. Let's see what happens in the next couple of days. Maybe the next difficulty adjustment can work slightly in the favor of everyone waiting for even lower fees.

[Cricktor]

From what I've (not very closely) observed in the last days or maybe one or two weeks in mempool, I'd be a bit surprised if your consolidation(s) will be confirmed with a fee range of 0.2-0.3sat/vB within a few days or a week. Aiming for 0.3sat/vB might work, maybe, but I've doubts with the current inflow of all this runestone and whatnotelse shit.

Not knowing your exact fee rate, allow me to place a prediction: it won't confirm within a week. Well, who cares when you're not in a hurry. Let's see, if my gutt feeling is right.

[Pmalek]

From what I've (not very closely) observed in the last days or maybe one or two weeks in mempool, I'd be a bit surprised if your consolidation(s) will be confirmed with a fee range of 0.2-0.3sat/vB within a few days or a week. Aiming for 0.3sat/vB might work, maybe, but I've doubts with the current inflow of all this runestone and whatnotelse shit.

Not knowing your exact fee rate, allow me to place a prediction: it won't confirm within a week. Well, who cares when you're not in a hurry. Let's see, if my gutt feeling is right.

I don't think it will either, so I won't even try it right now. I read an analysis last night by someone who calls himself a "Bitcoin and spam analyst". I can't remember the guys name, background, or affiliations, but I am sure I could find it somewhere in my browser history if needed. He wrote that around 70% of all transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain in the last 7 days were non-monetary. In other words, bloat, spam, runes, inscriptions, and whatever else is landing on-chain in recent times. It's pretty sad that most people are currently not using Bitcoin for bitcoin.

[LoyceV]

He wrote that around 70% of all transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain in the last 7 days were non-monetary. In other words, bloat, spam, runes, inscriptions, and whatever else is landing on-chain in recent times.

I would have expected an even higher percentage.

It's pretty sad that most people are currently not using Bitcoin for bitcoin.

Around 2017, when fees spiked to 1000 sat/byte, I already felt like Bitcoin can't grow if people can't make transactions. Fees are much lower now, but the damage is done: you can't have a payment system in which fees explode when it becomes more popular.

[TheButterZone]

Have to wonder how much of L2 service providing resembles the firefighter-arsonist/* industrial complex dynamic. The more spam on L1, the more average people who can't manage fully self-sovereign custody on L2, are led to use L2 service providers & pay all their fees.

[ABCbits]

He wrote that around 70% of all transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain in the last 7 days were non-monetary. In other words, bloat, spam, runes, inscriptions, and whatever else is landing on-chain in recent times. It's pretty sad that most people are currently not using Bitcoin for bitcoin.

You probably talking about https://thebitcoinportal.com/blockspace/overview. When i choose 7 day overview, it says "Non-monetary 3,267,047 69.7% of Transactions". But i don't see or find how they determine the category. For example, i don't know they include all TX that contain OP_RETURN as non-monetary or contain structure of known non-monetary protocol (such as OP_13 on rune/runestone).