Ledger size will grow forever?

[fuentesjn]

Wondering how big the file containing the bitcoin ledger is. If it is a public database that every node has, I assume it will grow in size as new blocks are added to the chain, so the file will be growing forever?

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[Heisenberg_Hunter]

Currently the blockchain size is about 167,487 MB ~ 163.561 GB till yesterday (05-12-2018). The blockchain is a growing list of records and it continues growing in size when a new block gets added in the ledger. Considering maximum size of block i.e 1Mb gets added to the chain every 10 mins the size of blockchain increases by 144 Mb per day and it goes on increasing and will only stop if there is no transaction taking place on chain.

If the total bitcoins were mined around the year 2140 as per data, the total number of blocks would be around 6,929,999. Consider 1 mb of block size and the total maximum size would be 6.5 TB during 2140. Block sizes may vary depending upon the number of transactions and the block chain size may vary based on that.

On a minimum rate, a block may contains 300 bytes of data and it would sum up to the blockchain size of 1900 GB during 2140.

[bob123]

~snip~

So, the biggest blockchain size in 2140 should be around 12.4TB.

But obviously there will be block weight increase and newer technology which could reduce transaction size on specific scenario such as MAST and MuSig.

How is a block weight increase obvious ? On-chain scaling can never be as efficient as off-chain scaling solutions.
Reducing transaction size is just one way to approach the scaling issue. There are several others, reducing the amount of transaction (e.g. through the lightning network) for example.


@OP
A ledger size between 10 and 100 TB shouldn't be a problem at all in 120+ years. Neither storage- nor network-wise.
The storage technology is growing way faster than bitcoins blockchain.

[Kakmakr]

This is exactly why the Lightning Network was developed, to reduce the size of the Blockchain in the future. The majority of the micro transactions will be moved off-chain to reduce the size of the Blockchain in the future, when Bitcoin goes mainstream. This is a major advantage over other Alt coins, like BCash.

This is why I would rather invest in Bitcoin than any of these other Alt coins, because they lack the vision for the future. ^smile^

[bob123]

This is exactly why the Lightning Network was developed, to reduce the size of the Blockchain in the future. The majority of the micro transactions will be moved off-chain to reduce the size of the Blockchain in the future, when Bitcoin goes mainstream.

The lightning network (or scaling itself) does not necessarily imply a reduction of the blockchain size.
A reduction in overall size of the blockchain can only be accomplished (excluding forks) by non-full blocks.

Now, lets pretend the LN will work as intended and revolutionize online payments.
If people only use LN, and blocks are not full through all the funding/withdrawing, why would someone who is just joining the action choose to open a channel just to close it afterwards again if fees are already at < 1sat/B?
This person probably would just make an on-chain transaction. I don't think we will see blocks only filled 50% in the future.


The LN has been developed as a scaling solution for bitcoin. From 3-4 tx/s to 1000+ tx/s (with the same growth of blockchain size) is pretty impressive in terms of scaling.

[fuentesjn]

@OP
A ledger size between 10 and 100 TB shouldn't be a problem at all in 120+ years. Neither storage- nor network-wise.
The storage technology is growing way faster than bitcoins blockchain.

Nice answer. Thanks Bob123

[hatshepsut93]

Wondering how big the file containing the bitcoin ledger is. If it is a public database that every node has, I assume it will grow in size as new blocks are added to the chain, so the file will be growing forever?

Yes, it will keep growing for as long as Bitcoin network exists, because this is how Bitcoin works - full nodes store the whole history of Bitcoin network to verify each and every transaction without the need to trust someone. This is why it's important to have the blocksize small, so people could always download the whole blockchain and verify it for themselves - and even if in 100 years the blockchain will weight 100 TB, by that time users should be able to store those amounts on their computers, as long as blocksize is not increased way too much, like many forks propose.

[thecodebear]

~snip~

So, the biggest blockchain size in 2140 should be around 12.4TB.

But obviously there will be block weight increase and newer technology which could reduce transaction size on specific scenario such as MAST and MuSig.

How is a block weight increase obvious ? On-chain scaling can never be as efficient as off-chain scaling solutions.
Reducing transaction size is just one way to approach the scaling issue. There are several others, reducing the amount of transaction (e.g. through the lightning network) for example.


@OP
A ledger size between 10 and 100 TB shouldn't be a problem at all in 120+ years. Neither storage- nor network-wise.
The storage technology is growing way faster than bitcoins blockchain.

I know on-chain scaling isn't efficient (at least without sacrifice decentralization), but i'm sure it will happen in future.
Even LN whitepaper mention we need to increase block size even if all Bitcoiner use LN, but total bitcoin user greatly increased.

I'm sure in future, there will be hard-fork in future when even 4,000,000 block weight can't sustain people needs even to open/close channel or refill balance (considering almost all users use LN) .

I certainly wouldn't make that assumption. The Core dev team has been adamantly against hard forking. I understand the reasoning - you risk splitting the Bitcoin network, though of course the whole point it to build a consensus before hard forking so that you don't risk splitting the network, but they seem to have zero interest in doing this.

And yes the LN white paper says there needs to be block size increases and yes core devs say they will consider a block size increase in the future when it is needed and safe. But it was needed last year when fees got insane. And it is safe to do you just have to put in a bit of work for I guess replay protection. So it is safe as long as they do the work and get consensus, and is needed. And yet they had no interest in doing it. So that should tell you that any increase in block size in the future, no matter how bad fees get, is unlikely to happen, at least not while the current devs are in charge of bitcoin's path forward.

On chain scaling is of course only part of the solution. LN is the main thing that will open up the ability to use Bitcoin as a payment network, but it relies on having space in the blocks to perform the channel openings and closings, so the number of people who can use LN and there bitcoin is entirely dependent on the size of the blocks, the LN just makes it so a lot more txs and a lot more use cases can occur within any given block size.

Really the perfect time for a hard fork to increase the block size was the past few months during the crash when interest was at a low point. By the time the masses come rushing back in next year they could have found segwit fully adopted, LN available and growing, and block size larger to allow the network to grow even that much more.

At this point Bitcoin is pretty much guaranteed to be constrained to the 4 million block weight forever.

[bob123]

And yes the LN white paper says there needs to be block size increases and yes core devs say they will consider a block size increase in the future when it is needed and safe. But it was needed last year when fees got insane.

There was no block size increase needed last year.
The solution already was there, but noone made use of it. Segwit.

Big exchanges didn't use segwit, didn't batch transactions and a quite heavy spam attack was going on. This all led to a heavy increase in the average fee (to get your tx into the next block).
In the end you choose which fee you want to pay.

And it is safe to do you just have to put in a bit of work for I guess replay protection. So it is safe as long as they do the work and get consensus, and is needed. And yet they had no interest in doing it.

It is not 'safe'.
It can not be regarded as safe without proper testing.

Btrash Bcash forked and increased their blocksize to 8mb without proper testing. Their network has still not been tested yet.
You can't predict how the whole network reacts to 8mb blocks. The network latecy. The increase in processing time for every node, the eventual abrupt termination of processes inside a node because the I/O operation took 8x longer than before.. you just don't know.

Without a testnet and proper testing over a long period the majority of btc user probably wouldn't support such a massive change in consensus rules.

So that should tell you that any increase in block size in the future, no matter how bad fees get, is unlikely to happen, at least not while the current devs are in charge of bitcoin's path forward.

Bitcoin does not have any 'devs'. It is a community driven project.
The user decides which consensrules he follows.

If you think you can improve bitcoin, do it. Make it better, convince everyone why it is better and maybe the majority will follow your 'upgrades'.

On chain scaling is of course only part of the solution. LN is the main thing that will open up the ability to use Bitcoin as a payment network, but it relies on having space in the blocks to perform the channel openings and closings, so the number of people who can use LN and there bitcoin is entirely dependent on the size of the blocks..

No. You got that wrong.

It does NOT depend on the size of the blocks. It does depend on the amount of transactions which fit into a block.
The amount of transactions can be increased with a bigger block size. But saying 'it is entirely dependent' is just wrong.

Segwit for example introduced weight. On average there are about ~2,2 times more transactions in a block now.
With 100% segwit usage there would be 4x more transactions inside a block compared to legacy transactions. Without a hardfork.

Really the perfect time for a hard fork to increase the block size was the past few months during the crash when interest was at a low point. By the time the masses come rushing back in next year they could have found segwit fully adopted, LN available and growing, and block size larger to allow the network to grow even that much more.

No, it wasn't.
Why increase the blocksize with a hardfork (and risk getting just another btrash coin) if fees are at 1 sat/B for 1 block confirmation? Can't get lower..

At this point Bitcoin is pretty much guaranteed to be constrained to the 4 million block weight forever.

Maybe, maybe not.
Only time will till which innovative technologies appear to strengthen bitcoins functionality.