Bitcoin Future Transaction Prices

[Hamza2424]

OP you can use the search feature to check the previous topics on the same subject, At the same time I don't think we need to start an entire discussion thread again, in my view if you think the Bitcoin network is costly you can move on to the L2's and other solutions. It's not the case with the entire year, in just peak times the Bitcoin network transaction fees go high, in the entire year if you check fees are not that high even though sometimes people take advantage of lower transaction fees just like a few days back, comparing to the yearly start.

You can't enjoy 2 Buses in 1 ticket so you need to sacrifice in order to enjoy.

[m2017]

I am working to get my bitcoin off of exchanges and into cold storage but I had a question regarding transaction prices. As more adopt Bitcoin, transaction prices are going to increase as there is more demand for blockspace. Is there any documentation or research into what transaction fees may look like in a world where Bitcoin is more widely accepted? I am worried that from an individual level the blockspace may become so valuable that moving Bitcoin on and off a personal cold wallet may be unfeasibly costly for the average user.

You would not have to worry about the future high cost of bitcoin transactions fees, because if this digital asset reaches such heights of value that even these commissions become prohibitively expensive, then you will find yourself (if just hodl) in such a good profit that these commissions will be for you completely insignificant.

Don't be too greedy.

My understanding is at the current moment while it is still becoming adopted, the value of the Bitcoin held should scale with the transaction costs. I am more wondering about long term viability of personal cold wallets, and how the different layer 2+ scaling projects (lightning, Fedimint, etc.) as well as custodial services may play into the long-run transaction costs. Anyone with knowledge or resources they could point me to would be greatly appreciated!

In order to save money (for transactions fees), refrain from using old format bitcoin addresses (legacy) and give preference, for example, SegWit.

By the time the BTC-price increases significantly, a new update may be released that will reduce high commissions. So, this problem may disappear by itself.

[coolcoinz]

Expect the fees to raise along with the price and remain proportional.

Is that honestly a bad thing for a hodler like you? Let's say you have $1000 in bitcoin and the transaction costs you $10. Moving that money when your bitcoin is eventually worth $2k and the tx is $15 or $20 shouldn't be a problem, am I right?
 
This is how it's going to look for a small investor, but some of us already have 1m+ in bitcoin. If the price goes up by 50% but the fee does the same, I probably won't even notice.

[kryptqnick]

Bitcoin transactions are perhaps getting higher with each spike. It can be seen by using monitoring websites with long-term charts of average transaction fees. However, the spikes aren't that common, and the fees remain acceptable once the spike is over. So I think that in case of urgent selling, a fee can become a larger and larger issue, but if it's nothing urgent, then I expect the fees to regularly be within reasonable limits (below $10) even as adoption gradually increases. Unless there are more overhyped projects or some country suddenly deciding to frequently use on-chain transactions, it shouldn't be an issue.

[Belarge]

Bitcoin transactions are perhaps getting higher with each spike. It can be seen by using monitoring websites with long-term charts of average transaction fees. However, the spikes aren't that common, and the fees remain acceptable once the spike is over. So I think that in case of urgent selling, a fee can become a larger and larger issue, but if it's nothing urgent, then I expect the fees to regularly be within reasonable limits (below $10) even as adoption gradually increases. Unless there are more overhyped projects or some country suddenly deciding to frequently use on-chain transactions, it shouldn't be an issue.

Bitcoin transactions comes with seasonal increase in fees and this is absolutely not helping. There are overhyped projects in the space but we should be extremely careful not to fall in the hands of scammers because they're definitely not going to pity us, rather they will hacked into our port folio without our conscience. Bitcoin is top project in the market, and it will continue to make increase because we're in the bull season already and we've watched ourselves hitting the top with gigantic profits.

[Wind_FURY]

I believe that it will be the same as the current situation. You worry about constant demand, but economically, how could that be if fees are very high? The users who can't afford it won't make an on-chain transaction, the users who can would slowly lose coins until they can't.

If the price of a good or a service is too high, then naturally the demand for that good or service will down.

This is my concern about a cold wallet. What is the end goal of Bitcoin? Global reserve currency (digital gold), or peer to peer cash? I am not sure both can be attainable in its current design ( am also a noob and just trying to understand more). If it is a cash system like it has existed in the early days, cold wallets for personal use makes sense. But if Bitcoin continues to grow it and is adopted by more, it may become a global reserve currency due to its finite supply. Under this global reserve currency assumption, bitcoin would be backing every bank, who would be throwing around huge transactions and willing to pay large transaction fees. This would crowd out individuals who want to use cold wallets other than those who hold a large sum of bitcoin, as they would have to pay bank level fees to move around Bitcoin which for most would not be economically feasible. In this scenario, the blockchain would become the source of truth of transactions, lightning would be used by banks for settlements, and you would need a secondary currency backed by bitcoin (US dollar, mint, other crypto, third layer solution, etc.) and make personal cold storage options (for Bitcoin specifically) unfeasible for most.

 Am I missing a key component of this train of thought? In this scenario, custodians become almost necessary due to the amount of transactions needed if everyone used their own personal cold wallet. Is this the natural progression of Bitcoin, or are there developmental efforts to make cold wallets feasible for all in the future as the adoption of Bitcoin continues?

Your fears are based on your presumptions that "if X happens", then Y will absolutely happen". No one can actually say that if Bitcoin's block size was increased - "this will happen", or that if the block size was maintained - "that will happen". There's the economic side of things when we use the Bitcoin network. In your fears you said that banks would price us plebs out, BUT it's a complicated situation. Will they actually do it?

Plus from the network's viewpoint, higher fees = more security = more value for the network.

[nelson4lov]

I wouldn't worry much about Bitcoin transaction fees  because it has never been the case that the spike in tx costs stay permanent for a longer time. The recent spikes we had were due to BRC20 spams but when all of that is taken away, the network should be able to withstand the pressure. But it's worth noting that the average user especially those in rural communities will have a hard time making plenty transactions if tx cost is closer to $1 or more if they can complete a similar transaction in fiat for less than $0.1 in fees.

[Dailyscript]

As more adopt Bitcoin, transaction prices are going to increase as there is more demand for blockspace. Is there any documentation or research into what transaction fees may look like in a world where Bitcoin is more widely accepted?

The more people keep adapting Bitcoin there will be more solution from miners to make more rooms for the blockspace. Th truth is that there will be more work for miners since they will be making lots money so many individuals would venture into mining and that would make it a  lot easier for the blockchain. I still believe everything would move smoothly its just a matter of time they will find a solution if there is a mass adaption compared to now.

I am worried that from an individual level the blockspace may become so valuable that moving Bitcoin on and off a personal cold wallet may be unfeasibly costly for the average user.

When such a time come, yes, the fees would be high at some point and transactions would take longer to complete. It has happened before but in the case of so may people entering into the system it would give a chance for miners to as well to join the system. So with time there will be balance.

[kentrolla]

Most of us are facing this problem but unfortunately there isn't any fix and it's like we have to accept the reality and either pay the transaction fee else keep BTC in wallet itself which would be very and no one would suggest that.

Now let me come to second point, no matter how many times we discussed this but we don't have a solve hence this will be discussed until we have a fix for this so I would request those so called expert not to respond if they don't have a solve instead of saying this has already been discussed numerous times.

[lixer]

As more adopt Bitcoin, transaction prices are going to increase as there is more demand for blockspace. Is there any documentation or research into what transaction fees may look like in a world where Bitcoin is more widely accepted? I am worried that from an individual level the blockspace may become so valuable that moving Bitcoin on and off a personal cold wallet may be unfeasibly costly for the average user.

As far as I know there’s no research or data that has been analyzed to come up with an accurate estimation of transaction prices. With bitcoin’s price being volatile, the same goes for transaction prices. We can’t determine just how huge can the mass acceptance be and how much it can impact transaction fees. I am hoping that by then it could have been resolved by a much more efficient technology.

I think transaction prices are visible already, so it's not hard to calculate them anymore. The ones that are hard are what the OP wants which are the future transaction prices because we don't know the numbers yet. When it comes to mass adoption of Bitcoin, we may not exactly know the future value's but we are sure that it is going to be huge. There will be no more banning of it in the future and those who ban it before are now going to allow it.

The only thing is, it might also make the transaction fees bloated but I'm sure that experts will find a solution to it again, just like what they did in the past, so let's not worry about it shall we?

[btc78]

There are overhyped projects in the space but we should be extremely careful not to fall in the hands of scammers because they're definitely not going to pity us, rather they will hacked into our port folio without our conscience.

Bitcoin is definitely the most secure and safest crypto currency out there that most people would rather pay for high transaction fees in order to make transactions than use other projects. Unfortunately not everyone has this choice. If they do not have enough funds, they can forget about their transaction going through for a while.

Despite this being a huge problem, I don’t think adoption will stop just because of this. But still it will be nicer to not have a huge chunk of your coins stripped away.

[Darker45]

I don't think you should worry about this much. More than a decade has passed since Bitcoin's inception; adoption has accelerated a lot, the price has skyrocketed, even global financial giants have joined the game, but we could still enjoy as low as 4 Sats/vB every once in a while.

If more adoption would mean unaffordable transactions, there will always be responding technologies that address it. A rising problem would always be followed with a solution.

But I believe transaction fees would remain as volatile as Bitcoin's price. It might be like this for the next few decades. From 4 Sats/vB, it could suddenly jump to 100 or even 1,000 but from there it could also fall to 8 the next minute.

[OcTradism]

I don't think you should worry about this much. More than a decade has passed since Bitcoin's inception; adoption has accelerated a lot, the price has skyrocketed, even global financial giants have joined the game, but we could still enjoy as low as 4 Sats/vB every once in a while.

If more adoption would mean unaffordable transactions, there will always be responding technologies that address it. A rising problem would always be followed with a solution.

Understand basics about Bitcoin blockchain, mempools and how transaction fee is calculated and paid, will help Bitcoin users to be more cleverly with their transactions and save more transaction fees.

The protocol is the same for everyone but we can be different on our own ways to use the blockchain, when broadcasting transactions from our non custodial wallets with which we have rights to set up fee rate but if we don't know how to set it up properly, we will have to pay expensive transaction fee as same as making withdrawals from centralized exchanges.

But I believe transaction fees would remain as volatile as Bitcoin's price. It might be like this for the next few decades. From 4 Sats/vB, it could suddenly jump to 100 or even 1,000 but from there it could also fall to 8 the next minute.

It will drop but from 1000 or 100 sats/vbyte, fee rates in the mempools will not fall to 8 sats/vbyte in next minutes.

[KingsDen]

I am working to get my bitcoin off of exchanges and into cold storage but I had a question regarding transaction prices. As more adopt Bitcoin, transaction prices are going to increase as there is more demand for blockspace. Is there any documentation or research into what transaction fees may look like in a world where Bitcoin is more widely accepted? I am worried that from an individual level the blockspace may become so valuable that moving Bitcoin on and off a personal cold wallet may be unfeasibly costly for the average user.

There was when I was so worried about the future bitcoin price and that made me to tend to exchanges then. But I came to the understanding and realization that bitcoin price will always high at a point but will definitely return to normal after some time. Besides, even in the future if the price to withdraw your bitcoin from your wallet is very high, there must also be solutions then.

I should think more on how to earn bitcoin and secure it and not how to be unable to withdraw my bitcoin when I need it. The mempool cannot be consistently filled and the transaction prices keep hicking. Let's have the mentality of 'when we get to the bridge, we cross it'.

[Mrbluntzy]

I also thought so, in the future the transaction fee of Bitcoin is going to be more expensive than the transaction fee of this year. It is difficult for me to know how high the fee can go but I believe that as the price of Bitcoin continues to grow higher after every 4 year, that's also how the fee will be increasing, the reason why I think so is because of how the transaction fee was extremely low when 1 bitcoin was just $8.

[mirakal]

All I can say is that better wait until the time it was widely accepted, we all know the fees. But for now, let us just accept the fees are moving high as it is impossible to see it returning back below $1.

We just think that the price of bitcoin increases, the same thing happens with the transaction fee. Therefore, our expectation it will be higher than these days. That is why I feel bad when seeing the fees in the past weeks reach more than $20 because it has a huge impact on the adoption process as it surely increases uncertainties believing that it is not the preferred fee we've looking at. For big investors is not a problem but I was very concerned about small investors that will take the burden of paying high while earning less.

[CageMabok]

I also thought so, in the future the transaction fee of Bitcoin is going to be more expensive than the transaction fee of this year. It is difficult for me to know how high the fee can go but I believe that as the price of Bitcoin continues to grow higher after every 4 year, that's also how the fee will be increasing, the reason why I think so is because of how the transaction fee was extremely low when 1 bitcoin was just $8.

I think this is a very normal thing that happens in Bitcoin transactions because the price is already as high as it is now and it is quite balanced with the costs that must be incurred every time you make a transaction. Personally, I am also very aware of this, but I have never complained about the costs that I have to bear when I want to make a transaction because it is sufficient for the amount of value we are transacting. So enjoy the balance and continue to like Bitcoin like you like a very valuable asset and don't because of this our trust in Bitcoin could fade.

[franky1]

I am working to get my bitcoin off of exchanges and into cold storage but I had a question regarding transaction prices. As more adopt Bitcoin, transaction prices are going to increase as there is more demand for blockspace. Is there any documentation or research into what transaction fees may look like in a world where Bitcoin is more widely accepted?

None. I believe during the very early days of Bitcoin, no one wanted to talk that this might be a problem.
..
If the price of a good or a service is too high, then naturally the demand for that good or service will go down.

many people did talk about the financial cost of mining bitcoin/bitcoin economics. even hal mentioned it(2010).
he talked about how the fiat market price is deflationary and will cover the costs.. it should never be about paying more sats per tx. it would be about the fiat market increasing so each sat is worth more..

also those idiots(windfury admires) want bitcoin to reduce in demand so that they can promote another network people should use instead.
those idiots are not bitcoiners and dont care about bitcoin and its funny when i see windfury admire people that promote that people should stop using bitcoin and people should pay more sats on bitcoin.. it just shows windfury is not a bitcoiner either

[davis196]

I am working to get my bitcoin off of exchanges and into cold storage but I had a question regarding transaction prices. As more adopt Bitcoin, transaction prices are going to increase as there is more demand for blockspace. Is there any documentation or research into what transaction fees may look like in a world where Bitcoin is more widely accepted? I am worried that from an individual level the blockspace may become so valuable that moving Bitcoin on and off a personal cold wallet may be unfeasibly costly for the average user.

My understanding is at the current moment while it is still becoming adopted, the value of the Bitcoin held should scale with the transaction costs. I am more wondering about long term viability of personal cold wallets, and how the different layer 2+ scaling projects (lightning, Fedimint, etc.) as well as custodial services may play into the long-run transaction costs. Anyone with knowledge or resources they could point me to would be greatly appreciated!

I'm not sure that Bitcoin is going to be truly "globally accepted". And by "globally accepted" I mean Bitcoin becoming a truly mainstream global currency. This most likely would never happen. Bitcoin would be more like "digital gold", a financial asset that is mostly used by the big institutional investors to add in their portfolios. The problem is that those big institutional investors could afford to pay ridiculous transactions fees. This could scare away the small BTC investors. I don't know about any potential solutions of this problem, since I'm not a Bitcoin Core developer.

[Apocollapse]

The problem is that those big institutional investors could afford to pay ridiculous transactions fees. This could scare away the small BTC investors. I don't know about any potential solutions of this problem, since I'm not a Bitcoin Core developer.

Few months ago when SEC approved ETFs and make Bitcoin soared to $73K, the Bitcoin fees is cheap, it likes their investment didn't affect to transactions fees. However, they really not give any impact to the mempool because any Bitcoin ETFs is off-chain, means the exchange don't need to move the coins.

The fees shouldn't be a problem for small investors, since they can purchase Bitcoin in lightning network.