Bitcoin transactions settled instantly: Can this be reality one day ?

[pawanjain]

Bitcoin transactions settled instantly without confirmations: Can this be reality one day ?

Possible ? Yeah.
Likely to happen ? No.

Bitcoin's primary chain mines one block in every 10 minutes and so it will at least take that much time to get the transaction confirmed.
For bitcoin transactions to settle instantly, we will have to get the consensus to change the bitcoin protocol which is not likely to happen.
We have a layer 2 solution called as the Lightning Network to settle transactions instantly.

[Findingnemo]

I am big fan of bitcoin and it is my go to means for cross transactional payments but it is not something I advice for anyone trying to pay for groceries in supermarkets or making fast payments, three confirmation needed can take upto 30 minutes before it gets done and that’s a lot of time to wait

One confirmation is enough to consider the fund is yours, no need for 3 or 6 because it's not like we are going to buy for a million dollars in a supermarket, though.

As others said we already have an option that can make the bitcoin transactions as almost instant but it will not be recorded as onchain transaction so it makes it suitable only for small payments like super market or a restaurant and it can be the possible way forward if we ever adopt bitcoin as mode of payment.

[Zigabel]

Bitcoin transactions settled instantly without confirmations: Can this be reality one day ?

Before now how long does it take to settle a Bitcoin transaction? Can that be compared to how long it does now? Most definitely not, so yes a time is coming when this will be a reality. There are several advancements that are going on with Bitcoin over the years and the area of transactions time is of great consideration which has improved over time and so this makes something to bank on to really improve much better in the nearest future.

With the involvement of many bigger institutions and governments in Bitcoin, most definitely all of that will be settled and not be an issue to bother about with time.

[EL MOHA]

One confirmation is enough to consider the fund is yours, no need for 3 or 6 because it's not like we are going to buy for a million dollars in a supermarket, though.

As others said we already have an option that can make the bitcoin transactions as almost instant but it will not be recorded as onchain transaction so it makes it suitable only for small payments like super market or a restaurant and it can be the possible way forward if we ever adopt bitcoin as mode of payment.

The problem is actually the platform in which you making payments to, most platforms or merchants usually requires 3 confirmation just like most exchanges, this three confirmation is usually what most of them uses. One confirmation can be used for transactions lower amounts like less than $1000 while the standard transaction is almost 6 confirmation most especially for large figures like five digits prices. So yes if this super markets implements one confirmation which though is seriously having its risk because of block reorg it will be better but still one confirmation can still take more than 10 minutes which isn’t fast for certain transactions.

[Cookdata]

Bitcoin transactions settled instantly without confirmations: Can this be reality one day ?

Before now how long does it take to settle a Bitcoin transaction? Can that be compared to how long it does now? Most definitely not, so yes a time is coming when this will be a reality. There are several advancements that are going on with Bitcoin over the years and the area of transactions time is of great consideration which has improved over time and so this makes something to bank on to really improve much better in the nearest future.

With the involvement of many bigger institutions and governments in Bitcoin, most definitely all of that will be settled and not be an issue to bother about with time.

If the development you are talking about Bitcoin, it's already on Bitcoin Lightening network where transactions are settled withing seconds and later broadcasted to the Bitcoin main network. There is nothing in the future about transaction speed that we don't have now. If you are expecting Bitcoin to have lightening transaction on the main chain, it's possible but it's not going to happen because of decentralization and security of Bitcoin, it was purposely allowed to be this way.

What we may have in the future is lowest transaction fees, you can see that's already happening.


As you can see, there are some miners that are accepting transactions lower than 1 sats/vbytes, wallet like Trezor suite are supporting transactions <1sats and more are coming, this is ttw future.

[Abiky]

Bitcoin transactions settled instantly without confirmations: Can this be reality one day ?

Do you mean on-chain Bitcoin? Because transactions settle instantly on the Lightning Network (off-chain scaling solution). If you're talking about instant, on-chain transactions, then that's another subject. I hardly doubt they will ever become instant, especially when developers aren't going to allow it. You see, wait times are more of a feature than a bug. If BTC had zero confirmations, it would be less-secure (as it would increase the risk of a double-spend). At least, that's the way I see it. But I could be wrong.

Dash and similar coins have 0-conf transactions, partly because they use a concept called "masternodes" (which are nodes that provide specific functions to the Blockchain). Bitcoin Cash was going to get "Avalanche consensus" for zero-confirmation transactions, but the concept was ruled out by the community. The risk of doing this on Bitcoin is simply too high to bear. Better use the LN or another sidechain/L2 network if you really want to reduce wait times and save money on fees. But who knows? Maybe developers will make zero-confirmations a reality without compromising on the network security. One can only hope...

[Pmalek]

Bitcoin has a difficulty adjustment that ensures that new blocks are mined every 10 minutes on average. So a Bitcoin with instant confirmations every time you make them is a completely different network and not Bitcoin. Those mined blocks would be near empty. If you want instant transactions, try out the Lightning Network. Even Liquid's L2 is much faster than Bitcoin's L1. Anyone can set up LN at times like this when L1 fees are very cheap. Other than that, pay a high enough fee for your transaction to confirm in the next block and hope you won't wait more than the average for the confirmation.

[gogarza63@hotmail.com]

Instantly doesn't infer a specific amount of time. If your definition of instantly is less than a second. Yes. That day is coming. xoxo

[Abiky]

Bitcoin has a difficulty adjustment that ensures that new blocks are mined every 10 minutes on average. So a Bitcoin with instant confirmations every time you make them is a completely different network and not Bitcoin. Those mined blocks would be near empty. If you want instant transactions, try out the Lightning Network. Even Liquid's L2 is much faster than Bitcoin's L1. Anyone can set up LN at times like this when L1 fees are very cheap. Other than that, pay a high enough fee for your transaction to confirm in the next block and hope you won't wait more than the average for the confirmation.

Bitcoin can still be Bitcoin with "instant" transactions. But only through a sidechain or L2. I'd say wait times are more of a feature than a bug. They're there to ensure network security. Otherwise, it would be easy to flood the network with transactions and render it useless. The Lightning Network "works", but requires paying an on-chain fee for opening or closing channels. If Bitcoin gets congested, no one will be able to participate in the LN except for those who already opened a channel. The benefits you get with the LN, comes at the cost of centralization. Same as the "Liquid" federated sidechain.

As it's said in the real world, "you get what you pay for". I'd rather wait a considerable amount of time (average 10 minutes) knowing that my transaction will go through safely. It's what makes Bitcoin the best crypto in the world. The OP can choose an altcoin or L2 network of his choosing. It's his choice, anyways.

[Call_Me_Guru]

Bitcoin transactions settled instantly without confirmations: Can this be reality one day ?

This is not impossible, it has started. The example is the Lightning Network, it uses the off-chain payment to bypass the real bitcoin blockchain protocol. Advancement may take shape where alternatives will bring faster speed and convenience for people to adopt it more than LN. The L1 is the base for bitcoin, it is the one that must follow the bitcoin protocol to guarantee more transparency and security, but it is slow. The L2 is more scalable to give faster and cheaper bitcoin transaction. But the L2 security is questionable.

[Pmalek]

Bitcoin can still be Bitcoin with "instant" transactions. But only through a sidechain or L2. I'd say wait times are more of a feature than a bug. They're there to ensure network security. Otherwise, it would be easy to flood the network with transactions and render it useless.

It's a security feature. One thing it does is to ensure that all nodes are up-to-date about the recent found block. We must never forget that Bitcoin is a decentralized P2P network. Information about new blocks must propagate throughout this network to reach all nodes and miners. Otherwise, we would have more orphaned blocks and more wasted energy mining orphaned blocks. That propagation time was slower in Bitcoin's early days because global internet connections weren't as fast as they are today. Considering how difficult it is to reach a consensus in Bitcoin to change something significant, it's not going to be easy to find a consensus for such a change.   

The Lightning Network "works", but requires paying an on-chain fee for opening or closing channels. If Bitcoin gets congested, no one will be able to participate in the LN except for those who already opened a channel.

That's true. And it's also why you need to plan ahead. If you know you will need LN, open and fund your channel(s) in advance when network fees are low. They have been low for some time already. It's the same as when you need to consolidate inputs. Don't do it when the mempools are full and you need to pay high fees.

[passwordnow]

Off chain transactions cost you zero confirmation.

For faster payments we already have lightning which is pretty cool.

Does that come with additional costs ?

Transactions in the LN are cheaper compared to the normal transaction that we do, so it cost lesser than the usual ones that we do in the Bitcoin network. As we can see right now, network isn't that congested and clogged at all so we should just enjoy the cheaper fees that we have. But I understand that it's about the zero confirmation.

[Digifann1]

Off chain transactions cost you zero confirmation.

For faster payments we already have lightning which is pretty cool.

Does that come with additional costs ?

Transactions in the LN are cheaper compared to the normal transaction that we do, so it cost lesser than the usual ones that we do in the Bitcoin network. As we can see right now, network isn't that congested and clogged at all so we should just enjoy the cheaper fees that we have. But I understand that it's about the zero confirmation.

The problem with on chain is that it is unpredictable. If you need to make a fast transaction, you should avoid on chain and use lightning. If you happen to have an unlucky day, you could spend 1 or even 1 and a half hours waiting for the first confirmation. Whereas with LN either it works and a route to the other side can be found, or it does not work perhaps due to liquidity requirements if you are doing larger transactions. However, you will find within seconds or at most a minute whether it worked or not.

I personally never had any issues with reasonably sized transactions on LN. It is perfect for when you have to make a fast transactions of low or medium value.

[Cookdata]

The problem with on chain is that it is unpredictable. If you need to make a fast transaction, you should avoid on chain and use lightning. If you happen to have an unlucky day, you could spend 1 or even 1 and a half hours waiting for the first confirmation. Whereas with LN either it works and a route to the other side can be found, or it does not work perhaps due to liquidity requirements if you are doing larger transactions. However, you will find within seconds or at most a minute whether it worked or not.

I personally never had any issues with reasonably sized transactions on LN. It is perfect for when you have to make a fast transactions of low or medium value.

Transaction on-chain can be predictable if only you understand how miners incentives transaction. Why do you even need to use lightening network if you are going to be doing a one time transaction. Using a channel, you are going to open a channel which need an onchain transaction fee. Instead of doing that, why not pay the fee you are avoiding and have your Bitcoin confirm within some minutes. If you pay good fee, you should get your transaction confirmed in 10 minutes on average.

It's even possible that you will want to open a channel but will take time, if you are not sending transaction like sending your coin through lightening to exchange like Kraken, you don't need lightening. If you are considering paying a merchant, you need also to open a channel with them and that will cost you another transaction fee, to close the channel you need to also pay some fee. Why not do your transaction through onchain and be done for once, transaction fee are even cheap now.

[Ucy]

Confirmation or verification is a very important principle of the Bitcoin system. It can be categorized under trustlessness which is basically not trusting a transaction until it's confirmed or verified by multiple nodes (to prevent fraud or things like double-spending), unlike centralized system that would typically require single verification. So, once confirmed, it's fully approved.

There could only be a faster and safe way of doing it.  Maybe by having very fast and consistently accurate fewer nodes to do the verification while other nodes (esp equally faster ones) watch them to detect and prevent wrong approvals.
 Or probably have special contract address that receiver's address would accept immediately (on one confirmation) when detected because the contract will sort gurantee the receiver that he is certainly getting paid, and that the fund could even be resent if rejected by the network.
We could also use a very fast auxiliary chain that is more acceptable to the Bitcoin Network.

[Digifann1]

Transaction on-chain can be predictable if only you understand how miners incentives transaction.

No, they are not. You are just being stupid. It has nothing to do with fees. Sometimes there is no block at all for 1 or 1.5 hours. No amount of fees can change that.

Why do you even need to use lightening network if you are going to be doing a one time transaction. Using a channel, you are going to open a channel which need an onchain transaction fee. Instead of doing that, why not pay the fee you are avoiding and have your Bitcoin confirm within some minutes. If you pay good fee, you should get your transaction confirmed in 10 minutes on average.

False assumptions. Like many other wallets, I have a lightning wallet always ready. I don't need to open any channels they are already ready. The equivalent comparison would be telling me that I need to buy Bitcoin first to use my Bitcoin. Dumbass.

[Cookdata]

Transaction on-chain can be predictable if only you understand how miners incentives transaction.

No, they are not. You are just being stupid. It has nothing to do with fees. Sometimes there is no block at all for 1

Swine-asshole.

Why don't you use your main account to interact instead of abusing people on different threads going around like a coward. Can't even swallow a constructive attack. Spit on you.