What is XRP?

Ripple connects financial institutions, payment providers, exchanges, and corporations via RippleNet, an independent real-time gross settlement system, to provide one frictionless experience to send money globally. It is built on the most advanced blockchain technology that is scalable, secure, and interoperates different networks. Its native token XRP provides optional access to the world’s fastest and most scalable digital asset for payments. The total supply of XRP is capped at 100 billion, and its average transaction speed is 4 seconds.

A brief history of XRP

Created by US-based technology company Ripple Labs Inc., XRP is the native cryptocurrency of XRP Ledger (XRPL), a decentralised, public blockchain engineered by Jed McCaleb, Arthur Britto, and David Schwartz. The ledger was launched in June 2012 with the goal of creating a digital asset that was more sustainable and built specifically for payments. Today, XRP is one of the largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalisation.

How XRP works

XRP Ledger (XRPL) is the open-source distributed ledger created by Ripple. The native token of the XRP Ledger is XRP. XRP transactions are processed by a network of trusted validators on the XRP Ledger. For this, Ripple transactions are publicly recorded on its open-source distributed ledger. As it doesn’t use PoW, no mining is required in the Ripple network. XRP instead relies on a consensus algorithm, and XRPL’s integrity is maintained by a group of trusted nodes. Any Ripple transaction needs to be verified by at least 80% of the nodes on the network to be included in the ledger. Anyone can become a validator. However, Ripple maintains a given set of trusted validators. This trusted list of nodes is called the unique node list (UNL).

What is XRP used for?

Ripple is a privately-held fintech company, and its global payment solution behind XRP is a patented payment network called Ripple Network (also known as RippleNet). RippleNet is a payment network that is built on top of Ripple’s consensus ledger, called XRP Ledger (also known as XRPL). Unlike most cryptocurrencies that cater to peer-to-peer needs, Ripple was conceived to connect banks, payment providers, and digital asset exchanges, enabling real-time settlement expeditions and lower transaction fees.