Solana - SOL

Solana’s tagline might as well be: "Why wait?" This chain was designed from the ground up for speed and scalability. While most blockchains process transactions in seconds (or minutes), Solana does it in milliseconds, and can handle thousands of transactions per second without breaking a sweat.

How Solana does it:

• Proof of Stake (validators lock up SOL to secure the network), and
• Proof of History (a cryptographic clock that timestamps transactions, so the network doesn’t waste time figuring out what happened when)

It’s fast. It’s cheap. And it’s ideal for apps where speed actually matters, think high-frequency trading, NFTs, and on-chain games.

But let’s not gloss over the hiccups: Solana has had multiple network outages, and critics say it’s not as decentralized as it looks. Still, the developer activity is massive, the community is thriving, and the ecosystem keeps growing, with big moves in DeFi, NFTs, and mobile.

Solana SOL came from a bunch of ex-Qualcomm engineers who decided the blockchain world needed less waiting and way more speed.

At the center of it all is Anatoly Yakovenko. Before crypto, he was building high-performance systems at Qualcomm and later worked at Dropbox. In 2017, he dropped the idea of Proof of History, a new way to keep time on-chain and unlock serious scalability.

Yakovenko teamed up with his former Qualcomm colleague Greg Fitzgerald, and together they founded Solana Labs. They pulled in even more ex-Qualcomm talent (because why not start a blockchain with your whole engineering dream team?) and built something blazing fast.

Solana SOL officially launched in March 2020, and within months, it had become the platform for developers chasing speed, performance, and a low-fee experience.

Buying SOL with Plus Wallet is simple, fast, and designed for humans, not just crypto pros.

Here’s how:

1. Open Plus Wallet and tap “Buy”
2. Select SOL
3. Fund your purchase via card, bank transfer, or crypto
4. Confirm, and your SOL is in your wallet. No waiting, no confusion

Of course, you can buy SOL on other platforms, but Plus Wallet gives you the cleanest path to ownership. Your SOL isn’t locked behind an exchange, it’s instantly accessible, fully secured, and always under your control.

Proof of History (PoH) is Solana’s secret weapon, and it’s why the network moves so fast.

Instead of waiting for nodes to agree on when a transaction happened, PoH creates a verifiable timestamp before transactions are even confirmed. This gives Solana a built-in clock, allowing validators to process blocks in parallel instead of one-by-one like on most chains.

The result? Way less overhead, way more throughput, and blazing-fast confirmation times. It’s like upgrading from dial-up to fiber in blockchain terms. And while it’s not without its critics, PoH is a serious innovation that pushes scalability to a whole new level.

Yes, you can swap SOL for stablecoins like USDT or USDC directly inside Plus Wallet.

Just open the app, select "Swap," choose SOL as your input and USDT or USDC as your output, then confirm. No exchanges, no bridges, no extra steps. It’s all handled securely within your wallet.

Plus Wallet gives you:

• Transparent swap rates
• Clean UI with zero confusion
• Full control over your SOL and stablecoins at every step

Swapping in Plus Wallet feels less like trading crypto and more like switching gears, it’s fast, simple, and right where you need it.

Let’s talk numbers:

• Solana processes thousands of transactions per second (TPS) with block times under 500 milliseconds
• Ethereum processes ~15–30 TPS, depending on congestion, with block times around 12 seconds (and slower finality)

Solana is faster,  no question. But it trades off some decentralization to get there, with fewer validators and a more centralized hardware requirement.

Ethereum has the lead in ecosystem depth and decentralization. Solana has the edge in pure speed and user experience. If you’re building something where throughput matters, Solana’s a top-tier option.

Solana is fast, but it’s also been known to trip over its own speed. The network has experienced multiple outages over the years, some lasting hours. Most were due to bots spamming the network, congestion bugs, or validator overload.

That said, Solana’s team has been shipping fixes aggressively, improving stability, and hardening the protocol. The chain is maturing, and downtime has decreased significantly.

If you’re using Solana, it’s worth knowing:

• It’s still evolving
• Outages have happened, though they’re becoming rarer
• It’s a high-performance network that sometimes moves too fast for its own good

Fast tech means fast bugs, but it also means fast fixes.