What is Avalanche (AVAX)? Price, History & Where To Buy

Avalanche (AVAX) is an innovative layer-1 smart-contract platform created by Ava Labs. It’s a versatile blockchain that claims to prioritize decentralization, security, and scalability while reducing costs and ensuring fast transaction speeds.

Current Avalanche (AVAX) Price

Avalanche (AVAX) Exchange Rate Calculator

Historical Avalanche Price Chart

It has quickly accrued a TVL (total value locked) of nearly $11 billion, and it’s the 19th largest cryptocurrency in the world by market cap.

How Avalanche (AVAX) Works

Avalanche aims to resolve some of the biggest issues that older blockchains have. Most notably, scalability and the general lack of interoperability.

The creators envisioned a continuous development that would advance blockchain technology. They chose to address these fundamental blockchain issues through an innovative approach.

The Avalanche network is governed by its primary network, which facilitates the validation of the three following subnets:

1. Avalanche Exchange Chain (X-chain): Used to facilitate the trade of digital assets, including AVAX cryptocurrency and other cryptocurrencies. It uses the Avalanche consensus protocol.
2. Avalanche Platform Chain (P-chain): A blockchain used to manage validators to create and track subnets. It uses the snowman consensus protocol.
3. Avalanche Contract Chain (C-chain): Used to deploy and create smart contracts and is a sample of Ethereum virtual machine, which uses the snowman consensus protocol.

These subnets allow the Avalanche network to operate as the ‘fastest smart contracts platform.

By utilizing three blockchains with specific functions, the network can perform optimally without sacrificing any speed. This unique approach separates the avalanche protocol apart from other blockchains.

What Is Avalanche (AVAX) Used For?

One of the unique propositions of Avalanche is that individuals and developers can deploy their own blockchains through Platform Chain (P-chain). This is seamless and simple and caters to private and public blockchains.

A significant value proponent for developers is that the sequence of blockchains used, alongside a superior proof of stake consensus mechanism, allows for true decentralization and a seamless experience.

Many developers migrate their Ethereum DApps because of Avalanche blockchain’s compatibility with the Ethereum toolkit. One of the benefits is that these DApps can function on independent Avalanche blockchains, allowing developers immense authority over various functions, accessibility, and security.

These appealing capabilities have seen the Avalanche platform attract a substantial amount of developers in a short time. Many developers prefer Avalanche blockchain over other blockchains because of these unique capabilities.

The AVAX cryptocurrency is what powers the network and is used to pay for transactions on the network. Individuals use the AVAX token to interact with DApps in the ecosystem.

Essentially AVAX is used to pay ‘gas fees’ – similar to how ETH is used for gas fees in the Ethereum network.

Where To Buy AVAX?

AVAX is currently the 19th largest cryptocurrency by market cap.

AVAX can be purchased on several centralized crypto exchanges. Before you’re able to purchase it, you’ll need to deposit funds on the crypto exchange and purchase the tokens by placing an order.

These crypto exchanges are the safest place where you can buy, sell and store the AVAX cryptocurrency.

Five of the most popular crypto exchanges are:

1. Binance
2. Coinbase
3. KuCoin
4. HTX
5. Gate.io

All of the above exchanges allow users to buy, sell, transfer and store Avalanche (AVAX) in a digital wallet on the exchange. You can use your debit or credit card to purchase AVAX.

If you intend on transferring your AVAX tokens to a wallet off of the exchange – you can choose to send them to an Avalanche wallet that is compatible.

Avalanche Wallet & Metamask are the most common wallets used for storing AVAX tokens and staking AVAX. You’ll need to configure Metamask to set up the Avalanche Network.

How long has AVAX existed?

Avalanche (AVAX) was released in 2020 after successfully securing $42M in its initial coin offering. It was founded by Cornell University professor Dr. Emin Gün Sirer.

He also proposed a peer-to-peer cryptocurrency called Karma in 2002, which was never pursued.

What’s controversial about Avalanche and AVAX?

Avalanche has been surrounded by controversy – as is the case with most crypto projects. Let’s take a look at 2 of the top controversies surrounding Avalanche (AVAX)

1. Gas Fees Are Not Always Low – Avalanche is often dubbed the ‘Ethereum killer‘ because it has much faster transaction times and lower transaction fees or ‘gas fees.’ This, however, was not the case when the network saw a surge in the number of transactions – the transaction fees surged to more than $10 a transaction, leaving many AVAX enthusiasts concerned.
2. It’s Late To The Party – Many individuals think that the project has joined the party too late. It is up against some seriously influential competitors in the crypto space, but the founders and investors don’t see this as a problem. The investors have continued to back Avalanche, and AVAX is now the 10th largest cryptocurrency in the world by market cap. However, much uncertainty exists regarding the future success of Avalanche.

How many AVAX Tokens are there?

At the time of writing, AVAX has a circulating supply of 268,51 million tokens.

AVAX has a total supply of 395,89 million tokens.

Can AVAX be mined?

AVAX can’t be mined. Avalanche uses a proof of stake consensus protocol, unlike Bitcoin, which uses a proof of work consensus protocol.

Users stake Avalanche to receive staking rewards, similar to mine, but it doesn’t require extreme computing power or mining software.

What is the market cap of AVAX?

The market cap of AVAX is:

AVAX market cap = total amount of coins in circulation x current market price of AVAX

AVAX Market Cap = 311,582,143 x $10.97 = $3.4Bn (19th largest cryptocurrency in the world)

The market cap fluctuates according to circulating supply and market price.

Biggest Competitors Of Avalanche (AVAX)

Avalanche uses a unique approach to achieving an optimal decentralized, secure, and fast network. Unlike conventional blockchains, it can process up to 4,500 transactions per second and maintain network security and minimal transaction fees.

Some competitors to AVAX are projects that have larger TVL in their ecosystems and larger market caps. Ethereum and Solana would be such projects and could thus be deemed as competitors to AVAX.

However, the Ethereum network cannot process nearly as many transactions as Avalanche; it still has almost ten times more TVL (total value locked) in its ecosystem (decentralized finance) – nearly $100 billion.

Solana can process up to 65,000 transactions per second but has a limited number of network validators, making it less decentralized than Avalanche.

What are the future plans for Avalanche?

Avalanche has prioritized the deployment of smart contracts and custom blockchains. Additionally, Avalanche claims to be working towards becoming home to many more decentralized applications, such as decentralized exchanges.

The current Avalanche TVL is $11 billion and is a blockchain platform that continues to attract developers and grow in daily active users.

Pros and Cons of Avalanche Blockchain, AVAX, & Avalanche Network

Pros

• Avalanche Has Very Unique Technology – Avalanche ensures the mainnet runs optimally by utilizing three subnets serving specific functions. The X-chain, C-chain, and P-chain allow the network to stay decentralized, remain secure and maintain ultra-fast transaction speeds.
• Ethereum Dapp Migration Capability – Decentralized applications created on Ethereum can be deployed on Avalanche. Avalanche has Ethereum tool kit capability, which allows developers to run Ethereum DApps on the Avalanche network through custom blockchains if they desire. Many developers prefer Avalanche because of its speed, security, and low fees compared to Ethereum.
• Scalable Without Losing Decentralization – The blockchain architecture of Avalanche allows for scalability while maintaining network integrity and decentralization. Avalanche can uphold its decentralized network, unlike other blockchains, even if it scales.
• Incentives For Participation – 50% of the token allocation was kept for staking rewards. Users are highly incentivized to participate in staking, which secures the network and allows for the seamless validation of transactions. Staking rewards are allocated according to the portion being staked – users who stake more get more AVAX token rewards.
• Fast and Cheap Transactions – The Avalanche network can process up to 4,500 transactions per second at an incredibly low price. It is unrivaled compared to projects like Ethereum, which can process 13 transactions per second and have gas fees of up to $100 when the network is congested.

Cons

• AVAX token Is Expensive – Projects rely heavily on retail adoption, which means that retail investors need to purchase tokens to support the project. These tokens will then be used in the ecosystem for staking or participating with DApps. The problem is that the AVAX token is already $100. Although many might consider this affordable compared to projects like Cardano (ADA), $1.18 retail investors might be inclined to invest in cheaper cryptocurrencies.
• Substantial Competitors – The Avalanche foundation only launched AVAX in 2020, which is significantly later than other competitor projects that were released. Many competitors, such as Ethereum, have been around for years and have amassed a vast community of investors and developers – Avalanche needs to work incredibly hard to keep the project growing and surpass its competition.

Avalanche User Reviews

Review Summary

Recent Reviews

Submit a Review