Polkadot Price Today

The current real-time Polkadot price is $6.18 . DOT price has plummeted by 4.52% in the last day and increased by 0.17% in the last seven days. It’s important to note that the current Polkadot market capitalization is $8,891,375,832. The maximum supply is coins, with a circulating supply of 1,437,953,431.37. Ethereum is ranked #14 in terms of market cap.

Polkadot In A Nutshell

Polkadot (DOT) is an innovative cryptocurrency project aiming to solve the interoperability problem present in crypto by providing the infrastructure for various unrelated blockchains to communicate and transfer value. As it needs to handle a large volume of transactions, the Polkadot network is designed for high throughput and fast settlement time. 

Polkadot was created in 2020 by Robert Habermeier, Peter Czaban, and Ethereum co-founder Gavin Wood. While Polkadot refers to the network, DOT is the token used to pay fees and for governance. 

How Polkadot Works – Basically Explained

In contrast to projects like Ethereum, which allow smart contracts to be built within the confines of the network, Polkadot enables developers to create their own blockchains called Parachains, which benefit from Polkadot’s security and reliability. As such, developers can use Polkadot to build blockchains that use custom tokens, governance rewards, block times, and fees. 

Parachains allow Polkadot to achieve its interoperability, scalability, low cost, and high throughput. Unlike Bitcoin, where transactions follow each other, parachains enable multiple transactions to be processed simultaneously. Parachains connect to Polkadot’s relay chain, which is used for consensus and transaction validation. 

Polkadot uses a Nominated Proof of Stake (NPoS) consensus mechanism for transaction validation. People wishing to validate transactions and improve the network’s security can run a validator node. Nominators can stake Polkadot to vote on trustworthy validators, resulting in a community-governed consensus mechanism. 

What makes Polkadot Unique

One of the most significant advantages of the Polkadot network is its ability to push updates to the mainnet without downtime or forking. This allows Polkadot to implement improvements and new technologies much more efficiently than the Ethereum network. Moreover, people use the DOT token to vote on proposals, giving the community control over Polkadot. 

Polkadot has become so popular with developers because the network supports custom user-created parachain blockchains. As people have control over the blockchain and can freely edit its essential components, developers can tailor Polkadot blockchains to specific use cases, avoiding compromise and improving efficiency. 

Polkadot Price History 2020 to 2024

Polkadot was first available to investors through an Initial Coin Offering (ICO), which saw the asset sell for $0.29, meaning ICO investors would be sitting at around 1,879% profit. Upon the August 2020 launch of the Polkadot mainnet, DOT traded for around $2.8969. However, DOT hit $6.2988 within a week, indicating high investor demand. 

For the remainder of 2022, DOT stayed out of the limelight, trading around $4.50 and building momentum for its next upward move. As a result of the market-wide bull run and parachain anticipation, DOT surged significantly. It hit $10 in early January, $18.60 in late January, $39.70 in February, and a peak of $47.96 in May. 

Over the next few months, DOT fell sharply, dropping as low as $10.96 as the crypto market cooled off and investors took profits. However, spurred on by the late 2021 bull run, the asset enjoyed a substantial upward move, rising from its low in July to an all-time high of $53.88 by November, a 391% gain in just four months.

Following its impressive run, DOT was in a consistent downward trend, averaging around $5 in 2022 and just $4 in 2023 until October. Late 2023 and early 2024 saw DOT rebound, climbing to $11.32. However, the asset has since steadily fallen and now trades for around $5.75. 

Polkadot Circulating Supply

DOT has a circulating supply of 1,437,953,431.37 tokens and no maximum supply. The Polkadot team targets an annual inflation rate of 10%, using variable staking rewards as a control mechanism. Part of the additional supply that enters circulation is distributed to stakers, while the remainder goes to the Polkadot treasury.