Microtransactions or Small and Quick Payments with Bitcoin (BTC) Can be Made via Lightning Network, OpenNode Team Explains
Ryan Flowers from OpenNode notes that the value of a single Bitcoin (BTC), the flagship cryptocurrency, keeps increasing and there will be more businesses that will accept BTC payments. Flowers points out that this has been the case in the past with larger corporations taking Bitcoin as payment. He claims that the Bitcoin blockchain network has improved due to certain advancements or updates made to the Lightning Network – which aims to serve as a scaling solution for the leading cryptocurrency.
Flowers explains:
“The Lightning Network is an update to the Bitcoin payment protocol, and as an upgrade, it serves to improve several of the pain points of Bitcoin and its use as a medium of exchange. As the next wave of Bitcoin adoption continues to build momentum, look for more and more businesses looking to start accepting Bitcoin with the Lightning Network.”
He also mentions:
“The two biggest points of friction with businesses that want to accept Bitcoin payments are the fact that on-chain transactions are slow and expensive. It’s true. Why would a business want to accept a payment that could take minutes or even hours to confirm? Or why would a business want to accept a payment, if the transaction fee for the payment costs more than the actual payment itself? As a business, you simply can’t afford this kind of experience.”
Flowers claims that these are the core features of the BTC blockchain network that provide the security to transactions and cannot be changed. However, it may be possible to improve the implementation, Flowers writes. He further notes that the Lightning Network (LN) offers an off-chain solution for making BTC payments. Transactions via the LN may be performed instantly and you only have to pay a fraction of the TX fees that come with regular Bitcoin transfers.
The LN may be used for microtransactions like paying for a cup of coffee. When using the LN, people don’t have to worry about underpayments, because transactions are settled instantaneously via the LN, the OpenNode team claims.
They recommend:
“Adding Bitcoin to your accepted payment methods can help grow your business in many ways, but by using the Lightning Network to accept Bitcoin you can benefit even further. By using the Lightning Network to accept Bitcoin you can increase your revenue by collecting payments with much smaller fees per transaction, enjoy instant payment acceptance, utilize microtransactions, and still enjoy the security of accepting Bitcoin.”
(Note: to learn more about how to effectively integrate Bitcoin into your business, check here.)
Since its genesis (or very first) block of transactions was mined (produced/generated) in early 2009, the BTC price has surged dramatically.
When first launched, Bitcoin was worth almost nothing but then its price began to rise quickly during the past decade. It’s notably the best-performing asset in the past 10 years and it’s trading at over $10,000 at the time of writing.
However, many traders and investors have lost huge sums of money by engaging in risky trades. Bitcoin remains a highly volatile asset and most investment experts recommend allocating only around 1-2% of a portfolio to Bitcoin.
