While we still do not know whether the rift among the main players of Bitcoin Cash will not cause the birth of Bitcoin SV (Bitcoin Satoshi Vision) at the next fork of the BCH, scheduled for mid-November, a “stress test” of the BCH’s current blockchain has been carried out.
2.1 million transactions in 24 hours
This Saturday, September 1, a stress test was conducted on the Bitcoin Cash network to test its ability to withstand a large volume of transactions, while observing the effects, particularly on transaction costs.
The test consisted of injecting 2.1 million transactions on the BCH network within one day.
According to BitInfoCharts, on the day of the stress test, Bitcoin Cash transactions accounted for approximately 63% of all cryptomarket transactions.
According to Fork.lol, the number of transactions per second on the BCH network peaked at almost 28,500 transactions per block, whereas the network typically averaged between 100 and 200 transactions per block. For comparison, the average number of transactions per block for Bitcoin (BTC) is 1,000 to 1,500.
As Cointelegraph notes, according to the BitInfoCharts transaction fee history graph, the average fee for a BCH transaction remained stable, even dropping from $0.02 to $0.0017 on the day of the test.
Several observers had to conclude that this stress test was a success, because the price of Bitcoin Cash, especially against Bitcoin (BTC) experienced a notable increase after the test day:
Trade while you sleep with two of the cryptocurrency bots on the market - Cryptohopper or Tradesanta.
Results that still need to be put into perspective
Certainly, some consider that this stress test is a success, in particular by the fact that the BCH network has not been congested by the large injection of transactions: no increase in transaction fees, and therefore no slowdown by favoritism of miners (resolving transactions first with the largest fees, as we saw on cryptos last December).
However, Dan Larimer, the CTO of the EOS project, did not fail to point out by a tweet that, over 7 days, and even with the massive injection of the BCH stress test, the EOS network remained the one where there were the most transactions (over a week thus) with approximately 49% of the total number of the cryptos transactions.
https://t.co/uANIw0wV8u paints a different picture. pic.twitter.com/3v8o0kodYk
— Daniel Larimer (@bytemaster7) September 2, 2018
The results of the stress test on the Bitcoin Cash network seem to be good news for this cryptocurrency in terms of its scalability, even if, as we have just seen, these results remain to be put into perspective. One thing is certain, the stability of the BCH and its future will depend more on what happens in November, with the next fork scheduled, because the risk of splitting in two (or even three) cryptocurrency is the real concern of Bitcoin Cash currently.