There are many causes to be bullish on the world’s sixth-largest cryptocurrency.
Cryptocurrency returns have been a blended bag in 2025. Main property like Bitcoin (BTC 4.31%) and Ethereum (ETH 4.88%) have gained nearly 20%, whereas the speculative finish of the market has cooled off, with Dogecoin sinking by greater than 40%.
Solana (SOL 6.09%) is sitting in the center, and is little modified for yr (as of Oct. 28). In my view, it is one of the vital attention-grabbing cryptocurrencies due to its distinctive community, which has change into a sooner, cheaper, and extra succesful model of the Ethereum community.
A rising variety of builders are constructing their decentralized functions on Solana, which may gasoline additional upside in the coin. So, may shopping for this cryptocurrency be your ticket to the millionaire’s membership in 2026?
Picture supply: Getty Pictures.
How Solana works
Ethereum stays the premier platform for constructing decentralized functions, that are fashionable in areas like finance and gaming. These apps run on sensible contracts, that are slivers of laptop code that dwell on the Ethereum blockchain and govern how every app features. Sensible contracts sometimes cannot be modified, that means no particular person, firm, or authorities can manipulate the app’s decentralized construction.
The Ethereum community itself can also be absolutely decentralized, hosted on 1000’s of nodes (computer systems) located everywhere in the world, which keep copies of its blockchain. This makes it far safer than a community that is managed centrally by way of a single information heart.
Solana is conceptually similar, however it was constructed to handle a few of Ethereum’s key limitations. For instance, Ethereum makes use of a proof of stake (PoS) validation mechanism, which suggests contributors in the community should put up cash as collateral in order to realize the best to confirm transactions and add blocks to the blockchain. They earn curiosity for doing so, but when they misbehave, they’ll lose a few of their staked cash.
Solana additionally makes use of a PoS mechanism, however it does so in conjunction with a proof of historical past (PoH) validation mechanism that encodes every transaction on the blockchain with a timestamp. This quickens the verification course of and permits 1000’s of transactions to be processed per second, whereas Ethereum is commonly restricted to fifteen transactions at a time earlier than congestion drives a sharp enhance in charges (referred to as “fuel”).
As is the case with Ethereum, at any time when a smart contract is activated on Solana (referred to as a transaction), it triggers a charge payable in Solana cash. Due to Solana’s mixture of PoH and PoS validation mechanisms, its charges are a lot decrease than Ethereum’s, which is why Solana is changing into a fashionable platform for builders. Decentralized crypto alternate Jupiter and non-fungible token (NFT) market Magic Eden are simply a couple of the apps which were constructed on Solana’s community up to now.
Solana’s rising provide may restrict additional upside
Many cryptocurrencies can have ever-growing provides as a result of validating transactions includes a course of referred to as mining, which pays rewards in the type of new cash or tokens. With out these rewards, validators would not take part in verifying transactions, and the ecosystems would crumble.
Bitcoin is probably the most notable exception as a result of its complete mineable provide was capped by its designer at 21 million cash, and the big majority of them have already been mined. Its relative shortage is among the causes some buyers take into account it to be a reliable retailer of worth. Solana, then again, technically has an uncapped provide, which suggests new cash will proceed to enter circulation in perpetuity.
Nonetheless, Solana has a pre-programmed mechanism that tapers its fee of provide progress by 15% yearly. Due to this fact, though provide elevated by 8% in its first yr, it’s going to solely enhance by 4.2% this yr. That determine will proceed falling till it reaches 1.5%, the place it’s going to stay.
Some Solana tokens are burned in every transaction, which suggests they’re faraway from provide ceaselessly, so if the community finally turns into extraordinarily fashionable, the whole out there provide of cash would possibly even begin to shrink. Nonetheless, that time might be years and even a long time away.
A rising provide is not excellent news for long-term worth creation, as a result of it consistently dilutes the worth of present tokens. Personally, I’ve by no means seen an asset with a vast provide that persistently elevated in worth.
Right now’s Change
(-6.09%) $-12.20
Present Worth
$188.06
Key Knowledge Factors
Market Cap
$103B
Day’s Vary
$187.19 – $201.42
52wk Vary
$96.70 – $293.31
Quantity
9.7B
Avg Vol
0
Gross Margin
0.00%
Dividend Yield
N/A
Changing into a Solana millionaire would possibly require a hefty beginning steadiness
Creating wealth in crypto is commonly about timing, as a result of apart from Bitcoin, most cash have spun their wheels since peaking over the last speculative frenzy in 2021.
Had you acquire Solana on Jan. 1, 2021, proper earlier than it took off, you would be sitting on an eye-popping acquire of 13,100% at present. However had you acquire it in early November of that yr when it peaked at about $240, you would be sitting on a lack of 17% proper now. Solana did make a new report excessive of $294 early this yr, however even then, a poorly timed funding from 2021 would have solely yielded a small acquire.
However there may be one good indicator of the potential upside from right here. The variety of day by day energetic Solana addresses soared to a new excessive of 9.1 million earlier this yr, and whereas it is at the moment down to three.5 million, that is nonetheless about 5 occasions greater than its peak from 2021.
Merely put, a rising variety of individuals are utilizing the Solana community, which may drive demand for the coin over time. Nonetheless, I would not guess on a life-changing return in 2026, contemplating the coin has gone nowhere in 2025.
