Kaspa

Kaspa is a proof-of-work network built on a block directed acyclic graph rather than a single chain of blocks. Its consensus protocol, GHOSTDAG, allows blocks created at the same time to coexist and be ordered rather than discarded, which is what lets the network produce blocks far faster than a conventional proof-of-work chain without sacrificing security.

The project was fair-launched in November 2021 with no premine, no presale, and no coin allocations to founders or investors, and it is community managed. That launch model is unusual for a project of its size and is central to how the community describes it.

Why the DAG matters

In Bitcoin's design, if two miners find a block at the same time one of them is orphaned, so raising the block rate raises wasted work and weakens security. GHOSTDAG instead includes parallel blocks in the ledger and applies a rule to order them. This means block rates of one or more per second are possible while orphaned work remains part of the security budget rather than being thrown away.

The network is written to be a fast settlement layer, and its roadmap points toward smart contract capability through rollups that build on the base layer rather than adding execution directly to it.

Supply and emission

KAS has a maximum supply of approximately 28.7 billion coins, with around 27.6 billion already mined. Emission follows a smooth deflationary curve where the block reward decreases continuously rather than halving abruptly, reducing by half each year through monthly steps. Because so much of the supply is already issued, remaining emission is small relative to circulating supply.

Kaspa is mined with specialized hardware and has attracted a significant hashrate, which is the main defense of any proof-of-work network.