XRP

XRP is the native digital asset of the XRP Ledger, a Layer 1 blockchain built for fast, low-cost global payments. Its core purpose is to serve as a neutral bridge asset between currencies: instead of banks pre-funding accounts around the world, value can be moved through XRP with settlement finalizing in three to five seconds for a fraction of a cent.

The project's roots go back to 2004 with Ryan Fugger's early payment network concept, but the modern XRP Ledger was created in 2012 by a team including Jed McCaleb and Chris Larsen, who co-founded the company now known as Ripple. Ripple builds payment solutions on the ledger and works with financial institutions, though the XRP Ledger itself operates as open, decentralized infrastructure.

How the XRP Ledger works

Unlike Bitcoin's mining or Ethereum's staking, the XRP Ledger uses a federated consensus protocol. Each validator relies on a Unique Node List of trusted validators, and transactions are permanently recorded once roughly 80% of those validators agree. This design delivers deterministic finality in seconds and supports throughput of around 1,500 transactions per second, without energy-intensive computation. All 100 billion XRP were created at the ledger's launch — no new tokens are mined — and a small amount of XRP is burned with every transaction as an anti-spam measure, making the supply very slowly deflationary.

Role in the ecosystem

XRP is used to pay network fees, provide liquidity for cross-border transfers, and trade on the ledger's built-in decentralized exchange, which supports tokenized assets without intermediaries. Its long-standing focus on payments and institutional finance distinguishes it from general-purpose smart contract platforms.