The 4th generation of blockchain is at our doorsteps and it promises to bring us closer to mass adoption than ever before. But before we delve into that, let’s quickly look at the 3 evolutionary phases blockchain technology has gone through since 2008.

What we have so far

The first generation of blockchain was designed by Satoshi Nakamoto and resulted in the first ever cryptocurrency Bitcoin.The hallmark of first-gen blockchains is that they use Proof of Work (PoW) algorithm to validate transactions. In this group are also Bitcoin’s various clones and forks like Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin.

The second generation was led by Ethereum and introduced smart contracts and made possible the easy tokenization of assets. It became hugely popular with developers and a platform of choice for the vast majority of ICOs. Other projects in that category are NEO and WAVES.

This kittie is not as innocuous as it looks!

Slow transactions, high network fees, and insane amounts of energy consumption have become synonymous with Bitcoin, while the CryptoKitties mania last December revealed that Ethereum is far from production-ready scalability.

3rd-gen blockchains are working to solve the problems of scalability, speed, and energy efficiency, by using approaches like Proof of Stake (PoS) validation and off-chain routing. Projects like Cardano fit that category.