What Are Layer 2 Scaling Solutions For Ethereum ?
There has been a lot of noise for the past one year about Ethereum scaling solutions. In the past year we have witnessed the likes of Arbitrum, Optimism and Boba. Recently, some Zero Knowledge solutions just rolled out their public main net such as ZK Sync, Stark net and Polygon ZK EVM. Moreover, there are still more projects such as Linea, Taiko and Scroll. These L2 solutions aim to build a more scalable Ethereum blockchains and other blockchains.
You maybe asking ; Why do we need Layer 2 solutions ?
The whole concern drives from Layer 1 blockchains which might include Bitcoin, Ethereum, dodge coin, Solana, Near, etc.. This blockchains truly offers security, developing attributes, foundational strength but they lack scalability. This is what brings about Layer 2 blockchains. Layer 2 blockchain might be developed in different form and scalability methods.
The vision of blockchain technology is to bring decentralization to the world system, nevertheless, fast transactions, cheaper transactions, security, scalability, privacy, immutability and flexibility has also being the main target of blockchain users and developers. Using Ethereum as a case studies, Ethereum is a base blockchain to a lot of blockchain technology which is quite interesting. Most cases, building and using the Ethereum base layer can be more frustrating considering the congestion, transaction fees and lesser scalability. A very good example was the rise of meme in early 2023 such as Pepe token, due to huge rise of investors and traders trading this token on Ethereum blockchain there was high rise in Ethereum fees and transaction become slower with hig gas. This is a very huge concern, this is one of the purpose of Layer 2 solutions in order to optimize this disadvantages.
Basically, lots of scalability issues can be solved by layer 2 such as off chain computation, smart contract development, payment and transactions and lots more.
Layer 2 scaling technologies usually process more transactions per second with lesser fees, each having it’s own special features than the other which might be in terms of speeds, security, developer focused, performance, compatibility, etc.. Layer 2 solutions scale the base Ethereum blockchain by delegating transaction processing and data storage to the L2 chains
Now lets, take a good view of this technology. We have various blockchain technology that are considered to be Ethereum layer 2 solution such as ImmutableX, Metis Dao, Polygon, Arbitrum and so on. In this article, we will consider the basic ones which are commonly used ?
- Arbitrum is a rollup based Layer 2 developed by Off Chain Labs specifically designed to increase scalability, transaction speed and improve the network’s privacy without sacrificing security and decentralization. This layer 2 solution makes it possible to lower the congestion by offloading more work and data from the Ethereum main net.
2. Optimism is also an Ethereum Layer 2 solution developed by Optimism Foundation designed to uphold the values of Ethereum and support various Ethereum DApps. It aims to lower gas fees through optimistic roll ups, which implies that it takes volume of transaction data to be process of Ethereum Layer 1 then return in an highly compressed form.
3. Boba Network is also an Ethereum scaling technology but not as popular to optimism and arbitrum. It was developed by Boba Dao designed as a scaling and augmenting solution for Ethereum which enhancing the capabilities of smart contracts and gives an improved transaction throughput. Personally, I found Boba technology to be amazing because of less complexities and had a very good throughput plus transactions are much more cheaper. Moreover, it is the first multichain layer 2 network with hybrid smart contracts which makes it more unique.
4. ZKSync is a layer 2 protocol that scales Ethereum with cutting edge zero-knowledge technology by increasing its throughput and preserving the Ethereum foundation values. This project has aimed to claim an hyperscalability feature which can enable blockchain to be easily scalable like the internet without marginal impact on security or cost.
5. Starknet is also another commonly used layer 2 solution developed by Starkware. It is designed to provide scale and Ethereum level security by producing Stark proofs off_chain. Basically referred to as a decentralized validity rollup which helps to facilitate easy development , crestivity and innovation on the blockchain.
6. Polygon zkEVM is a recent layer 2 solution developed by Polygon Labs. It claims to achieve scalability and execute smart contract transparently while maintaining opcode compatibility with Ethereum Virtual Machine.
We have seen that this Layer 2 scaling solution all share lot of similarities which shows that we are all trying to achieve a better goal. It is a good thing to have lots option for developers or blockchain decentralize application to choose from when it comes to Ethereum blockchain.
In future articles, I will share other Layer 2 solution that are still in beta stage or test net such as scroll, taiko and linea.
