Why Lightning?

• Secure: The integrity of the L1

• Near instant settlement

• Highly scalable

Catalyst Proposal

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How it works

As the name suggests, Cardano Lightning is to be a port of Bitcoin Lightning (opens in a new tab) to Cardano.

The network is made up of bidirectional payment channels. A payment channel is some means by which one party can make a payment, and the other party can receive it. Either party can close the channel at any time at no risk to the other party. In a bidirectional payment channel, payment can be made in both directions.

The magic really happens in hopping from one payment channel to another. For example, if Bob has a payment channel with both Alice and Charlie, then Alice can pay Charlie by effectively paying Bob and Bob paying Charlie.

Roadmap

Phase 1: Payment gateways

1. Protocol spec: Based on a lit review, together with a set of ADRs.
2. Smart contracts: Together with a full test coverage, and tx-building code.
3. Docs and SDKs: To build dapps atop Cardano Lightning, and facilitate product integrations.
4. POC: Hub and spoke network.

Phase 2: Routing & Discoverability

Continuing the work of phase 1 to a fully decentralised network with optimal channel routing.