What is Optimism (OP) Layer-2 Blockchain?

WHAT IS OPTIMISM (OP)?

Optimism is a Ethereum layer-2 (L2) solution that was built with the objective of being cheap and easy to use. It was first revealed back in June of 2019 and Optimism’s open mainnet was launched in December 2021. Another positive feature is that since Optimism was designed to closely mirror Ethereum blockchain, developers can deploy existing contracts on the blockchain in a very streamlined manner. It is essentially an Ethereum-based decentralized infrastructure platform that allows for instant transactions and also scalable smart contracts. OP is Optimism’s native token that runs the blockchain.

WHO ARE THE FOUNDERS OF OPTIMISM?

Optimism was founded in 2019 by Jinglan Wang, Karl Floersch and Kevin Ho. As of June 2022, the company has raised $178.5 million, according to data from Crunchbase.

HOW DOES OPTIMISM WORK?

According to Optimism’s community forums, Optimism is built in accordance to a strong design philosophy that stands on four pillars: simplicity, pragmatism, sustainability, and, of course, optimism. It’s important to understand these pillars as they heavily influence the design of Optimism as a whole.

So Optimism is what is known as a ‘rollup’ – which is just another way of describing a blockchain that typically piggy-backs off of the security of another ‘parent’ blockchain, and in this case – Ethereum. Specifically, ‘Optimistic Rollups’ as they are called, take advantage of the parent chain’s consensus mechanism (Proof of Work or Proof of Stake) instead of building their own.

KEY ATTRIBUTES OF OPTIMISM (OP)

One of the key attributes of Optimism blockchain network is that it has the ability to support all of Ethereum dApps. It is able to do so by running all the required computation off-chain and thereby increasing speeds and decreasing transaction costs. But all the transaction information however, is recorded on the Ethereum blockchain.

Optimism is one of the best attempts at bringing about scalability to the Ethereum blockchain network without sacrificing its security capabilities. Those using Optimism’s infrastructure have recorded vastly improved transaction speeds while at the same time, reduced costs to a fraction of what they would have been on the Ethereum mainnet.

HOW TO BUY OPTIMISM (OP)?

Use these three-step processes to buy your first OP using the CoinDCX crypto app.

1. Sign Up for the CoinDCX account: Enter a valid email address and a user name on the sign-up page. Once the Email Id has been verified, set a strong password to secure your account.
2. Verify the account: You need to complete your KYC, to buy OP on the CoinDCX platform. All you need to do is upload the documents and your account will be set up in 15 minutes.
3. Buy OP: After the account has been verified, you can deposit any amount of fiat currency you are comfortable with and start your crypto journey!