The TPS Scam in the Crypto Industry

Author: rosie

Translation: Deep from TechFlow

Editor's Note: This article criticizes the crypto industry's blind pursuit of high TPS (transactions per second), arguing that this race is misleading marketing which ignores real user needs. Projects exaggerate lab results to attract funding and attention, sacrificing decentralization, security, and practicality—solving problems nobody actually cares about. The author calls for focusing on genuinely meaningful blockchain applications and building according to actual use-case scale, rather than chasing flashy, meaningless numbers.

Below is the original content (slightly edited for clarity):

Every other week, a new Layer 1 or Layer 2 project launches claiming, "We can process 100,000 transactions per second!"

Sometimes it’s 50,000. Sometimes it’s a million.

The exact number doesn’t matter—because they’re almost all nonsense.

The “Who’s Faster” Race

The battle for scalability has become the most awkward contest in crypto. Every new protocol must claim higher TPS than the last—regardless of whether those speeds are:

• Actually achievable outside their AWS testnet (spoiler: usually not)

• Meaningful for real-world applications

• Necessary for any human use case

This obsession with throughput is like showing off a Lamborghini during rush hour. It’s not about specs—it’s about context.

Let’s Talk Real Numbers

Visa, the payment giant processing transactions for billions worldwide, handles around 1,700 transactions per second on average. Their theoretical peak is about 24,000 TPS—but they’ve never needed that capacity in decades of operation.

In contrast, most blockchain projects struggle to attract 100 daily active users.

If you have more emojis in your Discord than transactions on your chain, you’re probably solving a fictional problem.

The Hidden Costs of Chasing “Mega” Scalability

Obsession with theoretical throughput creates real problems for users:

First, disguised centralization: High TPS often comes at the cost of decentralization—all for a marketing headline.

Second, security theater: Cutting corners in the rush to scale, creating vulnerabilities that will eventually be exploited.

Third, brain drain: Top engineers aren’t building what users actually need—they’re stuck optimizing synthetic benchmark tests.

Fourth, outright deception: Lab numbers promoted by networks collapse under real-world conditions.

An Uncomfortable Truth

This fixation on extreme scalability exists for two reasons:

• You need impressive-sounding tech to justify your $100 million raise

• You’re desperate to stand out in a market flooded with over 5,000 blockchains

User needs are an afterthought. The real game is convincing retail investors you’re the ultimate solution—while VCs act as the loudest KOLs promoting your TPS narrative.

Build Something That Actually Matters

If you're truly building in this space, here’s a reality check:

• Focus on things only blockchains can do

• Design economic models that don’t rely on recruiting new users every month

• Build interfaces that don’t make normal people want to smash their computers

• Scale according to real use cases—not to make your pitch deck look good

A Reality Check on Scalability

The next time a project brags about handling 500,000 TPS, ask them: "What are these transactions actually doing? Who’s generating them? And why?"

When they start mumbling about "future adoption" and "web3 social," you’ll know the answer.

Real innovation isn’t theoretical performance in a vacuum—it’s building things people actually need, at a scale that matches real demand.

Everything else is just expensive performance art disguised as technology.