This summer, Ethereum scaling solutions have exploded in popularity. After years of research and development, Ethereum has a thriving ecosystem of Layer 2 (L2) networks, applications, and users. The Uniswap Protocol is deployed across a number of these L2s and the Uniswap app currently supports 4 of them, in addition to mainnet, with more coming.
Last month, we dug into Arbitrum and Optimism. Today, we're checking out Polygon. Polygon's original Proof-of-Stake (PoS) chain was launched in 2017 and has over 350,000 daily active users (DAU) transacting over 2 million times every day. This puts Polygon PoS as the most popular scaling solution on Ethereum today.
Uniswap launched on Polygon PoS in December 2021 as the fourth chain after Ethereum mainnet, Optimism, and Arbitrum. Uniswap started 2022 with just $2 billion in cumulative trading volume on Polygon PoS and ended with over $28B by the end. This year, that number stands at $47.35B, making Uniswap the leading liquidity protocol on Polygon PoS, processing over $215M in trading volume over the past 7 days.
Because swaps cost only 1 cent, Polygon PoS is a popular destination for inexpensive onchain activity. The Uniswap app's fiat-on-ramp makes it easier for swappers to fund their wallets directly on Polygon PoS.
Most L2 networks focus on a single chain but Polygon refers to a family of interconnected chains that address specific needs within the broader Ethereum ecosystem. Polygon PoS is the most popular chain, but there is also Polygon Miden and Polygon zkEVM. Both are zero-knowledge (ZK) rollups that use cryptography to secure transactions as opposed to Optimism, Arbitrum, and Base, which use crypto-economic incentives. In general, ZK rollups offer greater security guarantees and much faster finality than optimistic rollups, though their increased complexity requires careful development and powerful hardware.
A few months ago, Polygon announced its plans for Polygon 2.0 to unify Polygon PoS, zkEVM, and Miden with ZK technology. This will be the first experiment of its kind in crypto and a major undertaking to navigate challenges around centralization, interoperability, and security.
Multi-chain ecosystems are difficult to navigate; users have to fiat onramp, bridge between networks, and manage their funds. A successful migration to Polygon 2.0 would ease many of the UX problems that Polygon users currently face, but users still need a feature-rich app to interact onchain. At Uniswap Labs, we've built our self-custodial wallet as a friendly gateway into the Polygon ecosystem and other L2s with a direct fiat-on-ramp, seamless switching between mainnet and L2s, and WalletConnect for any app on Polygon.
Uniswap is encouraging users to go onchain and explore L2s as part of #ScalingSummer. To join our educational quests, click here.