Cardano Leads as Blockchain With Highest Development Activity in 2022

Proof-of-Stake (PoS) open-source ecosystem Cardano (ADA) has managed to maintain its peak position in terms of blockchain development activity this year.

Interestingly, this is the second time in a row that Cardano would lead development activity as it also topped the charts in 2021. The bearish market fueled by the implosion of the Bahamian-headquartered FTX Derivatives Exchange was not enough to derail the winning ecosystem.

According to Santiment Feeds insight, other leading ecosystems following Cardano closely in a top 10 list are Polkadot, Cosmos, Ethereum, Internet Computer, Elrond, Flow, Optimism, Aptos, and Polygon. In 2021, Cardano led the pack with a total blockchain development activity count of over 140,000 with over 53 active daily contributors. 

Full details of this year’s development activity are yet to be released by Santiment. It is expected alongside the company’s end-of-the-year report. 

Vasil Hard Fork Boosts Cardano Ecosystem

Notably, Cardano’s ranking victory hardly comes off as a surprise to community members especially as the ecosystem has been consecutively leading the blockchain development activity for several months. 

The latest was in November when it led with a blockchain development activity of 572.67 which was a 17.8% difference from its closest competitors Polkadot and Kusama.

At the time, the other ecosystems which made the list were Cosmos (ATOM) 398.97 Ethereum (ETH) 369.43, Internet Computer (ICP) 333.40, Status (SNT) 327.67, Decentraland (MANA) 310.93, Filecoin (FIL) 299.40, and Vega Protocol (VEGA) 277.13.

Many developers believe that the introduction of the Vasil hard fork in September after it was postponed in July, is the highest and most significant upgrade that Cardano has gotten. Vasil upgrade is touted to be one of the crucial network improvements since staking came into play through Shelley. Noteworthy, this upgrade has boosted the performance and capability enhancement of Cardano.

Additionally, it has enhanced the vigor of smart contracts with the Plutus version 2. Cardano 1.35.0 is the node version on which the Vasil upgrade is built on. Decentralized applications (dApps) have now become more efficient and easy to run because of the new cost model.