Stellar’s Podium Finish in 2025: Growth, Innovation, and Real Impact
Explosive Growth Across the Board
What a year for Stellar! 2025 delivered huge wins: real-world assets grew 172%, total value locked climbed 95% to over $211 million, and the network hit more than 10 million active accounts with 21.5 billion operations total. Over 800 projects launched worldwide in payments, lending, and more. Full-time developers jumped 31%, way faster than the industry average. It’s like Stellar finally got the spotlight it deserved after years of steady building.
Whisk Upgrade: Faster and Smarter Network
The star tech highlight? The Whisk (Protocol 23) upgrade, the biggest since smart contracts. It brought parallel processing for over 2,000 transactions per second, unified events for easier building, lower fees, and prep for better state management. Privacy work kicked off too, with partnerships paving the way for compliance-friendly features. Upcoming X-Ray (Protocol 25) will add zero-knowledge tools. Think of it as supercharging the engine while keeping it super affordable and user-friendly.
Tokenizing Real Assets Like Never Before
Stellar shone in bringing everyday finance onchain. Franklin Templeton’s tokenized Treasury fund topped $580 million and expanded to Europe. PayPal’s PYUSD launched here, Ondo brought institutional yields with USDY, and RedSwan tokenized $100 million in commercial real estate. It’s not hype, it’s making assets liquid, yields accessible, and payments seamless for everyone, from institutions to regular folks.
Game-Changing Partnerships and Real-World Wins
Big names trusted Stellar big time: PayPal integrated PYUSD, Visa and Wirex used it for stablecoin settlements, U.S. Bank tested custom stablecoins, and MoneyGram rolled out apps in Colombia. Even cooler, the Marshall Islands delivered the world’s first onchain universal basic income. These partnerships cut costs, speed up money, and prove blockchain works for serious finance. Exciting to see trust turning into action!
Community Boom and Exciting Road Ahead
The ecosystem buzzed with events like Meridian in Rio (over 1,000 attendees), hackathons, and new leadership from PayPal vets. Developers grew fast, projects spanned continents, and privacy upgrades are next. Stellar’s focus on open, trusted, inclusive tech delivered real impact in 2025. Here’s to even bigger things in 2026—who’s joining the ride?
Sources: