Kaspa

Kaspa is a Proof of Work cryptocurrency that implements the GHOSTDAG (Greedy Heaviest Observed Sub-Tree Directed Acyclic Graph) protocol, a breakthrough in blockchain architecture that allows blocks created simultaneously by different miners to coexist in the ledger rather than being discarded as orphans. This fundamental innovation enables Kaspa to achieve block rates of one per second (with plans for even faster blocks) while maintaining the security guarantees of traditional Proof of Work mining.

In conventional blockchains like Bitcoin, when two miners find a block at roughly the same time, only one can be accepted and the other becomes an orphan — wasted work. GHOSTDAG solves this by incorporating all simultaneously-mined blocks into the chain's structure as a directed acyclic graph (DAG), ordering them through a consensus algorithm. This means miners' work is never wasted, block times can be dramatically reduced without increasing orphan rates, and the network achieves confirmation times measured in seconds rather than minutes.

Kaspa was launched in November 2021 with a fair launch — no presale, no premine, no venture capital allocation, and no initial coin offering. The project was conceived by Yonatan Sompolinsky, an Israeli computer scientist who co-authored the original GHOST and PHANTOM protocols that influenced Ethereum's design. The combination of genuine technical innovation, fair launch ethos, and pure Proof of Work mining has attracted a dedicated community of miners and holders who view Kaspa as the natural evolution of Bitcoin's original vision.