The Open Network has posted the strongest transaction count growth among all major blockchains over the past 30 days — and it is not particularly close. According to CryptoRank data, TON reco
The Open Network has posted the strongest transaction count growth among all major blockchains over the past 30 days — and it is not particularly close.
According to CryptoRank data, TON recorded a 60.7% increase in transaction volume over the period, outpacing Sui at 34.8%, Base at 25.8%, Aptos, and Tron. For a blockchain that was trading under $1.20 in early April and has since nearly tripled in price, the on-chain activity data confirms that what is happening on TON is not purely speculative — it reflects genuine network utilization growth.
The timing is not coincidental. The 30-day window captured by CryptoRank’s data aligns almost perfectly with the period in which Telegram began executing Pavel Durov’s seven-step Make TON Great Again roadmap — a structured sequence of technical upgrades, governance changes, and rebranding decisions that have fundamentally altered how the market perceives TON’s trajectory.
The Fee Reduction That Changed the Math
The most direct mechanical driver of TON’s transaction growth is the network’s fee reduction introduced in early May. Transaction costs on TON dropped by approximately six times — bringing the cost of a standard transaction to around 0.00039 TON, equivalent to roughly $0.0005 at current prices and fixed regardless of network load. The network subsequently moved toward making most transactions effectively feeless.
The relationship between fee reductions and transaction volume is well-established across blockchain history. When the cost of transacting approaches zero, use cases that were previously uneconomical become viable. Micro-payments, high-frequency trading interactions, bot-driven applications, gaming transactions, and tipping systems all become practical when gas costs are negligible. TON’s 60.7% transaction growth in the 30 days following its fee reduction is a direct reflection of that dynamic.
Sui’s 34.8% growth over the same period appears to have been supported by a similar catalyst — the launch of gas-free stablecoin transfers on mainnet on May 21st. The pattern across both networks reinforces the same conclusion: fee elimination is currently one of the most powerful levers for driving on-chain activity growth.
The MTONGA Roadmap That Rebuilt Market Confidence
TON’s transaction growth cannot be understood in isolation from the governance and strategic changes that preceded it. Pavel Durov’s announcement of the Make TON Great Again roadmap in April and May 2026 represented a fundamental shift in how Telegram relates to TON — from arm’s-length ecosystem partner to direct operational controller.
The seven steps of MTONGA have been rolling out sequentially. Step 1 delivered Catchain 2.0 — a new consensus mechanism that made TON ten times faster, cutting block production time to 400 milliseconds and delivering sub-second transaction finality. Step 2 cut transaction fees by six times, with a path to near-zero costs.
Step 3 formalized Telegram’s takeover of the TON Foundation as the network’s primary driving force and largest validator — a structural change that addressed years of community frustration about execution pace and governance clarity. Step 4, announced most recently, rebrands the native currency from Toncoin to Gram — returning to the original name from TON’s 2018 white paper and signaling a deliberate push to connect Telegram’s 900 million monthly active users to on-chain participation.
Together, these steps have rebuilt the narrative foundation that TON’s community had been asking for. The price reflects it — TON climbed from $1.19 in early April to nearly $3.00 in early May following the announcements, a move of approximately 150%, before moderating to current levels.
Staking Returns That Are Hard to Ignore
Pavel Durov shared another data point in May that adds a different dimension to TON’s current momentum. TON is currently ranked first among the 50 largest cryptocurrencies by annual staking rewards — offering validators more than 20% APR as competition for validator slots increases.
That staking yield figure creates a self-reinforcing dynamic. Higher yields attract more staked capital. More staked capital reduces circulating supply. Reduced circulating supply provides structural price support. And with Telegram now the largest validator — providing the counterbalance that prevents any single smaller entity from dominating the validator pool — the decentralization argument for staking participation becomes more credible rather than less.
For institutional participants evaluating TON specifically, the combination of a 20%+ staking yield, a Telegram-backed network with one billion potential users, and the second-to-none transaction growth metrics in the 30-day CryptoRank comparison represents a genuinely differentiated investment profile compared to other Layer 1 alternatives.
What the Transaction Growth Actually Signals
Transaction count is one of the most honest metrics in blockchain analytics because it reflects actual user behavior rather than capital allocation. Price can be driven by speculation. TVL can be inflated by recursive protocols. Transaction count, at scale, requires real users making real decisions to interact with a network repeatedly.
TON’s 60.7% growth in 30 days — measured against a peer group that includes Sui, Base, Aptos, and Tron — is a meaningful signal. It suggests that the combination of near-zero fees, sub-second finality, and Telegram’s direct operational involvement is producing real behavioral change among network users, not just narrative momentum in price markets.
Three steps of the MTONGA roadmap remain unrevealed. The first four have delivered measurable, verifiable outcomes — faster transactions, lower fees, clearer governance, and a return to the original brand identity. Whether the final three steps maintain that execution standard will determine whether TON’s transaction growth continues its trajectory or reverts toward the baseline.
The on-chain data for the past 30 days suggests the momentum is real. Whether it is sustainable depends on what comes next.
