Waterfall Mainnet Goes Live With Over 2,000 Active Validators; Gate.io Lists $WATER

Leading layer 1 proof-of-stake network Waterfall announced Wednesday that its mainnet has gone live with more than 2,000 active validators, and its native token, $WATER, has been listed on cryptocurrency exchange and blockchain platform Gate.io.

The introduction of the Waterfall Network's mainnet is expected to provide the community with an invaluable platform where they can build decentralized apps (dApps) that can transform the industry by potentially bringing in new use cases.

Waterfall is capable of supporting at least 1.5 million nodes, as per testing conducted with support from the Google Cloud Web3 Startup Program. The said figure is more than any other proof-of-stake network, including Ethereum. Emerging from its testnet, the network allows almost anyone, anywhere to participate in the burgeoning decentralized economy by running a validator node.

"The strength of the Waterfall Network has surpassed even our most optimistic projections during testnet development. We now look forward to ensuring the community has a great platform to build and grow the network. Waterfall Protocol has been designed to reach communities as nodes can be run on any low-powered computing device as well as on Linux, Mac, Windows and in the future on phones," Sergii Grybniak, Blue Wave CTO and Waterfall Head of Research, told International Business Times in a statement.

As for $WATER's Gate.io listing, users can now stake $WATER tokens, start running a node, and earn tangible returns to help secure the Waterfall mainnet.

More exchanges are set to list the token in the coming weeks and will be integrated with global infrastructure providers. Grants and rewards will be distributed to researchers and developers who assist with community-driven security auditing activities such as completing bug bounties, as more validators sign on the Waterfall Network.

Waterfall reiterates that its native cryptocurrency, which is offered only outside of the U.S., is not the same as the $WATER memecoin.

Meanwhile, Waterfall continues to grow its community, with more than 100,000 followers. It is integrated with various staking infrastructure providers, including GigaStake, CoreNode, Liquify, StarDustStaking, and InfStones. It is currently working on integrating with Web3 infrastructure service provider NebulaBlock and peer-to-peer cloud infrastructure provider Edge.

Waterfall, which combines scalability and decentralization, incorporates a next generation Directed AcylicGraph (DAG) technology that allows for virtually unlimited scalability and portability of dApps. It has very low hardware requirements for participants to become validators, bringing a game-changer technology for dApp developers as they change they innovate across the blockchain realm.

(The headline and lede of this article have been updated to correct the validator count on the Waterfall mainnet. Updated 9:42 a.m. ET on Monday, July 22, 2024.)