📊 Live Data Dashboard
Real-time blockchain metrics from public APIs. Updated daily via GitHub Actions.
Mempool Fees (sat/vB)
Fee Trend — Last 14 Days
Fastest feeEconomy fee
Model Output
Market Context
⚡ For Developers & Lightning Node Operators
Estimate Your Real Cost
Lightning Channels UTXO Management Node Operations

Lightning nodes need to open channels (on-chain tx). Every channel open creates UTXOs that live in every full node forever. Use this model to estimate your real storage cost contribution and how it compares to current fees. Adjust the sliders to match your setup — all parameters documented in the open-source model.

📊 Inscription Volume / Month100K
📦 Avg Inscription Size400 B
⚡ Your Node Power Draw150 W
🌐 Your Bandwidth Cost / Month$50
🖥️ Your Hardware Cost$500
💡 Electricity Rate$0.12/kWh
⏳ UTXO Lifetime (years)10 yr
🔧 Hardware Lifespan3 yr
Your Node Cost / Yr
$924
Storage Cost / Inscription
$0.008
Your Externality / Yr
$9.2K
⚡ A Lightning channel open = ~1,000 vbytes = ~$0.63 at current economy fees. The storage externality for that channel (~0.02 cents/yr) is negligible — but the cumulative effect of 100K inscriptions/mo is not. Run the model yourself →
Alerts
Data Sources & Transparency
Data PointSourceRefreshHow It's Used
BTC Priceblockchain.info/tickerDailyComputes fee-to-storage ratio, sat/$ rate, inscription fee in USD
Fee Estimatesmempool.spaceDailyFee bar chart, history trend, alert conditions
Mempool Sizemempool.spaceDailyDisplays unconfirmed tx count — network congestion proxy
Block Heightblockstream.infoDailyBlock height display, BIP-110 signaling check via version bits
BIP-110 SignalDerived from version bit 4 in last 25 blocks via blockstream.infoDailyTracks miner support for BIP-110 soft fork proposal
What we do NOT collect: No user data, IP addresses, cookies, analytics, wallet addresses, or transaction data. All API calls are server-side via GitHub Actions. The only stored data is live_data.json (current snapshot) and fee_history.json (rolling 14-day history) — both are public and open source.

Why we collect this: To quantify the gap between what Bitcoin's fee market prices (congestion) and what node operators collectively bear (permanent storage). The UTXO cost model is the only open, verifiable model of its kind. Every number is reproducible — run python3 research/utxo_cost_model.py to verify.