Introduction

In this dashboard, let’s compare Optimism to Arbitrum, Avalanche, BSC, Polygon.

Structure

• Days Since The First Block
• Usage
• User Experience
• Active User
• Key Highlights
• Conclusion

Usage

Transaction: number of transaction, including both success and fail transaction.

User: number of unique address, including both address with success and fail transaction.

Transaction per user: average number of transaction per user = transaction / user.

T90D: trailing 90 days.

In the last 90 days,

• Optimism has the lowest average success transaction, the lowest average success user, & the lowest average percent success transaction per day. In early Sep 2022, daily success transaction increased 2x in a few days but couldn’t sustain the growth and has been around 180K transactions per day recently.
• However, Optimism is no.3 in average success transaction per user, after Polygon & Arbitrum.
• BNB, no.1 in average success transaction, average success user, & no.2 average percent success transaction is 20x, 43x, & 1% higher than Optimism. And BNB also has the lowest average transaction per user.
• Arbitrum, another optimistic chain, no.3 in success transaction, no.4 in average success user, no.2 in average success transaction per user, & no.1 in average percent success transaction per day is 1.5x, 1.4x, 0.2%, & 4% higher than Optimism.

In the last 90 days,

• Optimism has the lowest average transaction and the lowest average user. Both trends appears flat and haven’t shown any clear direction.
• However, Optimism is no.2 in average transaction per user, 2nd to Polygon.
• BNB, no.1 in average transaction & average user is 17x & 44x higher than Optimism. And BNB has the lowest average transaction per user.
• Arbitrum, another optimistic chain, no.3 in success transaction, no.4 in average success user, & no.3 in average transaction per user is 1.5x, 1.4x higher, & 5% lower than Optimism.

User Experience

Success Transaction

Success transaction: number of transaction with status SUCCESS.

Success user: number of address with success transaction.

Percent success transaction: success transaction / transaction * 100.

Percent success user: success user / user * 100.

Transaction Cost & Block Performance

Gas Fee: average gas fee per transaction in USD of all success transaction in a day.

Block Time: average time in seconds between 2 consecutive blocks in a day.

Block Transaction: average number of transaction per block in a day.

Throughput: number of transaction per second (TPS) = avg block transaction / avg block time.

• Crosschain price only available from Aug 24, 2022.
• Optimism block time calculated by time difference between 2 batches included in Ethereum state root.
• Arbitrum data doesn’t have Ethereum state root available. Thus I can only compare Optimism to other chains.

In the last 90 days,

• Optimism is no.3 in average gas fee. In early Oct 2022, there was a 4.6x surge in gas fee from $0.06 to $0.28 after gradually declining from early Aug, 2022. Recently Optimism gas fee has ranged between $0.1 and $0.17.
• Optimism gas fee is 12x higher than Polygon, the lowest gas fee chain.
• And Optimism gas fee is 2x higher than of Arbitrum, another optimistic chain, no.2 in lowest gas fee.
• Optimism has the longest average block time with 558 seconds. While other chains’s block time all < 4 seconds. This is due to the rollup - consensus relationship between Optimism and Ethereum, which other chains doesn’t have except Arbitrum.
• However, Optimism has the most average block transaction with 970, 8.5x higher than BNB, no.2 chain.
• Combine block time and block transaction, we have throughput. And Optimism has the lowest throughput among 4 chains. BNB, no.1 throughput chain, is 19x higher than Optimism.

Days Since The First Block

• Optimism is the youngest chain.
• Polygon is the oldest chain.

Active User

DAU: daily active user or number of address with at least 1 success transaction in a given day.

WAU: weekly active user or number of address with at least 1 success transaction in a 7 days period up to a given day.

MAU: monthly active user or number of address with at least 1 success transaction in a 30 days period up to a given day.

Stickiness: = DAU / MAU, measure how frequent do addresses use a given chain

Due to limit query resource, this section only look back 7 days.

In the last 7 days,

• Optimism has the lowest DAU, WAU, & MAU. At the opposite end is BNB which has the highest DAU, WAU, & MAU.
• Optimism stickiness is only higher than Arbitrum.

Key Highlights

• Days Since The First Block
  • Optimism is the youngest chain.
  • Polygon is the oldest chain.
• Usage
  • Optimism has the lowest average transaction and the lowest average user. Both trends appears flat and haven’t shown any clear direction.
  • However, ==Optimism is no.2 in average transaction per user, 2nd to Polygon==.
  • BNB, no.1 in average transaction & average user is 17x & 44x higher than Optimism. And BNB has the lowest average transaction per user.
  • Arbitrum, another optimistic chain, no.3 in success transaction, no.4 in average success user, & no.3 in average transaction per user is 1.5x, 1.4x higher, & 5% lower than Optimism.
• User Experience
  • Success Transaction
    • Optimism has the lowest average success transaction, the lowest average success user, & the lowest average percent success transaction per day. In early Sep 2022, daily success transaction increased 2x in a few days but couldn’t sustain the growth and has been around 180K transactions per day recently.
    • However, ==Optimism is no.3 in average success transaction per user, after Polygon & Arbitrum==.
    • BNB, no.1 in average success transaction, average success user, & no.2 average percent success transaction is 20x, 43x, & 1% higher than Optimism. And BNB also has the lowest average transaction per user.
    • Arbitrum, another optimistic chain, no.3 in success transaction, no.4 in average success user, no.2 in average success transaction per user, & no.1 in average percent success transaction per day is 1.5x, 1.4x, 0.2%, & 4% higher than Optimism.
  • Transaction Cost & Block Performance
    • ==Optimism is no.3 in average gas fee==. In early Oct 2022, there was a 4.6x surge in gas fee from $0.06 to $0.28 after gradually declining from early Aug, 2022. Recently Optimism gas fee has ranged between $0.1 and $0.17.
    • ==Optimism gas fee is 12x higher than Polygon, the lowest gas fee chain==.
    • ==And Optimism gas fee is 2x higher than of Arbitrum, another optimistic chain, no.2 in lowest gas fee==.
    • Optimism has the longest average block time with 558 seconds. While other chains’s block time all < 4 seconds. This is due to the rollup - consensus relationship between Optimism and Ethereum, which other chains doesn’t have except Arbitrum.
    • However, Optimism has the most average block transaction with 970, 8.5x higher than BNB, no.2 chain.
    • Combine block time and block transaction, we have throughput. And ==Optimism has the lowest throughput among 4 chains==. BNB, no.1 throughput chain, is 19x higher than Optimism.
• Active User
  • ==Optimism has the lowest DAU, WAU, & MAU==. At the opposite end is BNB which has the highest DAU, WAU, & MAU.
  • ==Optimism stickiness is only higher than Arbitrum==.

Conclusion

As the youngest chain among EVM L2s, across most of metrics in this dashboard, Optimism is the lowest performance chain. This has me worry about the future of Optimism vs other L2s.