XRP is one of those cryptocurrencies I’ve been watching for more than a decade.
I first bought XRP back in 2015, when you could still buy it for fractions of a cent.
At the time, what caught my attention wasn’t some complicated technical analysis or a promise that XRP would go to $100.
It was the story.
Ripple was talking about improving international payments, while recognizable financial institutions such as Santander were associated with the company’s growing network of relationships.
The idea that blockchain technology could eventually compete with parts of the international payments infrastructure dominated by systems such as SWIFT sounded interesting to me.
So I bought some XRP.
Nothing crazy. Probably somewhere around $500 to $800.
Then 2017 happened.
XRP exploded, my relatively small position turned into roughly 100x, and I eventually sold while surfing on a beach in Sri Lanka.
Yes, literally.
I didn’t sell the top.
Not even close.
But turning a relatively small speculative investment into tens of thousands of dollars wasn’t exactly something I was going to complain about.
More than a decade later, XRP is still here.
Its price is once again hovering around the psychologically important $1 level, and the cryptocurrency remains one of the largest and most discussed assets in the market.
Yet despite covering XRP countless times over the years, we’ve never properly answered the most basic question.
What is XRP, what does it actually do, and why has this cryptocurrency survived for so long?
Let’s get into it.
What Is XRP?
XRP is the native digital asset of the XRP Ledger, an open-source blockchain designed primarily for fast and inexpensive transfers of value.
The XRP Ledger, usually shortened to XRPL, launched in 2012.
Unlike Bitcoin, XRP isn’t mined.
Unlike Ethereum and many newer blockchains, XRP also doesn’t rely on traditional Proof of Stake.
Instead, the XRP Ledger uses its own consensus mechanism in which independent validators work together to agree on transactions and the state of the ledger.
New ledger versions generally settle within several seconds.
XRP itself can be transferred directly between users, used to pay transaction fees and serve as a bridge asset between different currencies or forms of value.
That’s where the original XRP thesis becomes interesting.
XRP wasn’t created primarily to be digital gold.
It was designed around payments.
Who Created XRP?
The history gets slightly confusing because people often assume Ripple created XRP.
That’s not quite what happened.
In 2011, developers David Schwartz, Jed McCaleb and Arthur Britto began working on what would become the XRP Ledger.
They were interested in Bitcoin but wanted to create a system that didn’t depend on energy-intensive mining.
The XRP Ledger launched in June 2012.
Chris Larsen joined shortly afterward, and a company called NewCoin was established. That company quickly became OpenCoin and eventually became Ripple.
The founders initially created the full XRP supply and gifted 80 billion XRP to the company that would become Ripple.
That history is important because it leads directly into one of crypto’s most common misconceptions.
Is XRP the Same as Ripple?
No.
Ripple and XRP are not the same thing.
Ripple is a company.
XRP is a cryptocurrency.
The XRP Ledger is the blockchain network.
Think of it as three separate things:
Ripple → Company
XRP → Cryptocurrency
XRP Ledger → Blockchain
Ripple builds financial infrastructure and products that can use blockchain technology, XRP, stablecoins and the XRP Ledger.
But Ripple doesn’t own the XRP Ledger.
XRPL is open-source, and independent developers can build applications on it. Ripple describes itself as one of many developers contributing to the ecosystem.
This distinction matters.
When someone says:
“Ripple is trading at $1.”
They’re technically talking about XRP.
Ripple itself doesn’t trade on a crypto exchange.
What Is the XRP Ledger?
The XRP Ledger is a decentralized public blockchain designed for transferring and exchanging value.
It has been operating since 2012.
That makes XRPL one of the oldest blockchain networks still operating today.
The network supports much more than simply sending XRP.
Developers can use XRPL for things including:
Payments.
Tokenized assets.
Stablecoins.
Decentralized trading.
Escrow.
NFTs.
Cross-currency transactions.
And other financial applications.
One interesting feature is that the XRP Ledger has included a built-in decentralized exchange for years.
DEX functionality wasn’t bolted onto XRP after DeFi became popular.
Trading different assets was part of the ledger’s original financial design.
How Does XRP Work?
Let’s say you want to send XRP to someone on the other side of the world.
You create a transaction.
That transaction is broadcast to the XRP Ledger network.
Independent servers compare proposed transactions and communicate with validators they trust.
Through the consensus process, the network agrees on which transactions should be included in the next validated ledger.
Once consensus is reached, a new ledger version becomes final.
This generally happens within several seconds.
There’s no Bitcoin-style mining competition.
You don’t need miners burning electricity to solve mathematical puzzles.
The result is a network designed to process transfers quickly and with very low transaction costs.
Does XRP Use Proof of Work?
No.
Bitcoin uses Proof of Work.
Miners compete using computing power to produce blocks and secure the network.
XRP doesn’t work that way.
There are no XRP miners.
That also means there’s no ongoing mining issuance creating new XRP.
The entire maximum supply was created when the XRP Ledger launched.
Does XRP Use Proof of Stake?
Not in the traditional sense.
This is another common misconception.
You don’t stake XRP with validators the way you might stake SOL on Solana or ETH through Ethereum’s Proof-of-Stake system.
XRP Ledger validators participate in consensus without receiving XRP block rewards.
That creates a very different economic model.
Validators aren’t securing XRPL because they’re competing for newly issued XRP.
Instead, validators are generally operated by organizations and individuals with an interest in maintaining a reliable network.
How Fast Is XRP?
Speed has always been one of XRP’s biggest selling points.
XRP Ledger transactions generally settle within approximately 3 to 5 seconds.
That’s considerably faster than traditional international bank transfers, which can sometimes take days depending on the payment route and financial institutions involved.
It’s also different from Bitcoin, where users may wait for multiple block confirmations before treating a large transaction as final.
Speed isn’t everything in blockchain.
But for payments, it matters.
Are XRP Transactions Cheap?
Yes.
XRP Ledger transaction fees are normally extremely small.
The reference transaction cost has historically been measured in tiny fractions of an XRP. XRPL documentation currently lists the reference fee at 0.00001 XRP, although actual costs can increase when the network is under load.
Interestingly, these transaction fees aren’t paid to validators as rewards.
The XRP used for the fee is destroyed.
That means every XRP transaction permanently removes a tiny amount of XRP from the total supply.
Don’t get too excited.
The amounts are extremely small.
XRP isn’t suddenly going to become scarce because everyone sends a few transactions.
The mechanism primarily exists to protect the network from spam.
What Is XRP Actually Used For?
This is where we need to separate the theory from reality.
XRP can function as a bridge asset.
Imagine a company wants to move value from Mexican pesos into Japanese yen.
Traditionally, international payments can involve correspondent banks, intermediary accounts and pre-funded pools of capital.
A digital bridge asset creates another possibility.
Conceptually:
MXN → XRP → JPY
The sender converts pesos into XRP.
XRP moves across the ledger.
The receiver converts XRP into yen.
Because the XRP transaction settles quickly, the bridge asset only needs to be held for a very short period.
That’s the original financial use case that made XRP interesting to me back in 2015.
Is XRP Trying to Replace SWIFT?
This needs some nuance.
You’ll often hear:
“XRP is going to replace SWIFT.”
That’s an oversimplification.
SWIFT is primarily a financial messaging network used by banks and other institutions to communicate payment instructions.
XRP is a digital asset.
They’re fundamentally different things.
The broader Ripple thesis has been that blockchain-based settlement can improve parts of the international payments system that currently rely on correspondent banking and legacy infrastructure.
So there is competitive overlap in the problem being addressed.
But saying:
“XRP replaces SWIFT”
makes the relationship sound much simpler than it actually is.
Do Banks Actually Use XRP?
This is another area where XRP marketing and Crypto Twitter narratives can get mixed together.
Ripple has worked with financial institutions around the world.
That doesn’t mean every bank working with Ripple automatically uses XRP.
Ripple has offered multiple financial products over the years.
Some use XRP.
Others don’t necessarily require it.
That’s an important distinction for XRP investors.
A headline saying:
“Ripple partners with major bank”
doesn’t automatically mean:
“Major bank is buying huge amounts of XRP.”
Always look at what the partnership actually involves.
What Is Ripple Payments?
Ripple Payments is Ripple’s infrastructure for moving money across borders.
The system is designed for businesses, banks and payment providers.
Ripple currently describes its payments infrastructure as capable of using assets including XRP and RLUSD when moving value through the XRP Ledger.
This is slightly different from the original XRP narrative.
Years ago, XRP was often presented as the obvious bridge asset at the center of Ripple’s payment vision.
Today, stablecoins have become a major part of blockchain payments too.
Which brings us to RLUSD.
What Is RLUSD?
RLUSD, or Ripple USD, is Ripple’s U.S. dollar stablecoin.
Unlike XRP, RLUSD is designed to maintain a value of approximately $1.
Ripple says RLUSD is backed by reserves of cash and cash equivalents and can be redeemed 1:1 for U.S. dollars.
RLUSD is issued on the XRP Ledger as well as other blockchain networks.
This creates an interesting situation for XRP.
On one hand, growing stablecoin activity can bring more financial activity onto XRPL.
That’s potentially good for the ecosystem.
On the other hand, using RLUSD doesn’t automatically require someone to buy XRP as the bridge asset.
That’s why I wouldn’t simply assume:
RLUSD grows → XRP price goes up.
Crypto economics rarely work that neatly.
Does RLUSD Need XRP?
RLUSD transactions on the XRP Ledger use the XRPL infrastructure, and XRP is used for network fees and account reserves.
But someone transferring RLUSD doesn’t necessarily need to convert the value of that transaction into XRP first.
That’s an important distinction.
For example, you could hold $10,000 worth of RLUSD and transfer the stablecoin directly.
You don’t need to buy $10,000 worth of XRP to make that transfer.
A small amount of XRP may be needed for network costs, but that’s very different from XRP being the bridge asset for the entire payment.
The relationship between RLUSD growth and XRP demand is therefore worth watching rather than assuming.
How Many XRP Exist?
XRP has a maximum supply of 100 billion tokens.
Unlike Bitcoin, there isn’t a mining schedule gradually creating the supply.
The XRP was created at the beginning of the network.
This has always been one of the controversial parts of XRP’s tokenomics.
A very large portion of the supply was allocated to the company that became Ripple.
Ripple later placed a significant amount of its XRP into on-ledger escrow to make future releases more predictable.
What Is the XRP Escrow?
Ripple’s XRP escrow is essentially a time-lock system.
In 2017, Ripple placed 55 billion XRP into a series of cryptographically enforced escrow contracts.
The original structure allowed up to 1 billion XRP to become available each month.
Unused XRP could then be placed back into escrow.
The mechanism was designed to provide more predictability around Ripple’s XRP holdings.
Ripple still controls a substantial amount of XRP.
As of June 30, 2026, Ripple reported approximately 32.6 billion XRP remaining in escrow.
For investors, that supply concentration remains something worth understanding.
Is XRP Centralized?
This question has caused arguments for more than a decade.
The answer depends on what exactly you mean by centralized.
Ripple is a centralized company.
XRP itself operates on the XRP Ledger, an open-source network run by independent servers and validators.
Ripple doesn’t need to approve every transaction.
There also isn’t one Ripple computer processing the entire network.
At the same time, critics have historically pointed toward Ripple’s enormous XRP holdings, its influence within the ecosystem and the history of XRPL’s validator architecture when arguing that XRP is more centralized than assets such as Bitcoin.
Supporters point toward the independent validator network and open-source ledger.
I’d avoid treating this as a yes-or-no question.
XRP has different decentralization trade-offs than Bitcoin.
That’s a much more useful way to think about it.
Can Ripple Create More XRP?
No.
The XRP Ledger started with a maximum supply of 100 billion XRP.
Ripple can’t simply decide tomorrow:
Let’s print another 100 billion XRP.
The escrow doesn’t create new XRP either.
It controls when existing XRP becomes available to Ripple.
And because transaction fees are destroyed, the total XRP supply technically decreases very slowly over time.
Why Did the SEC Sue Ripple?
This became one of the most important legal battles in crypto history.
In December 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued Ripple Labs and executives Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen.
The SEC alleged that Ripple’s XRP sales violated U.S. securities laws.
The case lasted for years.
A major turning point arrived in 2023 when Judge Analisa Torres ruled that certain programmatic XRP sales on exchanges did not constitute investment contracts, while some institutional XRP sales did violate securities law.
The litigation continued afterward.
Finally, in August 2025, the SEC and Ripple dismissed their respective appeals, ending the civil enforcement battle while leaving the district court’s final judgment and $125 million civil penalty in place.
That removed one of the largest regulatory clouds hanging over XRP.
Is XRP a Security?
This is where headlines often remove too much nuance.
The Ripple case didn’t establish the simplistic rule that:
“XRP can never be a security.”
Instead, the court examined how XRP was offered and sold in different circumstances.
Certain institutional sales were treated differently from programmatic exchange sales.
That’s an important legal distinction.
Assets don’t exist in a vacuum.
How something is sold can matter.
For ordinary crypto investors, the practical result was still significant.
The years-long legal uncertainty surrounding XRP in the United States was dramatically reduced.
Are There XRP ETFs?
XRP’s investment infrastructure has expanded considerably.
U.S.-listed exchange-traded products now provide investors with ways to gain exposure to XRP without necessarily buying and storing XRP directly.
For example, the REX-Osprey XRP ETF launched in 2025 and seeks investment results tied to XRP’s performance.
That’s significant because XRP spent years fighting a U.S. securities case.
Now the asset is accessible through regulated investment products.
Crypto moves quickly.
Does XRP Have DeFi?
Yes.
The XRP Ledger has supported decentralized exchange functionality since its early years.
The ecosystem has continued expanding with features and applications involving:
Tokenized assets.
Automated market makers.
Stablecoins.
Lending infrastructure.
NFTs.
Cross-chain connectivity.
And other financial applications.
XRPL isn’t usually the first blockchain people associate with DeFi.
Ethereum and Solana have captured much more attention there.
But XRP Ledger isn’t simply a payment rail anymore.
XRP vs Bitcoin: What’s the Difference?
XRP and Bitcoin were designed around very different philosophies.
Bitcoin was created as decentralized peer-to-peer money with a fixed 21 million BTC supply and Proof-of-Work security.
XRP was designed around efficient transfers and financial settlement.
Bitcoin uses mining.
XRP doesn’t.
Bitcoin blocks arrive approximately every ten minutes.
XRP Ledger transactions generally settle within several seconds.
Bitcoin’s supply is released gradually through mining.
All XRP was created at launch.
Bitcoin prioritizes censorship resistance and monetary scarcity.
XRP prioritizes payment efficiency and liquidity.
Calling one simply “better” misses the point.
They’re trying to solve different problems.
XRP vs Stellar: What’s the Difference?
XRP and Stellar have some interesting historical overlap.
Jed McCaleb helped create the XRP Ledger before later co-founding Stellar.
Both networks emphasize fast and inexpensive payments.
Both can support issued assets and cross-border transfers.
However, their ecosystems, governance structures, token economics and development histories have diverged considerably.
XRP has become heavily associated with Ripple and institutional payments.
Stellar has historically emphasized accessible financial infrastructure and cross-border payments through its own ecosystem.
They’re relatives.
Not twins.
What Are XRP’s Biggest Advantages?
XRP has several characteristics that have helped it survive since 2012.
Fast Transactions
Transfers generally settle within seconds.
Very Low Fees
Normal XRP Ledger transaction costs are tiny.
Long Operating History
XRPL has survived more than a decade of crypto cycles.
That’s meaningful in an industry where thousands of blockchains and tokens disappear.
Strong Liquidity
XRP remains one of crypto’s most widely traded assets.
Payments Focus
XRP has a clear original use case rather than being a token looking for a problem.
Ripple Ecosystem
Ripple has spent years building relationships and infrastructure around blockchain payments.
Whether all of that creates demand for XRP is a separate question, but the ecosystem itself is substantial.
What Are XRP’s Biggest Criticisms?
XRP has plenty of critics too.
And some of their questions are reasonable.
Ripple Owns a Lot of XRP
Ripple’s large holdings have created supply and decentralization concerns for years.
Ripple Adoption Isn’t Automatically XRP Adoption
This is probably the biggest misconception.
A company using Ripple technology doesn’t necessarily mean it’s buying XRP.
Stablecoins Compete With the Bridge Asset Narrative
Stablecoins such as USDC and RLUSD provide another way to move value onchain.
The world has changed considerably since the original XRP thesis emerged.
DeFi Activity Trails Competitors
XRPL has DeFi functionality, but Ethereum and Solana dominate much of the current onchain financial activity.
Every major cryptocurrency has moonboys.
XRP has some Olympic-level ones.
Claims that XRP is guaranteed to reach $100, $1,000 or replace the entire global financial system should be treated accordingly.
Why Has XRP Survived So Long?
This might actually be the most interesting question.
Look at the cryptocurrencies that were popular when XRP first exploded in 2017.
Many are gone.
Others technically exist but have almost no relevance.
XRP survived.
It survived the 2018 crash.
The 2020 SEC lawsuit.
Delistings.
The 2022 bear market.
Years of legal uncertainty.
Multiple generations of competing Layer 1 blockchains.
And countless new crypto narratives.
Then XRP returned to major market relevance again.
You don’t have to love XRP to acknowledge that staying power.
Crypto history has been brutal to old altcoins.
XRP is one of the exceptions.
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Why the $1 XRP Level Matters
I’m intentionally not going to turn this guide into a price analysis.
We’ve got plenty of those.
But the $1 area has become an important psychological level for XRP.
Round numbers matter in markets because traders pay attention to them.
They become places where buyers, sellers, leveraged traders and long-term holders make decisions.
More importantly, XRP’s long-term chart shows just how unusual its history has been.
It has experienced enormous speculative expansions followed by years of consolidation.
Then it has done it again.
And again.
That makes XRP one of the more fascinating long-term charts in crypto.
Is XRP a Good Investment?
That depends on what you believe will drive future XRP demand.
The bull thesis could include:
More institutional adoption.
Growth in XRP Ledger activity.
Tokenization.
Payments.
XRP ETFs.
DeFi.
Stablecoin growth bringing users onto XRPL.
Stablecoins could become better payment assets.
Ripple might succeed without creating significant demand for XRP.
Meanwhile, newer blockchains could attract more developers, while XRP’s supply structure may continue weighing on investor perception.
Or maybe the payments narrative simply doesn’t create as much token value as XRP holders expect.
There are reasonable arguments on both sides.
My History With XRP
XRP will probably always be a slightly nostalgic cryptocurrency for me.
I bought it in 2015.
Back then, crypto was a completely different industry.
Seeing recognizable banking names connected to Ripple caught my attention, and the idea of using blockchain technology to improve international payments made sense to me.
So I took a relatively small gamble.
Two years later, that position had increased roughly 100x.
Then I sold it while surfing in Sri Lanka.
I could have made significantly more if I’d held longer.
That’s crypto.
If you’ve been around long enough, you’ll have dozens of stories where you sold too early, bought too late or watched something you owned continue another 500% after you exited.
I don’t regret selling.
A 100x is a 100x.
What I find more interesting is that XRP is still relevant more than a decade after I first bought it.
I couldn’t say that about most altcoins I looked at in 2015.
Final Thoughts: What Is XRP?
XRP is one of the oldest surviving cryptocurrencies.
It isn’t Ripple stock.
It isn’t mined like Bitcoin.
And Ripple doesn’t control every transaction on the XRP Ledger.
XRP is the native digital asset of the XRP Ledger, a blockchain built around moving and exchanging value quickly and cheaply.
Ripple is a company that builds financial infrastructure around blockchain technology and remains closely connected to the XRP ecosystem.
That relationship has helped XRP enormously.
It has also created years of confusion.
The original XRP thesis centered heavily around cross-border payments and using XRP as a bridge between currencies.
That use case still exists.
But crypto has evolved.
Stablecoins are now enormous.
Tokenized real-world assets are growing.
DeFi has matured.
Traditional financial institutions are interacting with blockchain infrastructure in ways that looked extremely speculative when I first bought XRP in 2015.
So the question today isn’t simply:
Can XRP replace SWIFT?
That’s too simplistic.
The better question is:
Where does XRP fit into an increasingly onchain financial system?
After more than a decade, we’re still finding out.
And considering how many cryptocurrencies from XRP’s generation disappeared completely, the fact that we’re still asking that question is impressive by itself.
If you enjoyed this guide, check out our recent one on “what is Cardano (ADA)“.
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XRP FAQ
What is XRP?
XRP is the native cryptocurrency of the XRP Ledger, an open-source blockchain designed for fast and inexpensive transfers of value.
The XRP Ledger launched in 2012 and can be used for payments, tokenized assets, decentralized trading, stablecoins and other financial applications.
Is XRP the same as Ripple?
No. XRP and Ripple are two different things.
XRP is a cryptocurrency, while Ripple is a financial technology company that develops blockchain-based payment and financial infrastructure.
The XRP Ledger is the blockchain on which XRP operates. Ripple contributes to the XRP ecosystem, but it doesn’t own the XRP Ledger.
What is XRP used for?
XRP can be used to transfer value, pay XRP Ledger transaction fees, trade against other assets and potentially serve as a bridge between different currencies.
The XRP Ledger also supports stablecoins, tokenized assets, decentralized trading and other financial applications.
Can XRP be mined?
No. XRP cannot be mined like Bitcoin.
The entire maximum supply of 100 billion XRP was created when the XRP Ledger launched. The network doesn’t use Proof of Work and therefore doesn’t require miners to produce new XRP.
How many XRP coins are there?
XRP has a maximum supply of 100 billion tokens.
All 100 billion XRP were created at the beginning of the network. No additional XRP can simply be mined into existence.
A tiny amount of XRP is destroyed whenever users pay XRP Ledger transaction fees, meaning the total supply gradually decreases over time.
Do banks use XRP?
Some financial institutions have worked with Ripple and its payment technology, but a partnership with Ripple doesn’t automatically mean that a bank uses or buys XRP.
Ripple offers financial infrastructure that can involve XRP, stablecoins and other assets.
When evaluating claims about bank adoption, it’s important to distinguish between using Ripple technology and actually using XRP.
Is XRP designed to replace SWIFT?
Not exactly.
SWIFT is primarily a messaging network used by financial institutions to communicate payment instructions, while XRP is a digital asset that can transfer value on a blockchain.
Ripple and XRP-related payment technology may compete with parts of the traditional cross-border payment infrastructure, but saying that XRP simply “replaces SWIFT” oversimplifies how both systems work.
What is the difference between XRP and Bitcoin?
Bitcoin and XRP were designed for different purposes.
Bitcoin uses Proof of Work, has a maximum supply of 21 million BTC and focuses heavily on decentralization, censorship resistance and monetary scarcity.
XRP doesn’t use mining, has a maximum supply of 100 billion XRP and was designed primarily around fast and inexpensive payments and transfers of value.
XRP transactions generally settle within seconds, while Bitcoin prioritizes a different set of security and decentralization trade-offs.
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