Much has happened since our last company update. In 2024, we continued to build towards our mission of advancing Bitcoin with notable improvements and upgrades across our product suite. This included new upgrades to layer-2 technology stacks Core Lightning and Liquid, advancements in Blockstream wallets Green and Jade, and groundbreaking developments from our applied research division.
Join us as we explore a remarkable year, highlighting the progress we have made in building the infrastructure for an economy anchored to Bitcoin.
Core Lightning: Four Major Release Updates
2024 represented a pivotal year for Core Lightning (CLN) with four major updates, delivering a combination of powerful new features, enhanced performance, and greater reliability for both node operators and end users.
Among the year’s highlights was the long-awaited integration of dual funding, a feature that enables peers to collaboratively fund channels, thereby reducing trust requirements and improving overall liquidity management, while setting the stage for future channel management innovations such as splicing. Additionally, the continued evolution of the `reneplay` plugin introduced advanced multi-part payment routing, optimizing transaction paths based on liquidity and success probabilities. This improvement ensures faster, more reliable payments across the Lightning Network, reducing friction for users and enhancing the overall payment experience.
Another milestone was the full rollout of BOLT12, which officially transitioned from being experimental to fully enabled across all Core Lightning nodes in 2024. As the first new BOLT added to the Lightning Specification since 2017, BOLT12 simplifies invoice handling and expands the Lightning Network’s potential use cases, delivering powerful features like blinded paths for privacy and the added flexibility of self-payments. Its recognition and reception at the Lightning Spec Summit in September underscores its importance as a significant leap forward for usability and functionality within the network.
Performance and reliability improvements were also a central focus throughout the year. Core Lightning achieved a 50% increase in block processing speeds, significantly reducing startup times for nodes. Streamlined gossip synchronization and the introduction of a recovery plugin further bolstered the platform’s resilience, enabling operators to recover from data loss more efficiently. These enhancements, combined with updates to the `autoclean` plugin, have improved operations for larger nodes managing extensive channels, ensuring greater scalability and robustness.
Developers benefited from a range of updates designed to make Core Lightning more accessible and versatile. An expanded gRPC interface, with 49 new commands, for example, brings greater flexibility for advanced node management and integration. Documentation saw a significant overhaul, with the addition of auto-generated examples and schemas that have streamlined onboarding for new developers. Additional tools like rune restrictions, which allow for fine-grained invoice controls, and a secure WebSocket proxy, enabling seamless browser-based applications, have opened even more avenues for further innovation.
Greenlight: 20x Increase in Adoption
Greenlight, Blockstream’s Lightning-as-a-Service (LaaS) platform, reached new heights in 2024 also, continuing to simplify and scale Lightning adoption for businesses and developers.
One of the year’s standout moments was Greenlight’s integration with leading European Bitcoin platform, Relai, a development that has so far helped onboard over 200,000 more users to Lightning. This milestone marked a transformative leap, taking Greenlight from managing fewer than 10,000 nodes at the start of the year to 100,000 by mid-year, and over 200,000 by the end of 2024, representing a 20x increase in adoption over the course of 2024.
By automating node operations and streamlining liquidity management, Greenlight has enabled Relai to deliver faster transactions for its users and reduce operational costs—all while maintaining user sovereignty with its self-custodial architecture. Greenlight also introduced several key upgrades to support enterprise growth in 2024, including advanced database optimizations, improved connection limits, and expanded API capabilities.
As 2025 gathers pace, Greenlight remains at the forefront of our mission to expand the Lightning economy, empowering developers and businesses to bring Bitcoin payments to the masses.
Jade: New Features and Global Expansion
2024 was a year of significant growth and innovation for Blockstream Jade, with major updates enhancing its functionality and setting the stage for exciting developments in 2025.
Jade itself saw several new feature developments, including support for Miniscript, which offers advanced functionality for scripting Bitcoin transactions, and the re-introduction of Anti-Exfil, a security feature designed to protect against Dark Skippy attacks by preventing key leakage during signing. These updates were complemented by the launch of a new affiliate program, which auto-pays affiliates in sats, and the expansion of Jade’s global footprint, with shipping now available from both North America and Germany. The affiliate program, combined with a significant increase in resellers in different countries, highlights Jade’s growing popularity and adoption within the Bitcoin hardware wallet space.
2024 furthermore witnessed us put the finishing touches to the newest addition to the Jade line, Jade Plus, which launched on January 3 of this year. Boasting key enhancements such as a bigger, brighter screen, improved camera, metal body options, and air-gapped firmware updates and transactions through the optional JadeLink accessory, more about Jade Plus will be included in our next update.
Green: Complete UI and UX Overhaul
Another key milestone was the launch of Blockstream Green 2.0, introducing a completely overhauled user interface and experience for Bitcoin desktop wallets. This update has simplified workflows for sending, receiving, and managing funds, while introducing new features such as a live Bitcoin price feed and snapshots of current network fees. Users also gained the ability to have a unified recovery phrase for both Bitcoin and Liquid accounts, with the flexibility to combine or separate them based on personal preferences. Advanced users now benefit from separate watch-only wallets and an improved onboarding flow for managing hardware wallets, making Green 2.0 a more versatile and accessible self-custodial solution.
Green also continued receiving steady updates throughout 2024, designed to enhance functionality and usability. Key improvements included introducing manual coin selection for LBTC, addressing verification workflows with Jade devices, and providing notifications for expired 2FA coins, ensuring users stayed informed and secure. Regular updates to the Green Development Kit (GDK) ensured seamless compatibility with emerging Bitcoin technologies, while enhancements like QR unlock for Jade devices and in-app promotions highlighted the wallet's growing feature set.
These updates, alongside performance improvements such as better QR code scanning, streamlined onboarding, and additional options for multisig setups, showcased Blockstream Green's ongoing commitment to delivering a top-tier wallet experience for Bitcoin and Liquid users alike.
Liquid: Simfony and Cheaper Fees
As the technical provider for Liquid, Blockstream plays a leading role alongside the Federation's Technology Board in curating and implementing Liquid's development roadmap. In 2024, our team released a slew of updates to Liquid, but three were particularly noteworthy: the launch of the Liquid Wallet Kit, the release of Simplicity on Liquid testnet, and ELIP 200. These advancements have not only made Liquid easier to build on but also more beneficial for institutions and everyday users.
The Liquid Wallet Kit (LWK) launch introduced a powerful, modular toolkit for developers looking to incorporate essential Liquid features like confidentiality and lower fees into their Bitcoin offerings. Our goal with LWK is to create a reference tool that helps reduce the technical barriers to integrating Liquid, define and establish ecosystem-wide standards, and optimize Liquid's powerful features out of the box.
Despite being available for less than a year, LWK has already started to achieve these goals and is making an impact. Over 10 wallet providers and SDKs have employed it to build customizable and scalable Liquid integrations, including Breez SDK Nodeless, Blitz Wallet, and Bull Bitcoin.
Another notable development was the highly-anticipated release of Simplicity and its high-level language Simfony on Liquid testnet. This formal introduction follows seven years of deep research and development to create a next-gen blockchain language that surpasses Bitcoin Script and out-competes Ethereum's EVM by offering greater expressiveness with improved safety assurances.
To make Simplicity more accessible, we introduced Simfony, a new developer-friendly 'front-end' language that resembles Rust in syntax and abstracts away complex functional programming details. This allows developers to write sophisticated smart contracts with ease while preserving security and formal verification capabilities.
The release on Liquid testnet features a web-based IDE equipped with example programs demonstrating various use cases, many of which were previously impossible with existing scripting languages. The IDE also provides tools for managing public keys and generating addresses on Liquid testnet, giving developers hands-on experience as we lead up to a mainnet release of Simplicity in the near future.
We also recently deployed ELIP 200 on mainnet: a new policy that dramatically reduces fees up to 90% for Confidential Transactions (CT). This makes sending stablecoin payments on Liquid much more affordable, especially those in emerging markets, with transaction fees approximately 0.03 cents at current Bitcoin prices.
Beyond benefiting individual users, adopting ELIP 200 strengthens Liquid’s competitive edge among institutions and promotes broader adoption of financial privacy standards in new capital markets. For example, Mifiel leverages Liquid to expand Latin America’s access to global funding while preserving sensitive data from third parties, a practice that is standard traditional finance, but is lacking among blockchain-based solutions.
By lowering fees and bolstering Confidential Transactions, ELIP 200 paves the way for increased institutional participation in Bitcoin capital markets, ensuring secure, cost-effective solutions that safeguard sensitive financial information.
Education Initiatives, Company Announcements, and Conference Highlights
2024 was another milestone year for Blockstream in terms of education initiatives, strategic announcements and global engagement.
Education, as always, remained a cornerstone of our mission to engage with the Bitcoin community and promote wider adoption. February, for example, will mark the one-year anniversary of Bitcoin Capital, our virtual roundtable series launched in partnership with Bitfinex Securities to explore the intersection of Bitcoin and traditional finance. The series has already featured a star-studded roster of guests over the past year, including former Blockstreamer and Jan3 CEO Samson Mow, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino, Bitcoin analysts Lyn Alden and Tuur Demeester, as well as notable figures from the tradfi world, including Accenture’s digital asset lead, Alexandre Leizat.
Another educational milestone was the launch of Blockstream Local, an initiative designed to empower grassroots Bitcoin meetups with curated educational resources, early product access, and sustainable revenue models. The first workshop, focusing on Liquid and strategies for navigating high-fee environments, has set the tone for a robust pipeline of future workshops related to Lightning, Liquid and Jade. Furthermore, by enabling local groups to access discounts on products like Blockstream Jade and generate revenue through our affiliate and reseller programs, Blockstream Local has already helped communities around the world to expand their outreach while championing Bitcoin self-custody and circular economies.
In November, meanwhile, we announced the creation of Blockstream Asset Management (BAM). Led by Blockstream CEO Dr. Adam Back and newly-onboarded Chief Investment Officer Sean Bill, a seasoned hedge fund veteran and early advocate for institutional Bitcoin adoption, especially within the pensions industry, BAM represents a strategic pivot by Blockstream towards institutional-grade, Bitcoin-based financial solutions aimed at bridging the gap between Bitcoin and traditional finance.
Combining Sean and his team’s significant traditional finance knowhow with Blockstream’s technical expertise, e.g, as official technical providers to the Liquid, BAM aims to build innovative products that enhance liquidity and drive confidence in Bitcoin as a mainstream investment vehicle.
These funds exemplify Blockstream’s commitment to empowering Bitcoin holders with financial tools that offer new opportunities for growth and liquidity while supporting the broader Bitcoin ecosystem. As we look ahead, BAM’s vision is to establish Bitcoin as a cornerstone of modern investment portfolios, driving adoption and innovation across global capital markets.
Finally, Blockstream’s presence at key industry events throughout the year amplified our voice as a leader in Bitcoin infrastructure and innovation. Dr. Adam Back’s participation and keynote speeches at major conferences around the world, including visits to Tokyo, Taiwan and Lugano in collaboration with the Liquid Federation, for example, helped once again to showcase the transformative potential of Bitcoin, Lightning, and Liquid. All of these events underscore Blockstream’s position as a pioneer in advancing Bitcoin adoption, while also fostering partnerships and dialogue within the broader blockchain and traditional finance communities.
This year we are kicking off the conference circuit with our participation in the very first Plan B El Salvador in January, followed by iConnections in Miami, one of the year's most exclusive gatherings of institutional investors and asset managers.
Connect With Us
If your organization or business is interested in exploring opportunities for partnering with Blockstream or considering the integration of one of our products into your technology stack, we encourage you to connect with our team through one of the product pages on the main Blockstream site. You can also DM us on 𝕏 @Blockstream or via LinkedIn if more convenient.