Bitcoin adoption is climbing. Developer mindshare is returning to Bitcoin as the dominant chain for building serious applications. Wallets are getting faster, exchanges are scaling up, and institutional platforms are going live. This growth demands infrastructure that can keep pace.
The Blockstream Explorer API provides real-time access to Bitcoin and Liquid blockchain data—blocks, transactions, addresses, and asset information—through a REST interface that production applications rely on. With the latest 25.12 release, Explorer introduces transparent subscription pricing, comprehensive documentation resources, and a modernized dashboard experience built for teams at every stage of growth.
Transparent Pricing That Grows with Your Application
Developer teams need predictable costs and clear upgrade paths as their applications scale. Explorer 25.12 introduces three subscription tiers:
- Basic for prototypes and side projects ($40/month for 500k calls)
- Advanced for production applications ($100-$2,000/month for 1M-30M calls)
- Enterprise for institutional-grade infrastructure ($3,000/month for unlimited calls. Contact us for custom deployments)
The subscription model makes cost forecasting straightforward. Optional auto-upgrade prevents service interruptions when usage spikes unexpectedly—particularly valuable during market volatility.
Enterprise: Built for Institutional Scale
Enterprise tier provides unlimited API calls for $3,000/month. Unlike lower tiers where service stops when credits are exhausted (unless auto-upgrade is enabled), Enterprise has no usage caps or rate limits. Teams get instant support through a dedicated channel. Access to QuickSync—the fastest wallet sync protocol available—comes at 1:1 pricing with no premium. Optional custom agreements include dedicated servers, custom SLAs, and tailored deployment options. Enterprise customers get first access to new features.
For exchanges, custody providers, and settlement systems, Enterprise removes infrastructure as a bottleneck. This tier is designed for teams where uptime is non-negotiable and compliance requirements demand isolated, dedicated resources.
QuickSync: The Fastest Wallet Sync in Bitcoin
QuickSync is built on Waterfalls—the descriptor-based sync protocol that launched in September 2025 and has been running in production wallets since then. We're taking this opportunity to explain why it matters for wallet developers and their users. We believe descriptor-based syncing is how Bitcoin and Liquid wallets will scale in the future.
Traditional block explorers require wallets to generate addresses locally and query each one individually. Users restoring a wallet wait—sometimes for hours—as their device makes hundreds or thousands of separate API calls to check each address for transaction history.
QuickSync does involve a privacy trade-off: the wallet shares its descriptor with the server, which means the server can derive all addresses the wallet will generate. For users who trust Blockstream Explorer infrastructure, this trade-off delivers significantly faster sync times. For users who prioritize maximum privacy, traditional address-by-address scanning remains available.
QuickSync also supports UTXO-only sync, allowing wallets to skip full transaction history and immediately retrieve only unspent outputs. For large wallets with thousands of transactions—like exchanges or custody platforms—balances can be restored almost instantly.
A user downloads a wallet app, enters their recovery phrase, and sees their balance in under a minute. QuickSync dramatically reduces bandwidth consumption, which matters for mobile networks. Less processing requires less CPU usage, which means longer battery life. Fast sync has become table stakes for mobile apps, and QuickSync makes self-custody wallets competitive with centralized alternatives.
QuickSync runs in production through LWK (Liquid Wallet Kit), with integration into GDK (Blockstream Green Development Kit) in progress. For developers building on these SDKs, integration is as simple as upgrading to the latest version. Early benchmarks show a massive 62% reduction in sync time and 65% less number of requests required on average.
Integration with Bitcoin Dev Kit (BDK) is coming soon, which will bring QuickSync performance benefits to the broader Bitcoin wallet development ecosystem.
QuickSync pricing is structured to encourage adoption while reflecting the additional server-side work these calls perform. On the Basic tier, one QuickSync call counts as 10 standard API calls against your quota—so if you make one QuickSync request, it consumes 10 of your included API credits . On the Advanced tier, the ratio drops to 5:1—one QuickSync call equals 5 API credits. On the Enterprise tier, QuickSync calls are 1:1 with standard calls, meaning there's no premium at all. As teams scale and commit to the Explorer API, QuickSync becomes significantly more economical.
Simplicity Transactions: Making Advanced Bitcoin Scripting Visible
Blockstream.info is the frontend representation of the data we share through the Blockstream Explorer API. Staying at the absolute forefront of Bitcoin development means supporting new protocol features as they go live. Simplicity—a next-generation smart contract language that brings high-assurance, formally verifiable scripting to Bitcoin-based networks—is now live on the Liquid Network. We've added full support for Simplicity transaction visualization, displaying Simplicity transaction details including witness data, program encodings (the bytes that make up the Simplicity program), CMR (commitment Merkle root), Taproot control blocks, and script pubkeys in human-readable format. For developers building with Simplicity, this transparency into program execution and transaction construction is essential for debugging, verification, and understanding how these advanced smart contracts operate on-chain.
Ethereum had its chance. Solana burned billions.
— Blockstream (@Blockstream) November 6, 2025
Now Bitcoin is getting high-assurance smart contracts through Simplicity on @Liquid_BTC.
The future of finance runs on Bitcoin.
Simplicity TX live on the Blockstream Explorer ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/RondGK2F76
A Help Center Built for Developers
Great infrastructure needs great documentation. The new Explorer API help center provides comprehensive resources with step-by-step guides for every common integration pattern.
The help center covers everything from getting started with an Explorer API account to understanding QuickSync implementation, managing API keys securely, monitoring usage and costs, making REST API requests, and requesting enterprise deployments. Each guide includes code examples, best practices, and practical troubleshooting advice.
Support is now integrated directly into the dashboard. Developers can open tickets, describe issues, and track status in real time. Automated notifications keep teams updated when engineers reply.
Dashboard Rebuilt: Faster, Clearer, More Predictable
When developers log in, they see everything at a glance: API keys, current usage in real time, documentation links, health status, and quick actions. Clear visual indicators show active/inactive state. For teams managing dozens of keys across multiple environments, this eliminates operational headaches.
The analytics page displays current billing cycle usage. Usage data is clearly displayed, with invoices available for download.Invoice pages load correctly, receipt downloads work reliably, and billing cycles display accurately. Proactive credit warnings alert teams before service throttling begins.
Continuous Improvement: Stability and Reliability
Beyond headline features, 25.12 includes dozens of fixes that make the API more predictable. Testnet behavior is more stable. Error messages are clearer. Staging and production responses are now aligned.
In recent months, the free Blockstream Explorer API platform has validated our architectural decisions in our enterprise offering. The platform handled extreme traffic conditions that proved the effectiveness of rate limiting, workload isolation, and resilience design. These learnings have been incorporated into ongoing hardening—nginx connection capacity has been expanded, IPv6 routing improvements are in progress, and sizing has been tuned based on observed patterns.
Built for Every Stage of Growth
Individual developers get affordable access to professional infrastructure. $40/month provides the same technology that powers institutional platforms.
Growing startups get flexible pricing from 1 million to 30 million calls, faster support, early feature access, and production-scale QuickSync pricing.
Enterprise teams get unlimited usage for a fixed monthly price, custom deployment options, and infrastructure proven at extreme scale with isolated, dedicated resources for teams where uptime is non-negotiable.
Ready to Build?
Whether you're building a high-performance wallet that needs QuickSync, a trading dashboard that queries real-time blockchain data, or an exchange platform that demands institutional-grade uptime, Explorer API has a tier designed for your use case.
SDK integrations continue to bring QuickSync to more wallet developers, with BDK integration coming soon. We're also expanding beyond REST with Electrum RPC support for enterprise deployments, giving teams low-latency access for advanced use cases.
Explorer API continues to evolve into the most reliable way to build on Bitcoin and Liquid.
To learn more, visit blockstream.info/explorer-api
For enterprise deployments, reach out for enquiry here.