Avalanche (AVAX) is a proof-of-stake Layer 1 blockchain platform, and AVAX is its native token, which pays transaction fees and secures the network through staking. At the time of the market snapshot, AVAX traded at $8.55, down 0.45% over 24 hours, with a market cap of $3.80B (rank #37) and 24h volume of $198.89M. Its all-time high is $144.96, and the current price is 94.10% below it.
Core technology and architecture
The Primary Network is a special Avalanche L1 that runs three blockchains. The Contract Chain (C-Chain) is an implementation of the Ethereum Virtual Machine for smart contracts. The Platform Chain (P-Chain) handles validator and L1-level operations, and the Exchange Chain (X-Chain) creates and transfers digital assets. Mainnet comprises the Primary Network and all deployed Avalanche L1s.
The Etna upgrade, also called Avalanche9000 and implemented through ACP-77, activated on mainnet on 16 December 2024. It rebranded subnets as Avalanche L1s. L1 validators no longer need to stake 2,000 AVAX; they pay a continuous fee of 1.33 AVAX per month instead. Legacy subnets keep their previous rules.
Consensus and network security
Avalanche uses Snowman, a linear chain consensus in which validators repeatedly poll small random samples of the network. Finality is typically under one second. Security is proof-of-stake, with voting weight proportional to stake, and Avalanche does not implement slashing.
A Primary Network validator must stake at least 2,000 AVAX and stay online for 14 to 365 days. Delegators need a minimum of 25 AVAX. The Helicon upgrade, which went live on mainnet on 22 September 2026, raised the uptime requirement for rewards from 80% to 90% for new staking periods and cut the minimum validation period from 14 days to 48 hours.
Tokenomics
The maximum supply is 720 million AVAX, a hard cap. The circulating supply is 444,006,017 AVAX, and the total supply is 470,674,775 AVAX. Of the maximum, 360 million AVAX were minted at genesis, and the remainder is minted over time as validator rewards.
A Bitnomial CFTC filing lists staking rewards at 50%, investors at 16%, the founding team and advisors at 15%, the Avalanche Foundation at 9.3%, community and development at 7%, and airdrops and incentives at 2.7%. Coinhouse gives a different breakdown, so the allocations should be read as one filing's presentation.
Every transaction fee on the X-, C-, and P-Chains is burned. Avalanche's documentation states that AVAX will generally remain inflationary while it is far below the cap, because validator rewards can exceed the tokens burned. Coincub reported that staking held 46% of circulating supply as of September 2026.
Use cases and partnerships
Real-world asset (RWA) tokenization is the main institutional focus. BlackRock's BUIDL fund is available on Avalanche through Securitize, and CoinTrust reported it above $900 million on the network in July 2026. On 13 July 2026, Bridgetower announced it had tokenized more than $11 billion in production-linked RWAs on Avalanche using Chainlink infrastructure.
VanEck states that J.P. Morgan, Apollo, and Citi use Avalanche for RWA tokenization and backend infrastructure, and that Deloitte and AWS have also worked with the network. These are VanEck's characterizations. SMBC announced in April 2025 a partnership with Ava Labs and Fireblocks to develop a stablecoin for release in 2026.
Funds and public exposure
VanEck launched the VanEck Avalanche ETF on 26 January 2026, described as the first ETF tracking AVAX that includes staking rewards. Avalanche Treasury Co. (AVAT), a digital asset treasury company with an exclusive relationship with the Avalanche Foundation, began trading on Nasdaq on 11 June 2026.
Development and roadmap
Octane went live on mainnet on 8 April 2025 and introduced dynamic gas limits on the C-Chain. Granite activated on Fuji on 29 October 2025 and added P-Chain features for Interchain Messaging. Helicon bundles six ACPs, including continuous execution on the C-Chain (ACP-194), auto-renewed staking (ACP-236), and a reward curve recalibration rolling out over 90 days (ACP-285). On 30 July 2026, the Avalanche Foundation published an economic research agenda covering value measurement, capture, and distribution.
Who is behind Avalanche and where is it based?
Avalanche was developed by Ava Labs, founded in 2018 according to Forbes, Preqin, and 2023 congressional testimony by CEO Emin Gün Sirer. Sirer was a Cornell computer science professor. The other co-founders are Kevin Sekniqi, chief operating officer, and Maofan "Ted" Yin, chief protocol architect, who designed the HotStuff consensus algorithm. In August 2026, Charley Cooper was appointed president, and John Wu moved to senior advisor.
Forbes and Bloomberg's LEI record place the company's headquarters in New York. The 2023 testimony describes it as headquartered in Brooklyn, New York. Ava Labs, Inc. is a Delaware corporation. The Avalanche Foundation is recorded as Avalanche Foundation Limited, a Singaporean company limited by guarantee.
A VanEck S-1/A filing states that the codebase is open source and that neither Ava Labs nor the Avalanche Foundation currently oversees network development.