Arbitrum is a suite of scaling solutions on Ethereum that utilize Optimistic Rollup. It allows users to enjoy faster speed and cheaper transaction costs when interacting with web3 dApps.
There are 2 Arbitrum chains:
Arbitrum One: Major applications are currently housed on Arbitrum One, with a concentration of DeFi protocols.
Arbitrum Nova: Utilizes a milder trust assumption in exchange for lower fees. Introduced to cater for high-volume applications such as gaming and social.
The arbitrum project consists of the following components:
Arbitrum Nitro: The underlying Optimistic Rollup technical stack powering all Arbitrum products.
Arbitrum rollup: The primary use case of the Nitro technology and the one used on the Arbitrum One chain. Arbitrum rollup orders and batches transactions to be posted onto Ethereum, thereby inheriting its security.
Arbitrum AnyTrust: A variant of Arbitrum Nitro’s that offers lower transaction cost and faster withdrawals in exchange for milder trust assumption. Instead of Ethereum, AnyTrust relies on an external Data Availability Commitee (DAC) for data availability. Arbitrum Nova uses Arbitrum AnyTrust.
Orbit: Permissionless platform for launching custom L3 chains on the Arbitrum ecosystem using the Arbitrum Nitro stack.
ARB is its native token and its current use cases include:
Governance: Token holders will be able to vote on Arbitrum DAO governance proposals regarding the future of Arbitrum One and Arbitrum Nova chains.
As at March 23rd 2023, the total token supply of ARB is 10,000,000,000. The current circulating supply is 1,275,000,000 (12.75% of the total token supply).
Learn more about the token distribution of ARB here.