Bitcoin Monitoring

The videos shown here visualize the propagation of blocks and transactions through the Bitcoin P2P network. Each dot on the map represents one peer, which has announced a specific hash to our monitor peer. The peers appear on the map at the estimated time they announced the hash to our monitor, i.e., the time we received their announcement minus the average latency to the peer.

Block Propagation

These videos show the propagation of nine arbitrarily chosen blocks from 2015 to 2023. Propagation speed and the number of peers have both increased drastically.

Block propagation | 01.08.2015
Block propagation | 01.08.2016
Block propagation | 01.09.2017
Block propagation | 01.02.2018
Block propagation | 01.02.2019
Block propagation | 02.02.2020
Block propagation | 01.02.2021
Block propagation | 01.02.2022
Block propagation | 01.02.2023

Blockchain Fork

The videos below show the propagation of both blocks of the blockchain fork at height 503949. Although the block visualized on the right side has been announced to our peer about 0.5 seconds earlier than the block on the left side, the block shown on the left side propagates much faster through the network and eventually becomes part of the longest chain.

Block Propagation | Included Block
Block Propagation | Orphaned Block

Transaction Propagation

These videos show the propagation of nine arbitrarily chosen transactions from 2015 to 2023. Propagation speed has decreased in order to improve anonymity.

Transaction propagation | 01.08.2015
Transaction propagation | 01.08.2016
Transaction propagation | 01.09.2017
Transaction propagation | 01.02.2018
Transaction propagation | 01.02.2019
Transaction propagation | 02.02.2020
Transaction propagation | 01.02.2021
Transaction propagation | 01.02.2022
Transaction propagation | 01.02.2023

License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.