TON cuts block times to 400ms with upgrade

Toncoin’s underlying network, The Open Network, has reduced block times to 400 milliseconds following its Catchain 2.0 consensus upgrade.

The update enables payment transactions to settle in roughly one second, with trades executing in near real time and decentralised applications operating at speeds closer to traditional platforms.

“More blocks mean more validator rewards, which create stronger staking incentives and bring more TON into the network,”

The project said in its announcement.

The upgrade significantly increases block production, driving annual inflation higher to around 3.6% from roughly 0.6% as more tokens are issued to validators.

TON’s improved performance builds on its original Catchain consensus design and aims to support high-speed usage across applications integrated with messaging platform Telegram.

Following the announcement, TON rose about 2.3% to $1.28, with trading volume climbing more than 35% to $130 million.

The move highlights growing competition among layer-1 blockchains to deliver faster settlement and improved scalability for mainstream adoption.