Bitcoin’s Lightning Network surpassed $1 billion in monthly transaction volume in November 2025, reaching an estimated $1.1 billion across 5.2 million transactions, according to a report from River.
River said the milestone was achieved despite bitcoin’s price declining throughout November and remaining subdued for much of 2025, highlighting growing payment usage independent of price momentum.
“Lightning adoption happened despite the price declining all of November and generally not doing much in 2025. The adoption was largely driven by exchanges, as well as a growing number of businesses accepting bitcoin payments,”
Said River director of marketing, Sam Wouters.
Although November’s 5.2 million transactions marked strong activity, monthly volumes remain below the August 2023 peak of 6.6 million transactions, which River attributed to micropayment experiments in gaming and messaging applications.
The report forecast a potential surge in Lightning usage as individuals and businesses experiment with AI-driven agentic payments, which involve automated systems initiating transactions without direct manual input.
The Lightning Network operates as a layer-2 scaling solution, enabling near-instant, low-cost bitcoin payments by processing transactions offchain and settling only net balances on the base blockchain, where blocks typically take around 10 minutes to confirm.
In December 2025, Lightning Network capacity reached 5,606 BTC, while institutional adoption continued with Secure Digital Markets transferring $1 million to Kraken via Lightning, demonstrating that seven-figure payments can be executed using the scaling network.
At the time of reporting, Bitcoin price was $66,966.93.