How many possibilities do mobile hardware, stablecoins, and applications Solana bring?

Despite only being live for a few days, Solana’s Breakpoint is striking a chord.

The flagship conference delivered a series of major Solana-related announcements, fueling many of the chain’s popular narratives while also feeding the Solana community’s broader claim that the network remains the best chain for everyday use.

Let’s dive into some of the hot claims and see what the builders of Breakpoint have accomplished in terms of beefing up the narrative weight!

“Solana is the best platform for mobile.”

Breakpoint highlights Solana’s ongoing investment in mobile development, including hardware like the Seeker phone and a growing ecosystem of mobile apps, positioning it as a leader in cryptocurrency’s inevitable mobile future.

Globally, about 60% of internet traffic now comes from smartphones, making internet usage more convenient. Interestingly, there is a strong overlap between regions with the highest mobile traffic and regions with the highest cryptocurrency adoption.

Standouts here include India, which ranked first in Chainalysis’ cryptocurrency adoption report, where about 70% of internet activity comes from mobile use, and Nigeria, which ranked second in Chainalysis’ cryptocurrency adoption report, where about 80% of internet activity comes from mobile use. Overall, there is a strong regional overlap in cryptocurrency adoption among regions where mobile penetration leads the way in cryptocurrency use, with the main concentrations in Africa and Asia.

With mobile wallet usage recently hitting all-time highs, these adoption and usage trends make Solana’s mobile-first strategy (including Saga and now Seeker and the low-cost general-purpose Web3 smartphone, the JamboPhone2) key to entering high-growth markets where mobile internet usage dominates and cryptocurrency adoption continues to surge, putting it ahead of other blockchains that lack the same strategic focus and progress.

While much of the success of these phones can be attributed to airdrop hunting, they still represent Solana’s investment in researching how to best integrate cryptocurrency into a mobile environment. In addition to the new crypto phones, Breakpoint is also launching new mobile apps from leading dApps:

• Jupiter, Solana’s leading aggregator, has released its upcoming mobile app on the Apple App Store and Google Play, featuring gas-free transactions, one-click redemptions, zero fees, and support for Google and Apple Pay and credit cards.

• Popular creator platform DRiP has launched a public beta of its mobile app on iOS and Android.

• Mobile horse racing game Photo Finish has launched on the App Store after its previous titles garnered over 15 million downloads.

These developments demonstrate that Solana remains the blockchain most poised for mobile cryptocurrency adoption and positions it as the blockchain best positioned to capitalize on the shift toward mobile-first internet usage.

“Solana is the best place for stablecoins.”

Building on the success of the stablecoin, Breakpoint showcases Solana’s efforts to prove its network is superior to Ethereum and Tron.

PayPal’s head of cryptocurrency was one of the loudest voices on Breakpoint, stating that Ethereum “is not the best for payments” while highlighting Solana’s token extensions (a feature that allows for additional functionality to be added to a token) as a big reason for them to expand to Solana.

Solana’s stablecoin supply is still a fraction of Ethereum’s, but has more than doubled so far in 2024. Despite the drop in transaction volume, Solana remains first in total stablecoin transfers, solidifying its position as the top stablecoin chain.

As stablecoin usage continues to grow, Breakpoint builders are demonstrating the potential for more emerging use cases.

• Fuse Wallet has announced the launch of a virtual Visa prepaid card that allows users to spend stablecoins while maintaining self-custody.

• Sling Money, a stablecoin payment service company that mainly serves Europe and Africa, announced support for USDC and Paxos USDP on Solana.

• Crypto payments provider Helio has announced support for Solana Blinks on Shopify, allowing people to sell items directly on Twitter.

• Philippines-based cryptocurrency firm Coins.ph has announced that it will launch a Philippine peso stablecoin on Solana in the fourth quarter.

Beyond that, Sky (formerly MakerDAO) announced a proposal for a more native integration with Solana, and Perena announced multi-token stablecoin swaps, showcasing extensive efforts to establish Solana as the home for stablecoin use.

“Solana is the best place to build everyday applications.”

Many of the top Solana projects have launched new developer tools designed to enable a simpler user experience, abstracting the complexity of crypto into the background.

• Reown (formerly WalletConnect) has launched Solana Appkit, providing developers with a comprehensive platform to easily integrate Solana into their applications and equip them with features such as simplified onboarding and fiat-to-crypto on-ramps, while also supporting multiple coding languages.

• Phantom has launched its new embedded wallet feature, which aims to simplify the onboarding process for new users to dApps by eliminating the need for seed phrases and external application downloads — meaning there’s no need to install browser extensions. Instead, users can create a self-hosted account using just an email address and a four-digit PIN.

• Squads Protocol, a popular multi-signature protocol, announced its v5 update, which provides developers with more control, flexibility, and security. Key features include dynamic spending limits and expanded admin management, making wallets more like bank accounts with daily withdrawal limits or multi-factor authentication - expanding the possibilities for businesses to use wallets or provide security protection for users.

Overall, these announcements highlight the Solana community’s interest in differentiation through everyday usability, with a focus on expanding the developer toolkit so dApps can improve the user experience.

All in all, Breakpoint makes it clear that the chain is more than just a narrative hub, but a frontrunner in supporting everyday cryptocurrency usage.

With mobile development continuing to make progress to match global adoption trends, stablecoin integration to support one of cryptocurrency’s most impactful use cases, and user-friendly developer tooling to deliver an application experience superior to Web2, Solana is proving that it is rapidly improving its market positioning.

In a world where different blockchains support different types of use cases, Solana’s builders are increasingly defining a clear path forward for the chain.