Sentinel's growth in 2024 has been so drastic that any comparison to previous years in its over half-decade history is almost impossible.
During the past several months alone, new network daily, weekly, and monthly records for users were all set. The all-time high for users in a year was already surpassed months ago; and now just eight months into the year, the Sentinel blockchain has seen an approximate 285% increase in unique users over the entirety of 2023.
The explosion over the past year has not been confined to raw user numbers. Sentinel's dApp ecosystem, node network, native coin, and many other metrics have also experienced steep increases.
Historical Perspective
If you've been following the development of Sentinel for multiple years, you may have an awareness of the workload that the chain has typically seen in the past.
- Until autumn 2023, the dVPN protocol was receiving fewer than 1,000 users per month.
- For most of 2023, only three applications existed to serve those users—all of which were third-party.
- The Node Network also numbered at fewer than a thousand. It did not surpass 300 until May of this year.
- The U.S. dollar market price of the Sentinel Coin at the start of August last year was $0.0003.
- During the month of August 2023, dVPN users consumed under 3.22 TB of data; which is just three standard consumer portable hard drives.
In Numbers
A statistical look at the first half of 2024 on the Sentinel Network.
Applications
As of 1 September 2024, there are six third-party dVPN clients utilizing the Sentinel Network. In addition to that six, there is also the project's flagship application, Sentinel Shield dVPN; and one internet browser with integrated Sentinel-powered dVPN.
For a live directory of active Sentinel-powered dVPN software and apps, see the dVPN Apps section of the Sentinel Documentation website.
All-Time Highs in Users
- The current record for unique dVPN users in a single day stands at 11,025, which occurred on 24 July.
- The daily user count had only surpassed 10,000 once before summer 2024 (10,378 on February 12th).
- The all-time high for dVPN users within a week was also established during that late-July frenzy: 31,394 unique users established connections during the week of the 21st through 28th.
- The all-time high for dVPN users within a single calendar month was set earlier in the summer: The network had 77,069 users during June.
Sentinel also recently surpassed 450,000 unique users all-time. Based on current usage trends, dVPN News expects the 500,000 user mark to be breached in under two weeks. The Sentinel team and community are confident that all-time users will surpass one million before the end of 2024.
Sessions Up 712%
July 22nd saw the largest volume of dVPN user sessions in the history of the network, with 52,959 in a twenty-four hour period. The previous record was 50,984 on June 28th.
There have been over 6.5 million sessions just over the first seven months of 2024, which is approximately a 712% increase compared to the entirety of 2023.
NOTE: One day in August saw over 400,000 dVPN sessions, but this was the result of a failed DDOS attack.
Node Network Growth
There has been a steep uptick in the number of available nodes since late May, when the set expanded from around 4,000 to the 7,000 range in the space of a week. That growth has plateaued since the beginning of the summer.
There was a downturn in the number of active nodes in March due to the introduction of limitations on subnets (in essence, a collection of nodes which share a single IP address range). This decision to prioritize quality over quantity traded short-term statistical growth for a smoother and more secure user experience.
Six months later, application adoption metrics prove that the gamble has paid off.
Data Consumption
Over one petabyte (PB) of data has been consumed on the Sentinel Network since its mainnet blockchain launched in March 2021.
Over halfway through 2024, almost 150TB of data is being used by users on the Sentinel Network per month. At this same point last year, dVPN users were using less than 3TB on the same periodic basis.
Blockchain Transactions
The Sentinel blockchain is now seeing more daily active wallet addresses (a metric known as DAU or Daily Active Users) than heavyweight Cosmos Ecosystem blockchains such as Osmosis, Cronos, Axelar, and Celestia—even the Cosmos Hub itself.
This feverish activity on the Sentinel blockchain is intrinsic to the nature of the products it delivers. Almost every step in the operation of services such as dVPN and the AI Data Layer takes place on-chain; from connecting or disconnecting to a node, to placing a data scraping order.
Rather than simply being a sum total of transactions, DAU is calculated by adding together the total number of unique addresses that initiated a transaction on a blockchain within a given period of time. This makes it a far more potent tool for gauging consumer adoption.
Though Sentinel oscillates through different spots in the Cosmos DAU ranking depending on the 24-hour period in question, it is now a mainstay within the top five.
To analyze metrics such as DAU, IBC volume, and total transactions yourself, check out the Cosmos Map of Zones explorer, linked below.
New Protocol, New Horizons
How Sentinel has unfettered its ambitions in 2024.
Sentinel's AI Data Layer made its debut last month, becoming the the first non-dVPN component of the Sentinel blockchain. The introduction of a new protocol to complement the dVPN one that we know and love was the first step in a campaign to expand Sentinel into a DePIN colossus similar to ecosystem partners, Akash Network.
Since spring, the team has defined the project in explicit terms as a peer-to-peer bandwidth marketplace. This movement was in no small part inspired by the successes of the dVPN protocol which we have outlined in the previous section.
That landmark decision on the project's development priorities and messaging is arguably far more consequential than any statistical trend.
Numerical data depicts real-time live network growth; but the maturation of Sentinel's vision into a form that is inclusive of all bandwidth and privacy usecases represents something with far more profound implications for the future: The complete removal of the project's ceiling, and any limitations it had previously placed upon itself.
The vision of Sentinel as something far more than a dVPN protocol has been baked into the project's DNA since its genesis over seven years ago; but 2024 has seen the first tangible steps in that direction.
For more information about the AI Data Layer, dVPN News has published a comprehensive overview which is linked below.
Sentinel Independent News
Applications & Products
As mentioned in the previous section, there has been a veritable storm of application releases in the Sentinel Ecosystem during the first half of 2024, including:
- Sentinel Shield dVPN, the project's flagship dVPN client.
- Breadcrumbs, a dVPN and data management application/
- Meile dVPN, the oldest extant third-party application on Sentinel, received its massive v2.0 overhaul.
- Casanode, a node manager suite for creating dedicated hardware Sentinel Nodes on Raspberry Pi devices and other single-board computers.
- V2:App, the first centralized VPN in history to abandon its old architecture in favor of becoming a dVPN.
- Dogwifhat dVPN, Sentinel's first attempt at catering to memecoin communities.
- A dVPN Telegram Bot by NORSE Labs.
- A proprietary blockchain explorer for the ecosystem.
Other products that are currently in the late development or community testing phase include Cosmos dVPN, Airdrop Access dVPN, Chinese-oriented Caishen dVPN, and Norse dVPN.
Sentinel Coin (DVPN)
A quick look at the Sentinel Network's native digital asset this year.
We're not generally in the business of discussing coin price at dVPN News. It's not the best idea to incorporate a metric which literally changes every single second into longform articles.
Be that as it may be, some things are too big to ignore. The recovery that the Sentinel Coin (DVPN) has experienced since late last year is nothing short of remarkable.
For a summary of the Sentinel Coin's design and uses, open the box below; or check out the complete overview on the Sentinel Documentation website.
What is the Sentinel Coin Used for?
- Payment for services rendered within the network, such as purchasing bandwidth for a dVPN connection or placing an order with the AI Data Layer.
- Rewards for network contributors such as Sentinel Node operators and stakers.
- Allocating voting power for governance.
- And of course, speculative investment by crypto traders.
The all-time high US dollar market price for a single Sentinel Coin was $0.05 in September 2021, shortly after the project's transition to the Cosmos Ecosystem.
2024 Performance
The Sentinel Coin has seen a dramatic upswing in market value over the past year, particularly since last December. Coin price has increased by over sixty percent over the past twelve months.
If the timescale for analysis is increased, things become even more astounding: The Sentinel Coin has gained over 400% in value since it hit its all-time low price ($0.00017) on December 22nd, 2022.
The team has signaled intentions of getting DVPN listed on another major centralized exchange, and beginning mass marketing efforts.
Resources for Sentinel Stats
Learn to monitor Sentinel Network statistics yourself.
Official options for Sentinel statistics, metrics, and information include dVPN Network Statistics and the Node Explorer dashboards on the Sentinel website.
For advanced analytics and specifiable criteria, MathNodes (the developers of Meile dVPN) operate the Metabase service. Busurnode, a validator and key figure within the node community, also maintains a live directory of every Sentinel Node at sentnodes.com.
Sentinel's proprietary blockchain explorer (developed in collaboration with Interbloc) provides easy access and insight into transactions, governance, validators, and blocks. Sentinel is also supported by Cosmostation's famous third-party Mintscan explorer.
Guides and text resources are maintained here on dVPN News as well as the Sentinel Documentation and Medium websites.
Join Our Journey
At dVPN.news, every member of the Sentinel community is a contributor. Whether you're writing articles, sharing tutorials, or participating in discussions, your involvement is what drives our collective growth, and best of all it's rewarded! Together, so if you to contribute to the growth of the Sentinel Network, you are in the right place!
Connect with Us
Stay in touch and be part of our growing community:
- Follow Sentinel on X
- Follow the Growth DAO on X
- Join the Growth DAO community Telegram Group.
- Join the official Sentinel Subreddit, r/dVPN.
