There is significant conflict around the core development of Bitcoin. Dubbed the “Bitcoin Civil War” or the “block size limit debate,” the general conflict is between keeping Bitcoin core as it is and enlarging the functionality of the software. This conflict appears simple, but the repercussions are enormous. Bitcoin’s permanent nature and the billions of dollars’ worth of assets that Bitcoin software secures mean that every code change is rigorously reviewed and debated.

Bitcoin hard-forked and split into two separate blockchains in 2017. The community of developers and Bitcoin miners couldn’t agree on how to address growth. Bitcoin had become increasingly unreliable and expensive to use. It had once been a nearly instant and almost free system; now transactions were costing more than $50 and taking hours to days to clear. The high cost and slow speed drove away users.

A primary issue was that Bitcoin’s transaction speeds were too slow, at seven transactions per second, to meet the demand on the network. Transaction fees climbed as users competed to have their transactions processed faster. One of the limiting factors was that Bitcoin’s block size limit was 1MB in 2017.