StellarUnpacked
XLM $0.0000 +0.00%
RA 05h 14m 32s · DEC −08° 12′ 06″ · Coin Galaxy / Sector XLM

Stellar, unpacked.

Stellar is an open, decentralized network built to move money across borders in seconds for a fraction of a cent. Its native coin is XLM, also called the lumen. This is a plain-language guide to all of it.

Ledger close
~5sec
Base fee
0.00001XLM
Max supply
~50BXLM
Launched
2014
Begin the tour ↓
01

What is Stellar?

Think of Stellar as shared plumbing for money: a public ledger that banks, apps, payment companies and individuals can all plug into.

Most blockchains try to be a world computer. Stellar's goal has always been narrower: fast, cheap, reliable payments and the issuing and exchanging of digital assets, such as dollars, euros, bonds or a local currency, all on one open network.

On Stellar, anyone can create a token that represents something real. Regulated companies called anchors hold the real-world asset and issue a matching token on the network. Those tokens can then be sent, traded and converted into each other almost instantly.

  • NetworkStellar (public, permissionless)
  • Native coinLumens (XLM)
  • ConsensusStellar Consensus Protocol (SCP)
  • MiningNone. No proof-of-work, no staking
  • Smart contractsSoroban (Rust → WebAssembly)
  • StewardStellar Development Foundation (non-profit)
  • Smallest unit1 stroop = 0.0000001 XLM
02

A short history

  1. 2014

    Launch

    Jed McCaleb (co-founder of Ripple and creator of Mt. Gox) and lawyer Joyce Kim found the non-profit Stellar Development Foundation and launch the network, originally built on a fork of Ripple's code.

  2. 2015

    A new consensus

    Stanford professor David Mazières publishes the Stellar Consensus Protocol. The network relaunches on its own, purpose-built codebase, stellar-core.

  3. 2017

    Enterprise interest

    IBM partners with Stellar on a cross-border payments project (later "World Wire"), bringing early institutional attention.

  4. 2019

    The great burn

    Inflation is switched off, and the SDF burns about 55 billion XLM, roughly half of all lumens in existence. Total supply drops to around 50 billion and is now fixed.

  5. 2021

    Dollars & cash

    Circle brings USDC to Stellar, Franklin Templeton runs its on-chain money-market fund on the network, MoneyGram announces cash-in and cash-out for Stellar wallets, and native liquidity pools (AMMs) go live.

  6. 2022

    Real-world aid

    The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) uses Stellar to deliver digital cash aid to displaced people from Ukraine, who can cash out at MoneyGram locations.

  7. 2024

    Soroban arrives

    Protocol 20 activates Soroban smart contracts on mainnet, adding programmable logic alongside Stellar's built-in payment features.

03

How it works

No miners and no staking. Stellar reaches agreement through trust.

Every validator chooses a quorum slice, a set of other validators it trusts, such as universities, exchanges, banks and non-profits. When enough overlapping slices agree on the next ledger, it's final. This model is called Federated Byzantine Agreement.

The result: a new ledger roughly every five seconds, settlement that is final with no waiting for confirmations, and a network that uses a tiny fraction of the energy of proof-of-work chains.

Tap a validator node to see its quorum slice →

7 validators · overlapping quorum slices

Built-in exchange

Stellar has a decentralized exchange baked into the protocol. Order books and liquidity pools let any asset trade against any other.

Path payments

Send euros, and the recipient receives pesos. The network finds the best conversion route through the DEX in a single, atomic transaction.

Anchors

Regulated on/off-ramps that hold real money and issue tokens for it. Shared standards (SEPs) mean any wallet can connect to any anchor.

Trustlines

An account must opt in before holding a token. That prevents spam tokens and lets issuers meet compliance rules.

04

The lumen (XLM)

XLM is the network's native coin. It isn't the product. It's the fuel and the spam filter.

Fees. Every transaction costs a tiny fee in XLM, 100 stroops (0.00001 XLM) per operation by default. That's enough to stop spam without pricing anyone out.

Reserves. Each account must hold a small minimum balance: 1 XLM for the account, plus 0.5 XLM for every trustline, offer or other entry it owns.

Bridge currency. When there isn't a direct market between two assets, XLM can act as the go-between in a path payment.

Supply. About 50 billion XLM exist, with no inflation and no mining. Much of the supply is still held by the SDF to fund ecosystem growth, and its holdings are published openly.

Fee calculator

0.01 XLM≈ $—

At the base fee. Fees can rise slightly during peak demand (surge pricing).

Minimum balance

2 XLM≈ $—

1 XLM base account + 0.5 XLM per entry. Reserves are locked, not spent.

Stroop converter

XLM = stroops
05

What it's used for

A

Cross-border payments

Remittance companies use Stellar to settle international transfers in seconds instead of days, often converting currencies along the way.

B

Stablecoins

Digital dollars like USDC and EURC run natively on Stellar, giving people access to stable value without a bank account.

C

Cash on/off-ramps

Through MoneyGram Access, people can turn cash into USDC in a Stellar wallet, and back again, at retail locations.

D

Tokenized assets

Fund managers issue shares of real-world assets, like Franklin Templeton's government money-market fund, as tokens on Stellar.

E

Humanitarian aid

Aid groups deliver funds directly to recipients' phones, with transparent tracking and lower leakage than traditional channels.

F

DeFi & dApps

With Soroban, developers build lending markets, DEX aggregators and other apps that plug into Stellar's assets and anchors.

06

Soroban smart contracts

Soroban is Stellar's smart-contract platform, live on mainnet since 2024.

Contracts are written in Rust and compiled to WebAssembly. Soroban was designed with predictable fees, built-in resource limits and easy access to Stellar's existing assets, so a contract can work with USDC or any anchored token right away.

The SDF backed the launch with a large adoption fund to support teams building on it.

// A minimal Soroban contract
#![no_std]
use soroban_sdk::{contract, contractimpl, Env, Symbol, symbol_short};

#[contract]
pub struct Hello;

#[contractimpl]
impl Hello {
    pub fn hello(env: Env, to: Symbol) -> Symbol {
        env.events().publish((symbol_short!("hi"),), to.clone());
        to
    }
}
07

Getting started

  1. Step 1

    Pick a wallet

    Popular Stellar wallets include LOBSTR (mobile & web), Freighter (browser extension by the SDF), and xBull. Hardware wallets like Ledger also support XLM.

  2. Step 2

    Back up your secret key

    Your secret key (it starts with S) or recovery phrase is your money. Write it down offline. Never share it, and no real support agent will ask for it.

  3. Step 3

    Fund the account

    A new Stellar account needs at least 1 XLM to activate. Buy XLM on an exchange and withdraw to your public address (it starts with G).

  4. Step 4

    Mind the memo

    When sending to an exchange, include the memo it gives you. Without it, your deposit can't be credited to your account.

Explore further

08

FAQ

Is Stellar the same as Ripple (XRP)?

No. They share some history, since Stellar's co-founder Jed McCaleb also co-founded Ripple and Stellar first launched on a fork of Ripple's code. Since 2015, Stellar has run its own codebase and consensus protocol. Stellar is steered by a non-profit foundation, and its network is open for anyone to run a validator.

Why is it called a "lumen"?

A lumen is a unit of light, fitting for a network called Stellar. "XLM" is the ticker symbol used on exchanges.

Can I mine or stake XLM?

No. Stellar has no mining and no protocol-level staking. Validators take part in consensus without earning block rewards. Some third-party platforms offer yield on XLM, and those carry their own risks.

Why do I need 1 XLM just to open an account?

The minimum balance (base reserve) keeps the ledger from filling up with millions of empty spam accounts. It stays in your account. You just can't spend below it.

What's a memo, and why does my exchange need one?

Exchanges often use one shared Stellar address for many customers. The memo is a short note attached to a payment that tells the exchange which customer it belongs to.

How fast and how final are transactions?

Ledgers close about every 5 seconds, and once a transaction is in a closed ledger it's final. There's no need to wait for extra confirmations or worry about chain reorganizations.

Who controls Stellar?

No single party. The network is run by independent validators around the world. The Stellar Development Foundation maintains core software and funds the ecosystem, but network upgrades are only adopted when validators vote to accept them.

Is XLM a good investment?

We don't give investment advice. Like all crypto assets, XLM's price can be very volatile. Do your own research and never invest more than you can afford to lose.