Microtransactions drive Bitcoin activity near record highs

CryptoQuant reports that transactions smaller than 0.01 BTC now account for roughly 80% of daily Bitcoin transfers, pushing overall network activity close to its all-time high and returning the firm’s Network Activity Index to positive territory for the first time since 2024.

The analysis, published in a Thursday report by CryptoQuant, notes that low-value transfers represented about 44% of daily transactions in 2023 and have nearly doubled since then. The report was authored by Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant.

CryptoQuant links the rise in microtransactions to data-inscription protocols that place images, text and token metadata on the Bitcoin blockchain. Protocols such as Ordinals, Runes and BRC-20 generate large volumes of small transfers and so-called dust transactions, some as small as 546 satoshis.

Usage of the OP_RETURN opcode, which allows data to be embedded onchain without creating spendable outputs, has climbed to near-record levels in 2026. Bitcoin Core developers removed an 80-byte relay limit on OP_RETURN in 2025, and the opcode can now embed up to 100,000 bytes of data, according to the report.

The increase in inscription-driven activity has raised the mempool-the queue of unconfirmed transactions-to about 128,000 entries, the highest count since February 2025. CryptoQuant points to earlier congestion in 2023 when Ordinals and BRC-20 activity competed for block space, and to a further spike in late 2024 after the Runes protocol launched.

Moreno wrote, “The economic value of these transactions is, however, disproportionately small.” The report warns that sustained growth in non-financial activity could “increase block space competition and raise fees for economic transactions.”

The report says analysts and network participants will monitor fee levels and mempool dynamics to assess whether continued inscription activity affects the cost and speed of routine Bitcoin transfers.