Cardano, the 11th largest blockchain by market capitalization, integrated the BitcoinOS (BOS) Grail bridge, marking an important moment for the programmability and scalability of both networks. Announced on Thursday, October 24, this event symbolizes Cardano “coming home to Bitcoin,” opening its ecosystem to the liquidity and power of the original blockchain.
With this integration, Cardano becomes the second layer 1 blockchain, after Bitcoin of course, in linking with the BOS infrastructure. This not only expands Cardano’s capabilities, but also marks a path of diversification and interoperability that is not very common among the largest networks with the Bitcoin network. It also shows “that the biggest names are returning to Bitcoin,” according to They reported in a blog.
EMURGO, one of the founding entities of Cardano, is developing this integration using BOS to bring Bitcoin liquidity to Cardano via the Grail bridge.
This bridge enables trustless exchange of BTC and other Bitcoin assets with Cardanobeing the first L1 chain, apart from Bitcoin, to facilitate the decentralized storage and transfer of BTC.
On a more technical level, the Grail bridge uses zero knowledge cryptographya technology that allows Bitcoin users to move their BTC to other chains without the need for intermediaries. BitcoinOS was a pioneer by verifying a ZK proof on Bitcoin in July 2024, and now, with this integration, it is expanding its reach to other networks.
This trustless bridge “is crucial to transforming each blockchain into a layer on top of Bitcoin,” they say from BitcoinOS, which highlights that this has the potential to unite “all cryptocurrencies.” “This offers Cardano users access to the Bitcoin ecosystem and vice versa, improving interoperability and scalability for both networks,” they added.
BitcoinOS highlights the need for unification between Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as the “most obvious problem” in the digital ecosystem. Despite its prominence, Bitcoin only represents a fraction of total cryptocurrency activity, the company clarifies. Altcoin networks, with their superior scalability and programmability, surpass Bitcoin in some features, such as daily transactions and programmability, they added.
Altcoins, alternative cryptocurrencies to Bitcoin, have in some cases shown superior returns this year, with increases of more than 100% in 12 monthsas CriptoNoticias has reported, although most of them have done so only occasionally, and their price drops have been larger.
This article was created using artificial intelligence and edited by a human Editor.