As Bitcoin Runes hype fades, transactions drop 84 percent.

The Bitcoin Runes protocol is struggling to maintain its share of Bitcoin transactions. Since its launch on April 20, Runes transactions have dominated Bitcoin blockchain traffic on eight separate days, mostly over the weekend.

The launch of Bitcoin Runes coincided with the fourth Bitcoin halving. The resulting boost has seen transaction volume rise on the Bitcoin blockchain. Earnings from Bitcoin (BTC) mining surpassed $100 million for the first time, setting an all-time high of $107.7 million in daily earnings.

Transactions handled by the Runes protocol accounted for more than 50% of all Bitcoin transactions as of April 24. The peak occurred on April 23, when these transactions represented 81.3% of the bandwidth. However, on May 2, this figure dropped to 11.1 percent.

As shown in the dune chart above, the runes boost is up again the following weekend on May 4th, 5th and 6th. However, it has been declining since then.

As of May 22, Runes represented 12.7% of Bitcoin transactions, much higher than Bitcoin Ordinals (0.7%) and BRC-20 (1.5%). The rest is taken in BTC. As a result, Runes transactions have fallen more than 84% from their all-time high.

Related: Runes and BRC-20s Are a Stepping Stone for Bitcoin DeFi

Runes are part of a broader developer movement known as Bitcoin Decentralized Finance (DeFi) or BTCFi, which aims to add more utility to the Bitcoin network. Adding the newly launched protocol to Ordinals and BRC-20, the Bitcoin network hit a record high of 926,000 daily transactions.

However, the real market opportunity for the Runes protocol may come months after the initial wave of investor hype subsides.

“Runes and Ordinals are showing the value of block space… The Bitcoin network is a very decentralized, secure and robust network, so there will be use cases and value from that block space,” Terawolf founder and CEO Nazar Khan told Cointelegraph.

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