TOP 5 Must-know Blockchain Trends For 2022
Blockchain Technology is presently one of the most promising technology trends with exciting potential across a wide range of use cases. It is basically a distributed and encrypted variant of a database, which can solve different issues pertaining to online security and trust.
Therefore, many tech enthusiasts wonder about finding the top blockchain trends for the next year to identify how the technology would evolve further. What will be the new use cases of blockchain? Will we notice a massive ripple effect for the blockchain future in 2022 with a new technological advancement? The following discussion tries to find some reliable answers to these questions by reflecting on the top trends in blockchain for 2022.
TOP 5 MUST-KNOW BLOCKCHAIN TRENDS FOR 2022
- Facilitating the control and distribution of vaccines
It’s now clear that tackling the Covid-19 global pandemic will continue to be a priority throughout 2022 and a key use case for many of this year’s top tech trends. As a matter of fact, Blockchain technology has several important potential use cases in vaccine tracking and distribution. Interestingly, blockchain trends in the year 2022 would emphasize their potential use cases across vaccine manufacturing, distribution, and control.
To prevent selling fake vaccines, blockchain application helps to prove the authenticity of vaccine shipments, and their distribution can be traced to ensure they are arriving at their intended locations. There’s also a need to ensure integrity at every point of the supply chain — for example, to ensure batches of vaccines are consistently stored at the correct temperature, as is needed by many of them.
IBM is one of the frontrunners in capitalizing on blockchain trends for COVID management in 2022. The tech giant has successfully developed a system that enables coordination among different agencies and healthcare authorities responsible for vaccine distribution. The system leverages blockchain for combining the documentation of vaccination rates and efficiencies from different platforms and tools used by healthcare authorities and agencies.
Most important of all, a pilot project successfully demonstrated the potential of blockchain for faster identification of product recall scenarios. Such applications can be helpful in identifying a vaccine batch that apparently causes unreasonably high incidences of side effects. Many other innovative advancements evolving as a response to the pandemic would drive blockchain growth in the field of manufacturing, distributing, and tracking vaccinations in 2022.
- The expansion of NFTs
Non-fungible tokens or NFTs were one of the biggest arrivals in the blockchain landscape in 2021. One NFT sold for $69 million in February 2021, and the world can’t stop discussing NFTs since then. As a matter of fact, non-fungible tokens are one of the critical highlights in answers to “What is the future of blockchain?” for obvious reasons. NFT art sold at massive prices in auctions introduced the world to the concept of unique digital tokens on blockchains.
Interestingly, the concept of NFTs has discovered some promising use cases in the world of music now. Many renowned artists such as Grimes, Kings of Leon, and Shawn Mendes have released their tracks as NFTs. However, the potential of NFTs, just like blockchain, exceeds far beyond their initial use cases, which grab attention. For example, distillers William Grant and Son sold bottles of 46-year-old Glenfiddich whiskey with NFTs for authenticating the provenance of each bottle.
Another potential use case of NFTs which finds a place among blockchain predictions for 2022 refers to NFTs in gaming. The applications of NFTs in gaming have been explicitly evident in popular play-to-earn games such as Axie Infinity. The NFT games allow players to ‘mint’ their own NFT creatures, known as Axies, and send them into competitions. With around 300,000 active players on Axie Infinity, it truly shows how NFTs can be more than just digital art. You might also want to know that unemployed people during the pandemic in the Philippines used Axie Infinity for trading NFTs and earning income for daily expenses.
The applications of NFT in fashion would also be one of the critical highlights in blockchain future applications and use cases. Notable brands such as Nike and Dolce & Gabbana have created footwear and clothing with NFTs. Furthermore, one can also expect formidable growth in new and innovative NFT use cases in the metaverse.
2. The Rise of the Metaverse
If 2021 witnessed the rise of discussions about the metaverse, the blockchain trends in 2022 would boost the metaverse itself. For many years, we have been witnessing the possibilities associated with virtual worlds only in science fiction novels. However, the concept of the metaverse has turned into a real phenomenon, with many popular platforms enjoying massive user bases. The metaverse is basically a shared, virtual world that offers immersive experiences. Participants can interact with the metaverse by using their digital avatars. The avatars could help in interacting with each other, creating in-world experiences, objects, and landscapes.
Notable names in the world of techs such as Facebook, Microsoft, Epic Games, and many more are actively showing interest in the metaverse. How is the metaverse relevant to blockchain trends this year? One of the significant aspects in the design of the metaverse is decentralization, which would enable transparency and seamless access to the metaverse. What could be a better alternative than blockchain for creating such decentralized networks? Apart from decentralization, metaverse also relies on blockchain capabilities for ensuring user governance privileges alongside verifiable provenance. Most important of all, the use of blockchain infrastructure also connects the metaverse economies to the larger crypto economy.
Experts assume that the metaverse is still far from becoming completely functional as a digital parallel of our real world. However, there are many promising applications in the metaverse which are already enjoying favorable levels of adoption. In 2022, blockchain predictions would focus largely on the potential technological support for the metaverse by big tech companies. The adoption of metaverse games such as The Sandbox and newly developing blockchain projects in the metaverse would highlight 2022. In addition, one can also look out for possibilities of metaverse games offering exclusive benefits as social and investment opportunities.
3. Blockchain and IoT integration
Blockchain is hugely compatible with the idea of the Internet of Things (IoT) because it is great for creating records of interactions and transactions between machines. It can potentially help to solve many problems around security as well as scalability due to the automated, encrypted, and immutable nature of blockchain ledgers and databases. It could even be used for machine-to-machine transactions — enabling micropayments to be made via cryptocurrencies when one machine or network needs to procure services from another. While this is an advanced use case that may involve us traveling a little further down the road before it impacts our day-to-day lives, it’s likely we will start to hear about more pilot projects and initial use cases in this field during 2022. Innovation in this field is likely to be driven by the ongoing rollout of 5G networks, meaning greater connectivity between all manner of smart, networked equipment and appliances — not simply in terms of speed, but also new types of data transactions including blockchain transactions.
4. Eco-friendly Blockchain
Another favorable method for introducing an eco-friendly blockchain among blockchain trends this year would focus on less energy-intensive blockchain network models. For example, blockchain networks might undergo a shift from the Proof-of-Work models towards Proof-of-Stake models for achieving consensus. One of the biggest blockchain networks, Ethereum, is most likely to adopt a Proof-of-Stake consensus model in 2022.
CONCLUSION
Being one of the most advanced virtual technologies in the world, Blockchain technology is becoming increasingly popular across a range of industries including technology, aerospace, automotive, and finance. 2022 is undoubtedly a promising period for this technology to thrive for a better future.
As a professional Blockchain software development company, we support our clients to leverage their business by using Blockchain technology for their trust-based technology. Get inspired by what we wrote? Do not hesitate to contact us via: hello@spiritlabs.co. Together, we will make your imagination become a real thing!
REFERENCE:
Article: The 5 Biggest Blockchain Trends In 2022 by Bernard Marr
Article: 8 Blockchain Trends for 2022 by Techfunnel Author
Article: The 5 Biggest Blockchain Trends In 2022 by Georgia Weston
