XRP Ledger EVM Sidechain Surpasses 1,400 Smart Contracts

XRP is making waves in the blockchain world with its newly launched EVM-compatible sidechain, which has crossed an impressive milestone of over 1,400 smart contract deployments within just the first week. This achievement marks a significant technical feat for the XRP Ledger ecosystem, demonstrating the sidechain’s potential to attract decentralized applications and developers from across the crypto space.

The EVM (Ethereum Virtual Machine) sidechain, developed by Peersyst, is designed to bridge the functionality gap between Ethereum and the XRP Ledger. It allows developers to create Ethereum-like smart contracts directly on a Ripple-backed infrastructure, thus fusing Ethereum’s flexibility with XRP’s efficiency. According to a confirmation by Peersyst on July 7, nearly 1,400 contracts had already been launched — a number that quickly grew to 1,412 at time of reporting.

Despite this robust start in terms of developer activity, user engagement has been more subdued. Out of the 1,211 new accounts tied to the sidechain, over 80% were registered within the initial 48 hours after launch. Following this surge, account creation tapered off, and daily active accounts have remained under 150, indicating limited regular usage at this early stage.

Still, the spike in smart contract activity is a testament to growing developer interest. Protocols like Uniswap have already seen versions deployed on the platform. Moreover, the sidechain’s infrastructure supports various DeFi experiments and yield-earning mechanisms, suggesting that the foundations for more robust ecosystem development are being laid.

The technical performance of the XRP Ledger EVM sidechain has also been noteworthy. The network has already processed over 1.12 million blocks with an average block time of just 5.66 seconds. More impressively, there were no delayed transactions observed in a 30-minute monitoring window, emphasizing the sidechain’s high throughput and minimal congestion.

Transaction data further validates the sidechain’s performance. So far, the network has facilitated more than 1,644 XRP transfers, with 539 transactions executed over a single 24-hour period. These transactions only incurred a total cost of 26.1 XRP, averaging a mere 0.048 XRP per transaction. This cost-efficiency is a distinctive appeal for developers and users looking to build or interact with decentralized applications without worrying about high gas fees.

The XRPL EVM sidechain is emerging as a viable competitor in the environment of scalable smart contract platforms. While it has yet to achieve the user numbers seen on ecosystems like Ethereum or Solana, its strong performance metrics and Ethereum compatibility give it unique positioning among blockchain developers aiming to build on Ripple’s technology stack.

Importantly, this development aligns with Ripple’s broader goal of improving cross-chain compatibility and strengthening the utility of XRP. Strategic efforts such as Ripple’s partnership with Wormhole exemplify the company’s ambition to enable seamless interoperability across blockchain networks.

From a macro perspective, Ripple’s approach with this EVM-enabled network highlights its intent to blend the strengths of different blockchain models—high speed, low fees, and strong cross-chain functionality—into a singular developer-friendly platform. This could signal a paradigm shift in how smart contracts are deployed and used within the XRP ecosystem.

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As adoption grows and more developers explore XRP’s smart contract capabilities, the sidechain’s early momentum could snowball into long-term traction. For now, the early metrics—smart contracts deployed, transaction speeds, and costs—point toward a promising start for this ambitious addition to the Ripple-backed blockchain universe.