A Complete Guide to Hedera (HBAR)
Everyone is looking for the next great cryptocurrency play. There are plenty of speculative tokens, but one token that is garnering a lot of attention, especially in the past year, is Hedera (HBAR). After experiencing major growth in early 2025, speculators are trying to make an accurate Hedera price prediction.
In this guide, you will learn all that there is to know about Hedera (HBAR). Below is a brief history of Hedera (HBAR), what makes it unique, how the consensus protocol works, and what kind of things can be found within the Hedera ecosystem.
What is Hedera (HBAR)?
Hedera is a decentralized public network meant to change how digital applications and transactions work. Rather than using traditional blockchain technology, Hedera employs the Hashgraph consensus mechanism. This allows transactions to process fairly, faster, and with a higher level of security that stands out in the distributed ledger world.
Hedera was created to handle some of the limitations that challenge traditional blockchains like massive energy consumption and slow transaction speeds. Hedera is scalable, eco-friendly, and efficient, giving both businesses and developers the opportunity to create anything from decentralized applications to secure payment systems.
Who are the Founders of Hedera (HBAR)?
Hedera was initially the brainchild of Dr. Leemon Baird, though he would partner with co-founder Mance Harmon to officially found the project in 2017. Dr. Baird, a computer scientist with an expertise in cryptography and distributed computing, is the man behind the Hashgraph algorithm. Harmon has history in leadership roles, both in the tech industry and the U.S. Air Force.
In August 2018, the Hedera mainnet was introduced via live beta, eventually becoming available to the public. The duo created the Hedera Governing Council to oversee the growth and development of the Hashgraph, featuring major global enterprises like Google, IBM, and the London School of Economics.
What Makes Hedera (HBAR) Unique?
An effective blockchain is only as good as the things that make it stand apart from the rest. Created with enterprise-level efficiency and security, Hedera has more than a few things that help it stand apart from industry peers.
Payments and Micropayments
Cost is a major hurdle when it comes to digital payments. Hedera is capable of processing huge quantities of transactions both quickly and cheaply, making it actually possible to handle micropayments. These fees are a fraction of a penny, making them far more manageable.
This opens a world of possibilities for pay-to-view content. Not only that, it is capable of handling transactions quickly, in most cases almost instantly. For businesses, credit card processing fees can be cut down tremendously, making it possible to have a more diverse, comprehensive payment system.
Supply Chain Management
Hedera has huge potential for supply chain management, from raw materials all the way to the finished product. All of this would be recorded within Hedera’s secure, shared ledger. Unchangeable records can be kept of where the product originated, who handled it, when these things happened, and more.
This makes it possible to stop counterfeiting because verifying authentication becomes a matter of checking the ledger history. Hedera is capable of creating transparent, secure, and efficient tracking for goods, making the supply chain as a whole far more trustworthy and reliable.
Decentralized Finance (DeFi)
Many major blockchains are working in DeFi, aiming to cut out traditional intermediaries. With real-world asset tokenization, it will be possible to take real-world assets like artwork or real estate and turn it into a token that can be traded or sold quickly and easily.
With low fees and a high throughput, Hedera is making fractional ownership more practical for users. People will be able to trade cryptocurrencies on a peer-to-peer basis without having to use a middleman like a bank or financial institution. Even better, users can participate in the ecosystem, ensuring tustworthiness.
How Many Hedera (HBAR) Coins are There in Circulation?
At its creation, Hedera was built with 50 billion HBAR tokens in the maximum supply. Though all 50 billion HBAR coins were minted prior to the launch of the mainnet in 2018, the maximum supply has not yet hit circulation.
As of May 2025, more than 42 billion HBAR have been distributed. The Hedera Governing Council has a distribution schedule for the release of all the pre-minted tokens within its treasury. There is no way to know when all 50 billion HBAR will reach public distribution.
How is the Hedera (HBAR) Network Secured?
The Hedera blockchain is secured using the Hashgraph consensus algorithm. It is essentially a voting protocol where trusted validators on the chain vote on transactions. It has been constructed so that no single member can keep the protocol from coming to a consensus on transactions.
Hashgraph is fair, fast, secure, and creates trust within the Hedera (HBAR) community. It has a few key benefits, most notably cost. It is highly inexpensive because it avoids the Proof-of-Work concept. Hashgraph nodes don’t need to have expensive mining rig to participate, instead being able to run off cost-efficient hardware. The Hashgraph wastes no computational resources because it doesn’t require resource-intensive processes like the aforementioned Proof-of-Work concept.
Another major benefit of using a consensus voting protocol is that throughput is high. The Hashgraph is quite fast, and its only limitation is its bandwidth. Even simple, fast home internet connections re enough to handle transactions quickly and easily.
Hedera Ecosystem
The beauty of the Hedera (HBAR) ecosystem is that it is capable of handling a litany of processes. Whether it be Web3 applications, enterprise applications, grants & accelerators, tooling & integration, network explorers, or wallets & custodians, it can all be found in one convenient place.
- Web3 Applications: Hedera (HBAR) is home to Web3 applications like HashPack, Citadel Wallet, LimeChain, and others that provide innovation through infrastructure development, tokenization, and data integration.
- Enterprise Applications: Enterprise blockchain solutions from BitGo, tejouri, ioBuilders, and others, connecting digital asset programs, blockchain solutions, and secure storage.
- Wallets & Custodians: Connecting crypto exchanges and wallets like Blade Wallet, Bank Social, and the Hedera Wallet on MetaMask for non-custodial wallets, staking rewards, and more.
- Network Explorers: Sentx, Hashpoint Research, and Hash Scan provide NFT insights, allowing users to analyze Hedera’s NFT ecosystem, taking raw data and turning it into refined insight and key market metrics.
- Tooling & Integrations: Tools like Supra, LinkPool, QuickNode, and Pyth Network are able to take real-time market feeds and price feeds and provide reliable, scalable performance for accurate data and better smart contracts.
- Grants & Accelerators: Through partnerships with HeadStarter, The Hashgraph Association, and the Hedera Foundation, entrepreneurs and builders can find grants, particularly for early DeFi projects on the Hedera blockchain.
FAQs
What is the highest and lowest price for Hedera (HBAR)?
Since its launch in 2019, Hedera (HBAR) has had many big drops and even bigger rises. Its all-time high price is $0.5692, while the all-time low price was $0.009861 at one point. Though it has since dropped, it is still trading at more than 2,000% its all-time low price.
What is the market cap of Hedera (HBAR)?
The market cap of a token is determined by taking the current market value of a single token and multiplying it by the total number of coins in circulation. With a total supply of 42.238 billion HBAR in circulation, Hedera (HBAR) has a market cap of roughly $8.851 billion USD currently. The market cap of a token can fluctuate consistently as the market price of each token shifts with market changes.
What is the fully diluted valuation of Hedera (HBAR)?
The fully diluted valuation of a token is determined by taking the market value of a token and multiplying it by the total number of tokens, also known as the maximum supply. When it was created, Hedera (HBAR) was given a total supply of 50 billion HBAR. Currently, with a market value of $0.2096 per token, Hedera (HBAR) has a fully diluted valuation of $10.478 billion USD. There are currently more than 42 billion HBAR in circulation.
What is the history of Hedera?
Hedera was the brain child of computer scientist Leemon Baird in 2015. His goal was to create a distributed consensus with scalability that would eventually become “the trust layer of the internet.” His work on the Hashgraph Consensus Algorithm led to the creation of Swirlds, Inc. with partner Mance Harmon later that same year.
In 2016, the duo managed to conjure up seed funding in order to build out their public distributed ledger, launching that project under the name Hashgraph Consortium LLC. In just over two years, on August 24, 2018, the Hedera mainnet went live in a beta.
Hedera launched the Hedera Governing Council as a means of overseeing the development and growth of the aforementioned Hedera Hashgraph. On the council is a litany of global enterprises consisting of the London School of Economics, IBM, Google, TATA Communications, and Swirlds, Inc., among many others.
The company has since implemented smart contracts and most of management moved to Swirlds Labs, an affiliate partially owned by Swirlds, Inc. The latest development came in early 2024 with the launch of the Hedera Wallet Snap, a plugin for MetaMask.
What are the potential use cases of Hedera?
Hedera (HBAR) was created with a litany of uses in mind, appealing to a broad range of industries. Perhaps the most significant use case is in the field of supply chain management. Security and transparency allow users to track products from start to finish. Hedera is capable of handling decentralized finance (DeFi) applications, allowing users to engage in borrowing, lending, and trading.
Other use cases include secure voting systems, digital asset management, identity verification, and more. Each of these use cases has a potentially critical impact on the sectors listed.
How do network consensus and validation work on Hedera?
Validation and consensus on the Hedera (HBAR) network is done through a consensus algorithm, done through virtual voting. The Hashgraph consensus allows validators within the blockchain to vote on transactions in order to approve their validity.
Implementing the Hashgraph consensus means that the blockchain is capable of handling thousands of transactions in just a few seconds. It also means that the blockchain is far more energy efficient than most of its peers that use some kind of Proof-of-Work concept that requires tremendous resources.
What is the maximum token supply of Hedera (HBAR)?
When it was created, Hedera (HBAR) was given a maximum token supply of 50 billion HBAR. Since its launch, more than 42 billion HBAR have been distributed in some manner.
How much has the price of HBAR changed over the past year?
Like many other cryptocurrencies, HBAR has had a series of peaks and valleys in the past year of trading. It held at around $0.11 per coin in May 2024, dropping slowly until it cratered out at $0.04 in November 2024. Beginning around Christmas 2024, Hedera (HBAR) began to see a sharp rise. By January 16, 2025, it managed to climb to $0.40 per token, though it has since trended downward an now sits at roughly $0.21 per HBAR.