A WORD ON THE
LIGHTNING NETWORK

Bitcoin blocks are intentionally small* (1MB each), resulting in the bitcoin mainchain being able to process about 7 transactions per second (TPS).

Visa processes about 24,000 TPS.

Also, it generally takes about 10 minutes for the first confirmation to go through on a mainchain transaction (since a block is mined on average every ~10 minutes).

This is not practical if you are at a store and want to make a quick payment for your goods.

* Important Detail: The reason the blocks are small, is to keep the timechain small enough for anyone to run their own node at home, which helps keep the network decentralized. Satoshi realized the importance of this ↓

Bitcoin users might get increasingly tyrannical about limiting the size of the chain so it's easy for lots of users and small devices.

~ Satoshi Nakamoto
2010-12-10