Before we show you how to buy the cryptocurrency Shimmer, it’s important to have a basic understanding of IOTA. IOTA is a token and distributed ledger system originally designed for the Internet of Things. Its purpose is to facilitate low-resource, feeless machine-to-machine microtransactions. IOTA was introduced through a crowd sale in 2015, and it differs from traditional blockchains in that it uses a DAG (Directed Acyclic Graph) called the Tangle. The Tangle offers advantages over blockchains, such as the ability to process transactions in parallel, rather than being limited to predefined block intervals with restricted block space. Furthermore, users validate previous transactions when issuing their own, eliminating the need for energy-intensive mining and allowing for feeless transactions.
On September 28th, 2022, the Shimmer Network launched as a staging network for IOTA. It debuted with the Stardust Tokenisation Framework Protocol Upgrade, which transforms the Shimmer Network into a Tangle-based multi-asset ledger. This upgrade allows anyone to mint their own custom native tokens and NFTs without fees. Shimmer serves as a Layer 1 innovation network, functioning as a parallelized multi-chain settlement layer for EVM and Wasm-based smart contract chains. Its purpose is to establish a foundation for the growth of digital assets and customizable, interoperable token economies. Users and smart contract chains anchored to Shimmer can mint, manage, wrap, unwrap, and transact assets with other smart contract chains anchored to Shimmer, all without fees.