How to Choose the Right Blockchain for Your Web3 Product

When building a blockchain-based product, there are many technical and non-technical factors to consider when selecting which blockchain network to build on. While gas fee is an important technical detail, there are other product and business considerations that should come first.

Starting with the Product and Users

Rather than jumping straight into the technical details, first think about the product you are building and the users it aims to serve.

Key questions to ask:

• Where are my target users already active? On which blockchains do they have existing wallets and assets? Building your product on a blockchain where you know your users are already active can significantly ease adoption.
• What other similar products have been successfully deployed? If there are existing products in your category on a particular blockchain, that's a good sign that the technology matches your use case.
• What infrastructure is available to support non-technical users? Factors like wallet accessibility, fiat on-ramps, regulatory clarity, and documentation resources can be just as important as core protocol features.

Evaluating Technical Factors

Once you've aligned on the business and user factors, you can dive deeper into the technical considerations for each blockchain.

Key questions to ask:

• Throughput and latency - How many transactions can the network support per second? How fast are transactions confirmed? The needs here will vary based on your product.
• Programming language and VM - What language is used to write smart contracts? Are there limitations in supporting certain feature needs? The compatibility of the virtual machine (VM) should also be taken into account.
• Portability considerations - What does it take to migrate or interconnect your product with other chains in the future?

Look at the Community Around

After validating the previous factors, you should check the communities around the blockchain. The communities play a central role in shaping the development, communication, and operation of the products, often attracting more users and fostering a strong ecosystem.

Key questions to ask:

• Do you know the team who develop the blockchain?
• How big is the community of developers and tech people around the blockchain?
• How fast can you get answers for your questions from support or the community?

Final Thoughts

The goal is to adopt a phased approach. After evaluating each factor, you will compile a list of potential blockchain candidates. Subsequently, you can make an approximate estimation of the product development requirements and the unit economics for your product.

Also understanding the features, quantity, and types of decentralised applications (dApps), as well as the developer base and community engagement for each blockchain can help predict the future valuation of that blockchain's native cryptocurrency.

Useful links

For conducting your research, there are various resources you can utilise, ranging from web3 stories on HackerNoon to blockchain homepages. Often, blockchain foundations provide comprehensive lists of products based on their blockchain.

Personally, I also frequently use the following websites: CoinMarketCap, DappRadar, and Alchemy