LI.FI's Declassified Bridge Survival Guide

aka The Bridge Resource Cheat Sheet

Here at LI.FI we have been hard at work building out an extensive knowledge hub of bridge resources. 

Today, we’re releasing our cheat sheet… To put it in LI.FI terms: 

We are aggregating all of our bridge resources, abstracting away the end-user's need to search for bridge information, and putting everything in one document. 

Part 1: Essential Reading

Bridging 101 (brought to you by the LI.FI research team)

• The Bridge Stack

  • a snapshot of the bridging industry in Q2 2022

• With Bridges, Trust is a Spectrum

  • an analysis of design tradeoffs different bridges make

• Blockchain Bridges

  • everything you need to know about bridges (written for Ethereum.org)

• What are Blockchain Bridges and How Can We Classify Them?

  • a breakdown of trusted vs. trustless bridges

• Bridgeducation Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3

  • Research extraordinaire Arjun Chand drops 10+ resources on bridging in each thread…

OG Articles (written by the industry OGs)

• The Interoperability Trilemma, Arjun Bhuptani

  • a bridge can be X+Y, X+Z, or even Y+Z…  but never XYZ

• Blockchain Bridges: Building Networks of Cryptonetworks, Dmitriy Berenzon

  • why bridges should be evaluated on security, speed, connectivity, capital efficiency, and statefulness

• The Bridges Are Dead, Long Live The Bridges!, Zee Prime Capital

  • tying together the different cross, multi, and omni-chain solutions. 

• Secure The Bridge: Cross-Chain Communication Done Right, Part I, Celia Wan

  • five questions bridge users ask themselves before, ahem, using a bridge. 

• Thoughts on Interoperability, DecryptCrypto

  • why cross-chain messaging is important

Aggregating the Aggregators

• The Daily Ape has two sections on cross-chain solutions…

  • Part 1: links to 20+ resources examining the cross-chain industry

  • Part 2: links to resources on 23 cross-chain solutions (including LI.FI)

• Nomad’s Awesome Interoperability

  • a curated list of interoperability resources, libraries, tools, and more… 

Part 2: Fun Tools

But what about bridge data, information, and tools for analysis? 

Here are five tools you can utilize to navigate the bridging industry: 

• DappRadar

A great place to start with any research project in crypto is DappRadar. Excuse the real-world reference, but it is like the Yellow Pages of crypto, as it collects information on every dApp, protocol, or chain in the metaverse. 

In the context of bridging, you can simply go to dappradar.com, type in the bridge/protocol of interest, and DappRadar will serve you usage statistics, along with where to find more information on the bridge via socials and documentation. 

Example: Polygon PoS Bridge (a bridge supported by LI.FI)

• Token Terminal

Token Terminal tracks a robust set of statistics (from total revenue to transaction volume) for 50+ protocols. 

Among those protocols include LI.FI supported bridges like Connext and Hop, along with others like Ren and Synapse. 

Example: Connext Revenue vs. Hop, Ren, Synapse

• DeFi Llama

DeFi Llama is the OG database for dApp explorers and has recently expanded to include bridges.

Which bridge has the most TVL? What is the largest bridge connecting to Gnosis? DeFi Llama has the answer. 

Example: Ranking the 10 largest bridges by TVL

• Bridge Away

Elias Simos, co-founder and CEO of Rated Labs, spun up a Dune Analytics dashboard called “Bridge Away” that particularly drips with alpha. 

Based on Elias’ dashboard, a bridgeooor and/or researchoor can easily find out that Polygon bridges offer the most TVL leaving Ethereum (which is more than Arbitrum and Optimism combined). 

• Bridgedex

Julia Wu, an “Entrepreneur-In-Residence with Human Capital and Bain Capital Crypto,” created one of my favorite bridging tools: a searchable knowledge base for bridges. 

The tool is simple. Choose a source chain, choose a destination chain, choose a token… and Bridgedex populates the available routes, along with TVL information and fees. 

Example: Julia’s thread on releasing bridgedex.xyz. 

Part 3: Conclusion

Hope this covered everything! If we missed anything, tweet at either @mark_murdock3 or @arjunnchand… and we will definitely respond (at any time of the day). 

To learn more about LI.FI and bridging…

• Head to our link portal at links.li.fi

• Read our SDK ‘quick start’ at docs.li.fi

• Join the official Discord server

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• Follow us on Twitter & LinkedIn

or try our any-2-any swaps NOW at transferto.xyz