Tokenomics

Bittensor's tokenomics center on TAO , the network's native token. TAO drives all economic activity within the system. Unlike many blockchain projects, TAO was never sold to investors. The project avoided initial coin offerings (ICOs) and private sales entirely. Every token must be earned through network participation. The total supply is limited to 21 million tokens, following Bitcoin's scarcity approach.

The network introduces new TAO tokens through a structured emission system. This system distributes 7,200 TAO daily across the subnets, and up to 14,400 ALPHA daily per subnet. The network distributes rewards in ALPHA to three main groups. Miners receive the subnet's ALPHA for providing their compute/AI models. Validators earn ALPHA (or TAO) for checking the work done by miners. Subnet owners get their ALPHA from the owner cut for maintaining their subnet. Each miner and validator earns tokens based on their contribution.

Halving events help maintain long-term sustainability. These occur when specific supply thresholds are reached. New token creation then reduces by 50%. The network also includes a recycling feature. TAO spent on subnet registrations flows back into the emission pool.