Proposal: Decrease the transaction fees

[GrothenDI]

Simple Summary

Currently, the transaction fees on TRON continue to rise, making it imperative to reduce fees in order to enhance TRON's competitive advantage and promote the development of the ecosystem.

Motivation

The TRON network has long been known for its high performance. However, as the price of TRX rises, increasingly high transaction fees are eroding this advantage. Higher transaction fees are crucial for the security and stability of the TRON network, but they also hinder the growth of the TRON ecosystem.

To ensure the sustainable and healthy development of the TRON ecosystem, it is essential to reduce current transaction fees.

Specification

I propose reducing the energy unit price from 210 sun to 100 sun. It will reduce the burning transaction fees by half.

How to Initialize the Voting Request

This is the command of initiating the voting request:

• createProposal 11 100

Timeline

Any opinions and discussions about this proposal are welcome before voting.

The estimated timeline:

• Creation time of the voting request: 26th August 2025
• The effective time of voting request: 29th August 2025

Background

Based on the previous discussion #771, since 2024, the price of TRX has shown a clear upward trend, having increased by about 2 times compared to its earlier value. This rise in TRX price has directly led to significantly higher transaction fees compared to 2024, setting a higher barrier for users and developers participating in the TRON ecosystem and constraining its development.

The trend of TRX price changes is shown in the chart below:

The impact of TRX price appreciation on typical on-chain transaction fees is shown in the table below:

Period	Avg. TRX Price	USDT Transfer Fees	TRC20 Transfer Fees	SUN SWAP V3 Fees (No Subsidy)
2024-Q1	$0.12	$1.64	$0.67	$11.89
2024-Q2	$0.12	$1.58	$0.65	$11.48
2024-Q3	$0.14	$1.91	$0.39	$6.90
2024-Q4	$0.21	$2.80	$0.57	$10.08
2025-Q1	$0.24	$3.22	$0.65	$11.59
2025-Q2	$0.26	$3.52	$0.71	$12.68
2025-Q3	$0.32	$4.28	$0.87	$15.41

Based on Proposal #95, the energy unit price was reduced to half its previous level, but the maximum increase factor of dynamic energy model was simultaneously adjusted. Currently, the maximum increase factor of dynamic energy model only applies to the USDT contract.

When denominated in TRX:
USDT transfer fees remain unchanged, while transaction fees for other contracts are halved.

When denominated in USD:
As the price of TRX continues to rise, USDT fees increase correspondingly. For other contracts, since the current TRX price has more than doubled compared to when Proposal #95 was executed, the earlier 50% reduction in energy unit price has been completely offset—resulting in fees rising instead of falling.

Consequently, overall transaction fees for all categories have increased significantly compared to last year.

Analysis

Impact on potential on-chain user scale

The table below analyzes the potential increase in users capable of completing a typical USDT transfer transaction through energy burning. It shows that reducing the energy unit price from 210 sun to 100 sun could add 12 million potential transfer users, enabling broader participation in the TRON ecosystem.

Energy Price (unit:sun)	Change%	Transfer Threshold (TRX)	Transfer Threshold (USD-7/31）	Eligible Accounts	Growth%
210	±0%	13.5	$4.28	26,874,075	±0%
190	-10%	12.2	$4.0	28,595,176	+6%
170	-19%	11.0	$3.6	29,891,921	+11%
150	-29%	9.7	$3.1	32,047,720	+19%
130	-38%	8.4	$2.7	33,361,085	+24%
100	-52%	6.4	$2.0	38,962,249	+45%
80	-62%	5.2	$1.7	42,065,640	+57%
60	-71%	3.9	$1.3	45,946,807	+71%

Impact on ecosystem development

Analyzing from the dimension of newly deployed contracts:

After excluding the impact of Sunpump’s launch in August last year on contract numbers, the daily count of newly deployed contracts has shown an upward trend since #95 halved the energy unit price. This demonstrates that fees reductions promote ecosystem growth.

Impact on on-chain TRX supply

Using TRX supply data (new generated and burned quantities) from June 30 to July 28, the following trend changes were calculated:

Reduction Percentage	Energy Unit Price(SUN)	TRX Supply Change During Period	Trend
current	210	-76,125,070 TRX	reduce
20% reduction	168	-38,419,262 TRX	reduce
30% reduction	147	-19,220,855 TRX	reduce
40% reduction	126	-252,783 TRX	reduce
50% reduction	105	18,715,289 TRX	increase
75% reduction	53	66,135,469 TRX	increase

The table reveals that reducing fees by 50% would shift on-chain TRX supply into an inflationary trend.

However, lowering transaction fees can stimulate increased transaction volume, potentially boosting future TRX burning scale.

Continuous monitoring of on-chain transaction metrics and periodic parameter adjustments are essential to promote the sustainable and healthy development of the chain.

[GordonLtron]

I am not sure how the reduction in the transaction fees would attract more developers to TRON, but it is definitely a good proposal for those who using USDT transfer daily!

[Sunny6889]

I agree, it is a urgent need to reduce transaction fee comparing with other popular networks.

[bladehan1]

How many new transactions can keep the TRX supply constant? If calculated based on USDT transfers

[GrothenDI]

How many new transactions can keep the TRX supply constant? If calculated based on USDT transfers

The current TRX is in a deflationary state. By reducing the energy unit price by approximately 45%, the TRX supply can remain stable without needing to increase transaction volume.

According to the fee reduction ratio proposed(about 52.38%), assuming the transaction scale remains unchanged, TRX will experience inflation with an inflation rate of approximately 0.25%. If the fee reduction can lead to an 26.4% increase in the burning transaction scale or 4.6% increase in the total transaction scale, the inflation will be offset.

[waynercheung]

How to balance the relationship between transaction fee reduction and TRX unit price?
For example, if fees decrease, the amount of TRX burned will be reduced. Will this affect TRX's deflationary status, thus impacting its price?

[GrothenDI]

How to balance the relationship between transaction fee reduction and TRX unit price? For example, if fees decrease, the amount of TRX burned will be reduced. Will this affect TRX's deflationary status, thus impacting its price?

In the long run, reducing fees will increase the transaction volume of TRX burning, thereby lowering the likelihood of inflation.
In the short term, if inflation occurs, it may indeed reduce the price of TRX. However, this short-term price decline would further decrease the transaction fees required for burning TRX, consequently driving up the volume of TRX burned.
Therefore, over the long term, fee reductions will not harm TRX's price.

[lxcmyf]

After lowering the energy price, will the network’s resistance to spam transactions be weakened?
Should additional anti-spam mechanisms be introduced to mitigate potential risks?
How will the reduced energy price affect the total TRX burned and the inflation/deflation balance?
Is there an estimation of the impact on the revenue of nodes and Super Representatives (SRs)?

[GrothenDI]

After lowering the energy price, will the network’s resistance to spam transactions be weakened? Should additional anti-spam mechanisms be introduced to mitigate potential risks? How will the reduced energy price affect the total TRX burned and the inflation/deflation balance? Is there an estimation of the impact on the revenue of nodes and Super Representatives (SRs)?

For the first question, assuming the TRX price remains unchanged, the cost of spam transactions would still be relatively high even after the fee reduction. Therefore, I believe no immediate adjustment to the anti-spam mechanism is necessary.

For the second question, please refer to Impact on on-chain TRX supply and my last reply of long term trx price prediction.

[xiaomudan778]

Agree with below reasons:

The community analysis suggests that while reducing transaction fees may result in short-term revenue decline and potential inflation, historical data and projections indicate the possibility of TRON gaining approximately 12 million additional tradeable accounts and maintaining sustained growth in smart contract transactions. The reduction would also help narrow the competitive gap with other major blockchain platforms, supporting TRON's long-term strategic positioning.

The implementation of this proposal would require ongoing monitoring. Regular adjustments to energy unit prices could help maintain TRON's competitive position within the blockchain ecosystem.

[LeeHongJun123]

Hi I'm just a dev that just build a project about tron network , I wonder how does the energy unit price 210 is calculated ? Because based on the website in tronscan 1trx = 1000000 sun , so it's abit confusing for me , although I do know the main message of this proposal already mention which is to reduce the cost of transaction , just pure curiosity please answer me , maybe it help me in future to think ways to cut costs

[GrothenDI]

Hi I'm just a dev that just build a project about tron network , I wonder how does the energy unit price 210 is calculated ? Because based on the website in tronscan 1trx = 1000000 sun , so it's abit confusing for me , although I do know the main message of this proposal already mention which is to reduce the cost of transaction , just pure curiosity please answer me , maybe it help me in future to think ways to cut costs

1 TRX = 1,000,000 SUN is the conversion rate between TRX and SUN. They are both currency units on TRON, similar to ETH and Gwei on Ethereum.

210 SUN is the energy unit price currently. In TRON, energy is similar to gas in Ethereum, and the energy unit price is similar to the base fee in Ethereum.

If a transaction consumes 500 energy (like 500 gas in Ethereum), and you choose to burn TRX to pay for this transaction, the TRX burned would be:

500 × 210 × 10^-6 TRX

(Since 1 TRX = 1,000,000 SUN , 1 SUN = 10^-6 TRX.)

If the current proposal is finally approved and takes effect, the TRX burned would change to:

500 × 100 × 10^-6 TRX

(Because the new energy unit price would be 100 SUN instead of 210 SUN.)

[lopeed]

If you check next comparative table:

https://gasfeesnow.com/

Then Tron needs be point to change his fee system to be competitive in the next years.

I suppose the easy thing to do is to reduce fees or block rewards, but perhaps creating an automatic system that stabilizes these fees during each maintenance period would be essential for the ecosystem and there will be users for and against, but we are talking about an effective solution for the rest of the time and not always depending on modifications to chain parameters, when it should be something automated.

[simbadMarino]

If you check next comparative table:

https://gasfeesnow.com/

Then Tron needs be point to change his fee system to be competitive in the next years.

I suppose the easy thing to do is to reduce fees or block rewards, but perhaps creating an automatic system that stabilizes these fees during each maintenance period would be essential for the ecosystem and there will be users for and against, but we are talking about an effective solution for the rest of the time and not always depending on modifications to chain parameters, when it should be something automated.

I agree on this, for now its ok to proceed with this reduction, however, a more robust and automated way to adjust fees is needed so TRON remains agile enough to adjust its fees and to relying on manual updates.

Now that we have Chainlink price oracles integrated on TRON, it's worth exploring how we can leverage this to adjust energy/bandwidth prices.

Payments processors and users love fees predictability, so we have to find a better way to make TRON fees less dependent on TRX price