First published 12 May 2021, two days after the genesis unlock. Expanded in October 2026 so cycles are not described as a second coin, and so a neuron is not described as interest. The Internet Computer is a network of subnet blockchains that host software in units called canisters. DFINITY, the organisation Dominic Williams founded, built it. ICP is the token. You stake it to vote, and you burn it to pay for computation. The network’s own governance, the Network Nervous System, can upgrade the code the nodes run and can add machines. That is a different design from a chain whose rules are not voted each week.
On 10 May 2021 the genesis unlock began. People who had joined a 2017 sale or a 2018 distribution could claim, after identity checks. On the order of 470 million ICP existed then. Much of the early supply was already inside neurons with staged unlocks. That claim window is history. A site that offers to finish it, and asks for a recovery phrase, is not the Network Nervous System.
Cycles are the fee. ICP is what you burn to get them
A developer loads a canister with cycles. Cycles pay for compute, storage, and bandwidth. Users of that canister often pay nothing, because the developer already did. That is the reverse of Ethereum, where the person sending the transaction bids for the block. Ethereum without the jargon is that other meter. Here the meter is on the application.
Cycles are created by burning ICP. They are fuel, not a token you withdraw to an exchange. The network prices them off a basket of currencies, so the ICP destroyed for a given amount of compute moves with the ICP price. The developer’s bill in cycles is the part that was designed to stay predictable. A cycle balance is not a second ICP balance.
There is no fixed cap. Voting rewards mint ICP. Node providers who run the machines are paid in ICP, which is also a mint. Burning ICP for cycles is the sink. A supply number from genesis is a historical figure. The live supply is whatever those three flows have done since.
A neuron is a lock with a vote
Staking ICP creates a neuron. You set a dissolve delay, up to eight years. Longer locks have more voting power. Rewards accrue as maturity, which can be minted into new ICP. You can also set a neuron to follow another neuron’s votes. Following is a delegation of the vote. It is not a custody arrangement that removes the lock. Leaving means starting the dissolve and waiting out the delay you chose. Staking is a lock and a queue, not a savings account. A dashboard percentage is that day, not a contract.
The design at genesis allocated voting rewards near 10 percent of supply a year and scheduled that share to fall toward 5 percent over eight years. That is the schedule as written. It is not a quote of the reward on a neuron you open today. An ICP account identifier is not an Ethereum address and not a Bitcoin address, even when a wallet prints it in hex. The wrong network is still the wrong city. Nothing here is an instruction to buy, stake, or dissolve ICP.
