Research corpus ScalingBLC-STUDY-0667

Basis of Lightning Technology: the public protocol specifications

The BOLTs are the public specification of Lightning: channels, commitments, and routed payments on top of Bitcoin, not a single company's product.

Official external source only
Design paper
Official source

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Record

Authors: Lightning protocol authors
Date: 2016
Publisher: Lightning protocol authors
Version: Source cited by the 2016 study. The study is the reading. This page does not add a second essay.
Document ID: BLC-STUDY-0667
DOI: None recorded
Last reviewed: 1 October 2026
Licence: No licence recorded. Rights status under review.

No hash is published. This build does not store those PDF bytes, so a checksum would be invented. Where a legacy path exists, it points at the Internet Archive copy of the old library.

Direct answer

The BOLTs are the public specification of Lightning: channels, commitments, and routed payments on top of Bitcoin, not a single company's product.

Where to read

Official source — Lightning BOLTs
Blockchain Lab study, the canonical readingOriginal commentary. Not a transcription of the paper.

Metadata and commentary only. The reading is the study page.

Full text

Full text is not published on this page. Public availability is not a licence to republish a document. Blockchain Lab has not recorded a licence that permits an HTML transcription, a training set, or a retrieval corpus of the paper. Text on this page is Blockchain Lab's own wording, or a pointer to a study that is also Blockchain Lab's wording.

What changed

A reading of the project's public design document. Not a copy, not a benchmark, and not an offer.

Relationships

Canonical readingLightning BOLTs study
Related paperLightning
Related paperEltoo
Related paperBitcoin

Cite this record

These citations point at the source document. They are not a licence to copy it.

Author–date

Lightning protocol authors (2016). Basis of Lightning Technology: the public protocol specifications. Lightning protocol authors. https://github.com/lightning/bolts

BibTeX

@techreport{lightningbolts2016,
  title = {Basis of Lightning Technology: the public protocol specifications},
  author = {Lightning protocol authors},
  year = {2016},
  institution = {Lightning protocol authors},
  url = {https://github.com/lightning/bolts},
  note = {Rights status: Official external source only. Blockchain Lab record: https://blockchainlab.com/research/corpus/papers/lightning-bolts}
}

RIS

TY  - RPRT
TI  - Basis of Lightning Technology: the public protocol specifications
AU  - Lightning protocol authors
PY  - 2016
PB  - Lightning protocol authors
UR  - https://github.com/lightning/bolts
N1  - Rights status: Official external source only
ER  -

CSL-JSON

[
  {
    "type": "report",
    "id": "BLC-STUDY-0667",
    "title": "Basis of Lightning Technology: the public protocol specifications",
    "author": [
      {
        "literal": "Lightning protocol authors"
      }
    ],
    "issued": {
      "date-parts": [
        [
          2016
        ]
      ]
    },
    "publisher": "Lightning protocol authors",
    "URL": "https://github.com/lightning/bolts",
    "note": "Rights status: Official external source only. Not a licence to republish the paper."
  }
]

JSON BibTeX file RIS file CSL-JSON

Rights record

Source status: Official source
Use status: Metadata and commentary only. The reading is the study page.
Rights: Official external source only
Training and retrieval: Not permitted from this site. There is no rights-cleared full text to retrieve or to train on.

Rights and licensing Corrections