BNB: From Exchange Discount Coin to the Fuel of BNB Chain
Binance’s 2017 coin now pays fees and secures BNB Chain
BNB was created in 2017 by the cryptocurrency exchange Binance. It began as a way to pay lower trading fees and is now the gas and staking coin of BNB Chain.
1. Binance’s coin, moved twice
BNB was first sold in summer 2017 through an ICO (an initial coin offering, a token sale to raise funds) as the Binance exchange, founded by Changpeng Zhao (CZ), was opening. It started life as an ERC-20 token on Ethereum, with 200 million coins issued.
In April 2019 BNB moved to Binance’s own blockchain, Binance Chain. In September 2020 Binance Smart Chain was added to run smart contracts (programs that execute automatically on a blockchain), and in 2022 both were renamed under the BNB Chain brand. The old Beacon Chain was wound down in 2024, leaving BNB Smart Chain at the centre.
2. Staking and burns: how the chain works
BNB Smart Chain is compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), so Ethereum apps and wallets work on it. Blocks are produced under ‘proof of staked authority’ (PoSA), in which a relatively small set of validators backed by staked BNB take turns. Upgrades in 2025 (Lorentz and Maxwell) cut the block interval from three seconds to 0.75 seconds.
BNB’s supply shrinks in two ways: part of every fee is burned in real time (BEP-95), and a quarterly ‘Auto-Burn’ removes coins according to a published formula. Binance has said burning will continue until the total supply falls to 100 million.
3. Fees, exchange perks and meme coins
BNB pays transaction fees (gas) on BNB Smart Chain and on its layer-2 network opBNB, and validators and delegators stake it to secure the chain. On the Binance exchange it brings fee discounts and access to token distribution events such as Launchpool.
Low fees drew DeFi (decentralised finance) apps such as PancakeSwap and Venus, and meme-coin launchpads like four.meme. In 2023 the chain added opBNB, built with the OP Stack, and BNB Greenfield for data storage. On the Crypto Nation map, BNB is the city-hall tower at the centre of BNB Chain City, because it is that chain’s native coin.
4. Things to know: close ties to one company
BNB’s utility and burn policy depend largely on one company, so Binance’s business and regulatory situation can affect it directly. In November 2023 Binance admitted to US anti-money-laundering violations and agreed to pay about 4.3 billion dollars, and Changpeng Zhao stepped down and served a four-month sentence in 2024. He was pardoned by the US president in October 2025.
BNB Chain has far fewer validators than Ethereum and is often described as more centralised. Cheap, easy token creation also brings many short-lived meme coins and scams, so it is worth checking a token’s contract address and source.
Written from information public up to October 2026. It does not recommend or rate any coin and is not investment advice. If something is wrong, please tell us through the contact page.