The Bitcoin network is currently facing a major traffic jam, with over 390,000 unconfirmed transactions causing a bottleneck in the mempool. The surge in unconfirmed transactions has led to a staggering 343% increase in transaction fees, which have risen from $1.99 per transaction to a current rate of $8.82 per transaction. The congestion can be attributed to the surge in minting and transferring of BRC20 tokens and Ordinal inscriptions flooding the network.

To clear the current backlog, a whopping 179 blocks would need to be mined, taking approximately 1.24 days. Despite the rise in activity, the situation has not led to a significant increase in Lightning Network adoption, as non-custodial solutions are few and far between.