Gas Fee
Cost of executing a transaction or smart contract on the blockchain.
A gas fee is the fee paid for executing operations on the blockchain — compensation for the computing power of validators processing transactions.
How it's calculated (Ethereum): Total fee = (Base Fee + Priority Fee) × Gas Limit
•Base Fee — minimum gas price, determined by network, burned (EIP-1559)
•Priority Fee (tip) — reward for validator priority
•Gas Limit — maximum amount of gas you authorize for the transaction
•Gwei — 1 gwei = 0.000000001 ETH
Gas for different operations:
•ETH transfer: 21,000 gas
•ERC-20 transfer: ~65,000 gas
•Uniswap swap: ~150,000 gas
•NFT mint: ~200,000+ gas
When gas is high:
•High network activity (NFT mint, airdrop claim, high market volatility)
•Solution: wait at night or weekends (less activity)
Alternatives to high gas:
•Layer 2 (Arbitrum, Optimism) — same smart contracts, 10–100x lower fees
•Solana, BNB Chain — alternative L1 with lower fees