What is Hedera?
Hedera is a public network that uses hashgraph consensus rather than a traditional blockchain, offering low, fixed-dollar fees and fast finality. It is governed by the Hedera Council, a group of large companies and institutions, and HBAR pays fees and secures the network through staking.
Utility Lens
What Hedera actually does
Offers predictable-fee services for logging data, issuing tokens and running smart contracts, aimed at enterprise and public-sector use.
- Real-world usage
- growingThe network processes large numbers of transactions, many from data-logging services, and enterprise pilots are increasing, though DeFi activity is small.
- Token necessity
- essentialEvery transaction fee is paid in HBAR and staked HBAR weights consensus.
- Decentralization
- limitedConsensus nodes are run by Council members rather than open to anyone, although the code is open source under the Linux Foundation.
- Track record
- provenMainnet since 2018 (open access 2019); a March 2023 smart-contract exploit led Hedera to temporarily disable network proxies.
What it’s used for
Companies use Hedera's consensus service to timestamp and order records, and its token service to issue assets. Developers also deploy Ethereum-compatible smart contracts. HBAR holders can stake to a node to help weight consensus, and since October 2025 US investors can buy a spot HBAR ETF.
Role of the HBAR token:
Evidence of real use
- Hedera contributed its full codebase to the Linux Foundation Decentralized Trust as the Hiero project in September 2024. Source
- Accenture joined the Hedera Council in April 2026. Source
- The Hedera Council capped staking rewards at 2.5% and tied them to HBAR's fixed 50 billion total supply. Source
ISO 20022: claim vs. reality
- What’s documented
- We found no documented ISO 20022 role for Hedera: neither Hedera nor the Hedera Council appears on the ISO 20022 Registration Management Group roster, and Hedera's documentation mentions ISO 20022 only as a glossary definition. Some Council members are banks and payment companies that use ISO 20022 in their own businesses, which is a separate matter.
- What you’ll hear online
- Posts circulating in 2026 say Swift 'completed ISO 20022 testing with Hedera' and has built HBAR into the global banking standard.
- Reality check
- We could not find any Swift announcement confirming that claim; it traces to social media and price-commentary sites. ISO 20022 is a bank messaging standard and does not certify or endorse any cryptocurrency, so a token cannot be 'integrated into' the standard.
How Hedera works
Instead of bundling transactions into blocks, hashgraph nodes 'gossip' about the transactions they have seen and keep a shared record of who told whom what and when. From this history, every node can calculate the same order of transactions and agree on it without voting rounds. The result is fast finality, typically within seconds, and fees set in US-dollar terms so costs stay predictable.
Nodes are operated by members of the Hedera Council, which includes large technology firms, banks, universities and others. Council members vote on software upgrades and treasury decisions. HBAR holders can stake to a node, which increases that node's weight in consensus and earns a modest reward. Membership is term-limited, and in April 2026 Accenture joined as a member. Because only Council members run consensus nodes today, Hedera is often described as permissioned at the node level even though anyone can use the network.
Hedera offers ready-made services, including a consensus service for timestamped messages, a token service and an Ethereum-compatible smart-contract service. Since 2024 the underlying software has been maintained as the open-source Hiero project. That move placed development under a neutral open-source home rather than a single company. Hedera also supports Ethereum tooling through its JSON-RPC relay, so developers can use familiar wallets and libraries.
Key moments
- 2018Hedera mainnet launches with Council-run nodes.
- 2019The network opens to the public and HBAR begins trading.
- 2023An exploit of the smart contract service leads Hedera to disable proxies temporarily while a fix is deployed.
- 2024Hedera donates its codebase to the Linux Foundation as Hiero.
- 2025The first US spot HBAR ETF launches on Nasdaq in October.
Supply
HBAR has a fixed total supply of 50 billion, all created at genesis. The Hedera treasury releases tokens over time, and staking rewards come from existing HBAR rather than new issuance.
Risks to understand
- Governance concentration: a limited set of Council organizations runs the nodes and approves changes.
- Treasury releases of unreleased HBAR can add supply to the market.
- Much transaction volume comes from a few data-logging applications, which can overstate broad economic activity.
- Misleading social-media claims about Swift or ISO 20022 can drive speculative swings unrelated to fundamentals.
Hedera FAQ
Is Hedera a blockchain?
Technically it uses a hashgraph, a different data structure, but it does the same job of keeping a shared, tamper-resistant ledger.
Who runs Hedera?
Nodes are run by Hedera Council members, a group of large organizations that also vote on upgrades and treasury management.
Did Swift integrate HBAR for ISO 20022?
We found no Swift source confirming this. ISO 20022 is a messaging standard and does not approve or integrate specific tokens.
Sources
- Hiero Turns One: Graduation and Growth — Hedera
- Hedera Council — Hedera Council
- Hedera Governing Council Votes to Approve Changes to Staking Algorithm — Hedera
- Analysis & Remediation of the Precompile Attack on the Hedera Network — Hedera
- Hedera Docs glossary: ISO 20022 — Hedera
- Registration Management Group member list — ISO 20022 Registration Authority
Last reviewed October 4, 2026 by The Crypto Guide editorial team. Utility Lens ratings are editorial judgments, not investment advice. Market data from CoinGecko. Spot an error? Request a correction.