On February 20, 2025, after greater than six years of cellular mining and three years of closed mainnet operation, Pi Community lastly dropped its firewall and let PI commerce.
Abstract
- Pi Community opened its mainnet firewall on February 20, 2025, permitting PI to commerce externally.
- PI reached an all-time excessive of $2.99 after launch earlier than falling close to $0.15 by Could 2026.
- Protocol 23 activated good contracts on Pi Mainnet, opening the trail for Pi DEX and Launchpad.
- Pi nonetheless faces tier-1 change gaps, KYC migration delays, and provide unlock stress.
Fifteen months later, the value has settled round $0.15, good contracts have simply gone dwell on mainnet, and the undertaking is in the course of a significant protocol improve. The story between these two factors is dense, and most readers have by no means seen it specified by one place. That is the chronology, sourced the place attainable to Pi’s personal bulletins, of what Pi Community has carried out since opening the gate.
The start line
To make sense of the place Pi sits in Could 2026, it helps to recollect the place it started.
Pi Community began in 2019 as a cellular app from a gaggle of Stanford-affiliated researchers, with founders Nicolas Kokkalis and Chengdiao Fan nonetheless on the helm right now. The pitch was uncommon from the beginning. Pi could be a cryptocurrency odd individuals might mine on a smartphone, with out specialised {hardware}, with out vital electrical energy prices, and with out making customers study the technical layer.
Belief could be established via a “Security Circle” mannequin, the place customers vouched for different customers they knew personally, constructing a social belief graph the consensus mechanism might use as a Sybil resistance layer. Pi’s consensus could be a modified model of the Stellar Consensus Protocol, federated quite than mined within the energy-intensive Bitcoin sense.
The neighborhood grew rapidly. By late 2024, Pi reported over 60 million customers throughout 230-plus international locations, with the most important concentrations in Asia and Africa. The app required customers to open it as soon as each 24 hours and faucet a button to verify they had been lively, and that gesture was, in Pi’s design, the person’s “mining” contribution. There have been no actual tokens being transferred, no on-chain exercise for these customers, till KYC and mainnet migration.
In December 2021, Pi launched what it known as Enclosed Mainnet, a dwell blockchain that ran behind a firewall. Customers who accomplished KYC might migrate their mined PI to mainnet wallets, however these wallets couldn’t connect with exterior exchanges or wallets. The Enclosed Mainnet section was Pi’s longest, lasting simply over three years. The Core Group revealed three situations that wanted to be met earlier than the firewall might come down: adequate KYC completion throughout the person base, a developed ecosystem of utility purposes, and favorable exterior market situations.
In February 2025, Pi judged these situations met. The Open Mainnet was set for February 20.
February 20, 2025: the firewall drops
At 8:00 AM UTC on February 20, 2025, Pi Community enabled exterior connectivity. PI tokens might now depart Pi wallets and transfer to exchanges, swap protocols, and exterior wallets. A number of main exchanges, together with OKX, Bitget, MEXC, and Gate, listed PI on the identical day, both because the native token or initially as IOU tokens that settled into native PI because the community related.
Buying and selling opened at roughly $1.47. Inside hours, the value ran to $2.10 on intense preliminary demand. By the top of the primary buying and selling day, it had settled at roughly $1.01. Within the weeks that adopted, as extra exchanges related and extra migrated PI grew to become liquid, the value reached an all-time excessive of $2.99 in late February 2025. The early pleasure mirrored years of pent-up demand from a neighborhood that, for a lot of customers, had been mining day by day since 2019.
The preliminary worth discovery additionally produced the primary all-time low. On the identical February 20 buying and selling day, intraday volatility briefly took PI to $0.049 as liquidity gaps and panic promoting met the wall of newly liquid provide. The wick was quick, however it grew to become a part of the chart.
Two structural options of the launch formed every part that adopted.
First, the migrated provide at launch was a small fraction of the eventual circulating provide. Of Pi’s 100 billion most provide, solely a small share was in mainnet wallets on day one. The remainder would migrate as extra customers accomplished KYC and because the community processed second migrations and validator rewards over time. This created a structural inflation dynamic: each subsequent month, extra PI would enter circulation, no matter demand.
Second, essentially the most outstanding exchanges, Binance and Coinbase, didn’t checklist at launch. Binance had run a neighborhood vote in early 2025 by which PI obtained robust assist, however the change didn’t act on the vote. Coinbase made no announcement. For a neighborhood used to anticipating tier-1 listings, this was the primary sign that Open Mainnet wouldn’t be the top of the wait.
The early months: worth discovery and the post-launch correction
From its February ATH, PI started a protracted decline. By mid-2025, the value had fallen under $1. By late 2025, it was buying and selling within the $0.40 to $0.60 vary. By February 2026, the primary anniversary of Open Mainnet, PI traded round $0.187. By mid-Could 2026, it sits close to $0.15, with a market capitalization of roughly $1.6 billion and a CoinMarketCap rank round #55.
A number of components drove the decline, they usually map cleanly onto the structural options above.
The provision unlock schedule was, and stays, a gentle headwind. As Pi processed second migrations, validator rewards, and referral bonuses via 2025 and 2026, extra PI entered circulation every month. With circulating provide rising and demand restricted by the absence of tier-1 change entry, the structural stress on worth was downward. As of mid-2026, roughly 10.4 billion PI flow into out of the 100 billion most provide, which means about 90 % of the eventual provide has not but entered the market.
Demand was constrained by the itemizing state of affairs. PI traded on tier-2 exchanges, however the absence of Binance and Coinbase meant institutional and high-volume retail merchants by no means gained quick access. Buying and selling quantity on Pi-listed exchanges stayed modest relative to the undertaking’s person base. As of late Could 2026, PI’s day by day quantity sits within the $1.5 million to $25 million vary relying on the supply, a fraction of what comparable rank-50 tokens see.
Broader crypto market situations throughout 2025 had been combined. Bitcoin reached new all-time highs in late 2025 earlier than correcting sharply in early 2026, and the altcoin market adopted the same sample. PI’s decline was steeper than Bitcoin’s, however the macro context was not supportive for any speculative altcoin through the late-2025 to mid-2026 window.
The KYC backlog: a narrative that defines the person expertise
Operating beneath the value story was a quieter, extra human one: the KYC backlog.
Pi requires customers to finish identification verification earlier than they’ll migrate their mined tokens to mainnet wallets. The method grew to become a bottleneck in 2025 because the person base scaled quicker than the verification system.
As of late 2025, Pi reported roughly 19 million KYC-verified customers and round 16 million who had efficiently migrated to mainnet, out of a claimed person base of greater than 60 million. That left a big share of customers in “tentative” standing, neither verified nor migrated, with their mined PI inaccessible.
Pi addressed components of the issue via 2025 and 2026. The Core Group eliminated a 30-day ready interval for brand new customers, expanded KYC validator rewards to incentivize community-driven verification, and made a further 2.5 million customers eligible for migration in January 2026.
By early 2026, Pi was experimenting with palm-based authentication as a brand new biometric verification choice. The Pi Day 2026 announcement on March 14 highlighted “Second migrations” and “KYC Validator rewards” as priorities, indicating the backlog remained an lively focus.
The KYC story is dual-edged within the Pi narrative. For Pi, it’s the basis of the undertaking’s identification layer and Sybil resistance, the identical function the Core Group has begun positioning as “human infrastructure for AI,” a verified-human dataset that might underpin AI coaching or verification providers sooner or later. For unverified customers, notably these in areas with much less frequent ID codecs, the expertise has typically been one in every of lengthy waits and unclear outcomes. Each readings of the identical reality sample coexist within the Pi neighborhood.
Ecosystem improvement via 2025
Alongside the migration and itemizing dynamics, Pi continued to construct its ecosystem. The tempo diversified, and outdoors observers and Pi lovers typically weighted the identical milestones otherwise, however the chronology is documentable.
All through 2025, Pi rolled out a number of ecosystem initiatives. The Pi App Studio launched as a low-code platform letting builders, and even non-technical customers, construct apps inside the Pi ecosystem. A November 2025 replace added supply code export and extra superior improvement capabilities.
PiFest, a recurring occasion encouraging retailers to just accept PI as fee, expanded via 2025, with Pi reporting over 100,000 retailers signed as much as take part in a minimum of one PiFest interval. Actual-world adoption past the Pi neighborhood remained restricted, however the experiments produced documented examples of customers paying for items and providers in PI.
The Pi Launchpad was introduced as a deliberate product for ecosystem token launches, with a Minimal Viable Product showing on Testnet throughout Q1 2026. The Launchpad is supposed to let tasks constructed on Pi challenge utility tokens, with the design topic to neighborhood suggestions through the Testnet interval.
A Chainlink integration was introduced in 2025, supposed to carry oracle providers to the Pi ecosystem and allow worth feeds for future DeFi purposes on the community. The combination’s sensible impression remained pending on the good contract improve that might comply with.
Testnet1 started phased protocol upgrades via 2025, reaching model 23 on September 18, 2025, as a staging floor for the eventual Mainnet improve.
Pi Day 2026 and the protocol improve cycle
March 14, 2026, was Pi Day, the undertaking’s annual milestone second. Pi Day 2026 introduced one of many densest batches of bulletins within the undertaking’s historical past.
The headline launch was the Pi Launchpad MVP on Testnet, letting builders and tasks experiment with the token-issuance pipeline forward of mainnet deployment. Pi App Studio gained the flexibility to combine Mainnet PI funds, opening a path for apps constructed on Pi to transact in precise PI quite than check tokens. The Pi Core Group additionally detailed an accelerated protocol improve roadmap, with Protocol 20.2 already deployed and a multi-stage improve path resulting in Protocol 23.
The improve cadence over the next weeks was deliberate. Protocol 21.2 deployed on April 6, 2026. Protocol 22.1 adopted on April 22. Protocol 22 was confirmed on Mainnet on April 27. Protocol 23 was activated on Mainnet on Could 11, 2026, every week sooner than initially deliberate, with a deadline of Could 15 for all mainnet nodes to finish the improve or danger dropping community connectivity.
Protocol 23 is essentially the most vital technical milestone since Open Mainnet itself. It introduces full good contract performance on Pi Mainnet, opening the door for the undertaking’s first decentralized change, Pi DEX, lending protocols, and the Pi Launchpad to maneuver from Testnet to dwell deployment. Pi has confirmed that subscription-based good contracts, PiRC2, are already dwell on Testnet, and that additional token normal upgrades, PiRC1, are deliberate in later releases.
In early Could 2026, Pi’s founders Kokkalis and Fan appeared at Consensus 2026, one of many largest occasions within the international crypto business. Their look was the primary main public-facing occasion by the founders in a while and got here alongside a renewed positioning of Pi as “human infrastructure for AI,” highlighting that Pi’s KYC-verified person base had accomplished over 526 million human verification duties throughout the community.
The framing represented a shift in how the Core Group described Pi’s long-term worth proposition, transferring from “mobile-mined cryptocurrency” towards “verified human identity layer.”
The change itemizing query
The one most-asked query within the Pi neighborhood all through the previous fifteen months has been about tier-1 change listings, and the reply remains to be partial.
PI trades on a rising checklist of exchanges. OKX listed at Open Mainnet launch. Bitget, MEXC, and Gate adopted. Bitfinex, HTX, and others added PI within the months that adopted. Smaller and regional exchanges expanded protection via 2025 and 2026. PI’s itemizing footprint by mid-2026 is broader than at launch, although it stays concentrated exterior the very high tier of worldwide exchanges.
Binance held its neighborhood vote in early 2025. PI obtained robust assist within the vote, however Binance didn’t checklist. The change has not made public statements explaining the choice or offering a timeline. Coinbase has made no public dedication.
Kraken added PI to its 2026 roadmap, with a tentative March 2026 itemizing date that was extensively reported within the Pi neighborhood. The itemizing was conditional on Pi finishing its transition to Open Mainnet, which had already occurred, and on satisfying Kraken’s inner assessment course of. As of late Could 2026, the Kraken itemizing has not been accomplished.
Many smaller platforms proceed to commerce PI as IOU tokens, artificial representations of PI not backed by Pi Core Group, quite than the native token. The IOU versus native PI distinction issues: an IOU is basically a promise to ship PI on sure situations, and its worth can drift from the underlying. For customers determining the place to commerce, the distinction is operationally vital.
The numbers, in Could 2026
To place all of this in a single place, the verifiable state of Pi Community as of late Could 2026:
PI worth: roughly $0.15, down from a $2.99 all-time excessive in February 2025, a drawdown of roughly 95 % from peak.
Market capitalization: roughly $1.6 billion, rating round #55 throughout all cryptocurrencies.
Circulating provide: roughly 10.4 billion PI of a 100 billion most provide.
Consumer base: 60+ million claimed, with roughly 19 million KYC-verified and roughly 16 million migrated to Mainnet as of late 2025/early 2026, with second migrations persevering with.
Good contracts: dwell on Testnet, activated on Mainnet by way of Protocol 23 on Could 11, 2026.
Pi DEX: focused for Q2 2026 Mainnet launch.
Ecosystem: Pi App Studio operational with Mainnet PI funds, Pi Launchpad MVP on Testnet, Chainlink integration in place, dApp improvement ongoing via the Pi Hackathon and developer packages.
Tier-1 change listings: none confirmed. Tier-2 listings embrace OKX, Bitget, MEXC, Gate, Bitfinex, HTX, and others.
What the subsequent twelve months maintain
Pi has not been quiet about what’s subsequent, and the roadmap is concrete sufficient to put out.
The primary merchandise is the Mainnet rollout of good contracts, now technically dwell, and the apps that can be constructed on high of them. Pi DEX, Pi Launchpad, lending protocols, and different DeFi primitives are the instantly seen subsequent layer. Whether or not this layer produces significant utility, and the way rapidly, will depend upon developer adoption and the design selections the Core Group makes through the Testnet suggestions cycle.
The second is the continued KYC enlargement, together with biometric experiments and validator-reward incentives, with the objective of narrowing the hole between claimed person base and verified mainnet contributors.
The third is the “human infrastructure for AI” pivot. If Pi succeeds in productizing its verified-human dataset, whether or not as a verification service for different crypto tasks, an identification layer for AI coaching and authentication, or one other adjoining product, it might characterize a big repositioning of the undertaking’s worth proposition. Whether or not the market values that pivot stays to be seen.
The fourth is the change itemizing state of affairs. The following tier-1 itemizing, if and when it comes, can be a significant inflection level for liquidity and worth discovery. Whether or not that occurs in 2026 or later is, like a lot else with Pi, unsure.
The fifth is the availability unlock dynamic. As extra customers full KYC and migrate, circulating provide retains rising in opposition to a finite demand pool. That is the structural headwind on worth, and it doesn’t resolve rapidly even underneath favorable situations.
Easy methods to learn all of this
Pi Community in Could 2026 is a undertaking with a documentable document of delivery. The protocol has upgraded. Good contracts are dwell. The Launchpad is on Testnet. The founders appeared on the business’s largest occasion. The ecosystem is broader than it was at Open Mainnet. The person base is bigger. The KYC backlog has narrowed.
It is usually a undertaking the place the value is 95 % under its launch-day peak, the place tier-1 change listings stay elusive, and the place structural provide progress retains absorbing demand. The identical reality sample helps each readings.
For customers who’ve been mining since 2019, the previous fifteen months have introduced concrete motion: Open Mainnet, change listings, protocol upgrades, good contracts, an increasing ecosystem. For customers nonetheless ready emigrate, the expertise has typically been one in every of ready, with mined PI inaccessible behind unresolved KYC standing. For merchants, PI has been a troublesome instrument: a token with an actual ecosystem and an actual neighborhood however constrained liquidity, persistent provide inflation, and an unclear path to broader change entry.
The Open Mainnet anniversary is a helpful second to take inventory not as a result of it marks an endpoint, however as a result of it lets the chronology be assembled in a single place. Pi is what it’s in mid-2026: a multi-year undertaking that opened its gate, shipped actual upgrades, saved its neighborhood engaged via a steep drawdown, and faces a set of real open questions on change listings, provide dynamics, ecosystem adoption, and the AI-infrastructure pivot.
The following yr of Pi’s story can be written by what the ecosystem truly produces now that good contracts are dwell, whether or not the tier-1 listings that haven’t but materialized finally do, and whether or not the human-verification infrastructure finds a market past Pi itself. The infrastructure is in place. What will get constructed on high is the half the Core Group, the developer neighborhood, and the Pioneers themselves at the moment are understanding, in public, day-to-day.
That’s what truly occurred. The remainder is for time to inform.
This text is for informational functions and doesn’t represent monetary or funding recommendation. Cryptocurrency markets are unstable and undertaking roadmaps can change rapidly; the figures and milestones described mirror reporting accessible as of mid-Could 2026. All the time do your individual analysis.
