Coolangatta in Australia, Now Installed Bitcoin ATM with Lightning Network Capability

The Australian city of Coolanggata has received its first Bitcoin ATM (photo: dock. Pixabay)

JAKARTA - The Australian city of Coolangatta has got its first Bitcoin ATM with integrated Lightning Network capabilities. A new ATM has been installed at The Strand shopping center in Coolangatta and is now available for use by the public.

Lightning Bitcoin ATMs work very much like traditional Bitcoin ATMs but save a lot of time due to the instant transaction capabilities of layer-2 Lightning solutions. It is also possible to buy very small amounts of Bitcoins

BTC, mostly in Satoshis, is the lowest Bitcoin denomination, with 1 satoshi being equal to 0.00000001 BTC.

Currently, cryptocurrency ATMs complete transactions on the blockchain directly, but this has its limitations. For example, operators had to adapt to batch transactions when miner fees on the Bitcoin network increased rapidly between 2017 and 2018.

In practice, this means that even if a user purchases BTC through an ATM, it is not sent to them directly. The operator has a process that waits for other ATM network users to use the machine before grouping and sending transactions for several users at the same time in one bulk transaction. This problem can be significantly solved with the help of Lightning Network.

Using Lightning, transactions are direct as carriers don't need to pool funds, as soon as cash is entered, users receive payments through the Lightning Network. While there is still debate as to whether fees will be significantly reduced, they are likely to be lower than on-chain payments.

The recent installment of Lightning-enabled Bitcoin ATMs in Australia comes after the country overtook El Salvador to become the world's fourth-largest Bitcoin ATM hub. Australia has 216 ATMs going into 2023.

According to Coin ATM Radar, the total number of crypto ATMs worldwide today is 38,602, of which 6,071 ATMs were installed in 2022 alone.