What is Etherscan and what is it for?

One of the largest and most well-known platforms in the crypto world is Etherscan, a block explorer and an information, analysis and statistics platform dedicated to the world of Ethereum, whose capabilities have been ported to other networks in developments such as PolygonScan (for the network Polygon) or BSCScan (for the BNB Chain network).

Etherscan is a benchmark in everything a block explorer should have, especially in blockchain networks as complex as Ethereum with its tokens and countless smart contracts, which it has been working on since 2015, when this platform began to function and earn a space within the crypto world.

Exploring Ethereum with Etherescan

The main function of Etherscan is clear: be a block explorer for Ethereum. Thanks to this website we can access all the public records of the Ethereum network, including its blocks, transactions, tokens, smart contracts and more. To achieve this, Etherscan relies on an infrastructure of full nodes and archive nodes that allow Etherscan to download all the information from the Ethereum blockchain into a powerful centralized database that we can query via its web interface.

Yes, Etherscan, the main Ethereum block explorer, is a centralized service, something that does not conflict with its functionality, since, first of all, this explorer has earned great respect and prestige in the community, and in second, anyone with a full node and a historical node can consult and verify the information on the Ethereum network and contrast it with that provided by Etherscan.

But why is Etherscan a centralized service? Can it be decentralized? The reason for the centralization of Etherscan is simple: to make the queries we make much faster and more informative. Let's review an example, and look up the following address on Etherscan:

0x37369a7b436e6A3B9D0AFE195FaB2a415ec358DF

If we look up the address in Etherscan we can get this record:

There we can see its balance, the tokens that are managed by the address, the number of transactions, their TX ID, the method used, the block where the transaction was included, the date, to whom it was addressed, the amount of the transaction, the commission paid, and a series of data and analytics that we could not obtain directly using an Ethereum node in such a simple way.

In any case, users can always do two things:

1. Trust the data offered by Etherscan and the community that validates said data all the time.
2. Install their own block explorer, with all that this entails, to be able to verify for themselves and at all times, the operations that are carried out.

For example, we can create our own block explorer for Ethereum and obtain the information of that block very quickly, as seen on the screen, although the data detail will be less because we do not have a complete database for such. finish.

Performing information searches

Now, the Etherscan block explorer feature is easy to use. It is enough to place the address that we want to track or the TX ID (transaction identifier) ​​to be able to search for the information that we want. For example, if we use this TX ID, we will see the information associated with that operation:

0x0b5d5136a0f8e2300bf2b78ff08d05c0bcf8ec8d877d2b78fae5578e3d7d0242

We can quickly see that it is a purchase operation of an NFT carried out in OpenSea, together with the date, the shipping and receiving addresses, the total of the operation, commissions and other useful information. All this, by simply copying and pasting the TX ID of the operation.

This is possible because the operation in question is related to the movement of ETH, but what if we are talking about a token? Can we search directly? Let's do the test with this TX ID:

0x113005d25078d0efa97916a99e8e90058097dec0a7148c5a619f80e9c23ec50a

And indeed we have the record of the operation, in this case, a movement of ERC-20 tokens, belonging to the USDT token. This means that Etherscan not only offers us data on the ETH movement that is made on the network, but also on the tokens that live on the network, giving us full access to all the information behind that operation.

Searching for tokens by name

Of course, lookup operations can not only be done using data such as address or TX ID, names can also be used. For example, if we search for the name "B2M" in Etherscan we get:

And if we access it we can see all the information of the token in question:

This is a simple way to find information about the tokens that exist in Ethereum, their mobility within the network and all the necessary data around it, such as the contract with which it was deployed:

Which allows us, of course, to review the smart contract itself from the interface, allowing us to review and verify its information and security at all times, and with any token (fungible or non-fungible) or smart contract deployed on Ethereum.

Network analytics within Etherscan

Of course, the potential of Etherscan does not end with the above, but we can also see detailed statistics and analysis of the network. The option "Charts & Stats" It offers us access to such useful data as:

1. Daily and historical price of ETH.
2. Maximum supply in the network.
3. Market capitalization.
4. ETH supply growth (ETH historical issuance)
5. Daily transactions.
6. Network data (Mining, Top Miners, Mined Blocks, Commissions and Rewards).
7. Block size, blockchain size and its growth.
8. Cost of gas and its history

All this without counting the powerful API that Etherscan offers to access this data and perform network analysis in a more personalized way and adapted to the needs of users or developers who need that access.

Thanks to all this, Etherscan is considered the largest Ethereum block explorer, being used de-facto, by most exchanges, wallets and crypto platforms, to offer its users traceability of their operations on said network. It is not a small thing and behind this achievement is the hard work of a team focused on offering a powerful tool so that Ethereum users have an explorer to match now and in the future with the arrival of Ethereum 2.0 as the mainnet of this grid.