10 must-know blockchain trends for 2026 and beyond

Summary

Blockchain and digital assets are set for major expansion: market forecasts predict growth from around $31.28bn in 2024 to over $1.43tn by 2030, driven by demand for secure, transparent transactions and recent regulatory moves such as the US GENIUS Act. Analysts expect 2026 to bring faster institutional adoption, clearer regulation and wider real-world use cases beyond cryptocurrencies.

The article breaks this outlook into ten trends to watch in 2026 and beyond, covering the maturing value of blockchain tech, evolving regulation, tokenisation of assets, the role of stablecoins, cross-border payments, AI integration, customer experience improvements, quantum risks and decentralised AI compute.

Key Points

Market momentum: Analysts forecast huge market expansion to 2030, driven by enterprise demand for secure, auditable transactions.
Blockchain value beyond crypto: Smart contracts, supply chain, IP protection and programmable assets show the technology’s broader usefulness.
Growing regulatory clarity: Laws like the GENIUS Act (US) and regional regimes (EU, Singapore, UAE, Hong Kong) are reducing policy uncertainty for businesses.
Regulation spurring innovation: Proposed acts that protect developers (eg, clarifying money-transmitter status) could lower barriers for builders and platforms.
Tokenisation scale-up: Real-world asset tokenisation (property, equities, collectibles) is accelerating, with major institutions and DTCC initiatives pointing to expansion.
Stablecoins under the spotlight: Stablecoins are poised as a mainstream settlement rail for cross-border, B2B and treasury flows — but fragmentation and interoperability are risks.
Cross-border payments: Blockchain-based ledgers and tokens are being trialled for faster, lower-cost bank-to-bank transfers; CBDC progress is uneven globally.
Blockchain + AI agents: Combining blockchains with autonomous AI agents enables machine-to-machine transactions, agent wallets and new identity/reputation models.
Customer experience gains: Wallet-as-a-service and mainstream wallet integrations are improving usability, though deeper enterprise integration remains work in progress.
Quantum and decentralised AI: Current blockchains are not quantum-safe — post-quantum migration is needed — while decentralised AI training/inference looks increasingly feasible, especially for inference workloads.

Why should I read this?

Quick and useful — this roundup saves you the time of digging through dozens of reports. If you’re a technology leader, product owner or investor wondering what actually matters in blockchain this year, this piece points straight to the bits that will affect strategy: regulation, tokenisation, stablecoins, AI integration and the gnarly quantum problem. Basically, read it if you want to know where to focus in 2026 without wading through hype.

Source

Source: https://www.techtarget.com/searchcio/feature/7-must-know-blockchain-trends