What is the Internet Computer (ICP) inflation rate?

+1.99% a year, and +0.48% in the next 90 days. That is new ICP minus what is burned or bought back, checked Oct 3 2026.

Is ICP inflationary or deflationary?

Inflationary: ICP's supply is growing, about +1.99% a year.

Where does new ICP supply come from?

New ICP every month for node operators (1.74M in 90 days) plus voting rewards holders cash out (1.11M).

MrNasdog Pressure Framework · Inflation Analysis

ICP Inflation Analysis · October 2026 · Mixed flows · supply roughly steady

ICP supply is growing slowly: the Internet Computer created 2.85M ICP in the 90 days to Oct 3 2026 and burned 129,302 ICP, so supply rose about 0.49%, with about 0.48% projected for the next 90 days. The new ICP comes from two protocol mints — monthly payments to node operators and voting rewards that neuron holders cash out — while the only thing removing ICP is the burn apps pay to run on the network. ICP has no supply cap.

The verdict, in one paragraph

Over the last 90 days the MrNasdog Pressure Framework measures ICP net supply at +0.49% (2,845,178 ICP created against 129,302 ICP burned, on a circulating base of 557.03M ICP). The independent inflation monitor reads +0.76% for nearly the same window, a gap of 0.27 percentage points — inside the 0.5-point tolerance, so no warning chip is shown. The next 90 days project to +0.48%. ICP is a mildly inflationary network whose computing burn is growing but still small: every ICP burned is matched by about 22 newly created.

Sell pressure: where new ICP comes from

Node provider rewards were the largest source: 1.74M ICP in three monthly payments of 668,529, 541,884 and 525,110 ICP on Jul 15, Aug 14 and Sep 13 2026. The Internet Computer sets these payments in XDR, the IMF basket, and converts them to ICP at a 30-day average price, with a floor of 2 XDR per ICP that governance set on Jul 6 2026. All three payments in the window were paid at that floor. The payments shrank for two reasons: the network cut its live nodes from 821 to 618 under a revised subnet plan adopted on Jul 31 2026, and governance halved pay for 17 node operators who failed two emergency-response drills, for three months.

For the next 90 days we project 1.68M ICP of node rewards across payments due around Oct 14, Nov 13 and Dec 14 2026. The October payment still carries the drill penalty; from November the halved operators are due back at full pay. Against that, ICP now trades above the floor — the 30-day average is about 2.12 XDR — so each payment needs fewer ICP: about 497K ICP in October and 591K ICP in each of November and December.

Protocol inflation from voting rewards added 1.11M ICP. Neurons earn rewards as maturity, and maturity becomes new ICP only when its owner cashes it out, so this row counts what was actually minted: 1,109,655 ICP. The voting reward pool was cut by about a third in April 2026 under the Mission 70 plan and has stayed near 53,800 ICP a day since, so we carry the same 1.11M ICP forward.

Vesting unlocks are zero: the seed and strategic sale rounds finished unlocking by June 2025. Foundation and unscheduled unlocks are zero because every Foundation, seed and early contributor neuron is already counted as circulating, so selling them moves coins inside the market rather than adding new ones. Long-term locked or bankruptcy is zero: no estate or trustee is paying out ICP.

Buy pressure: where new ICP goes

The protocol burn is the only buy-side force: 129,302 ICP in 90 days. Apps on the Internet Computer pay for computing and storage in cycles, and cycles are made by burning ICP — 129,162 ICP went that way, plus 141 ICP of transfer fees. The burn rose every month, from about 26.7K ICP in July to 45.5K in August and 55.6K in September, as use of the network grew. No rule change drove the rise, so the projection keeps the 90-day figure.

There is no programmatic buyback into a wallet. The Mission 70 plan sends 20% of cloud-engine revenue to burn ICP; when that runs, it shows up in the same burn. There is no Foundation buy on record this window. New long-term locks book zero: about 289.6M ICP sits staked in neurons, but staked ICP still counts as circulating supply.

Foundation and overhang

The biggest pile waiting to enter supply is not a wallet — it is unminted neuron maturity: about 96.45M ICP of maturity plus 16.96M ICPof staked maturity, built up from years of voting rewards. None of it is in today's supply; it becomes new ICP only when owners cash it out, which is exactly the 1.11M ICP measured in the sell row. We read it from the governance system every rebuild.

Inside the float, we track the Neurons' Fund (15.28M ICP staked), seed neurons (71.54M ICP staked), early-contributor neurons (12.62M ICP) and the DFINITY Foundation, which publishes no wallet list; its public voting neuron holds 10 ICP. These are already circulating, so a sale would not raise supply. If the unminted maturity pile falls faster than the cash-out rate between refreshes, the outflow enters the sell side at the next refresh.

How ICP compares to other uncapped Layer 1 chains

ICP belongs to the uncapped proof-of-stake Layer 1 group, where staking rewards create new coins every day and a fee or usage burn removes some. Ethereum is the closest match in shape: validators are paid in new ETH and the base fee is burned. Our Ethereum reading shows supply up about 0.21% in 90 days — a lower rate than ICP's 0.49% — but the two work differently. Ethereum's new coins go straight to stakers; ICP's voting rewards wait as maturity until the holder chooses to cash out, which leaves a large unminted pile behind.

ICP is unusual in two ways. First, it pays the companies that run its hardware directly in new coins every month, sized in a fiat basket, so a lower ICP price means more ICP is minted — the 2-XDR floor exists to limit that. Second, its burn is tied to real computing use rather than to transaction fees: apps convert ICP into cycles to run, so burn grows with the amount of software hosted, not with trading activity. Chains with pure fee burns tend to burn more when markets are busy; ICP burns more when its cloud is busy.

What to watch in the next 90 days

Oct 14 2026:the next node provider payment, about 497K ICP at today's 30-day price, the last month of the drill penalty.

Nov 13 2026: the halved operators are due back at full pay, lifting the payment to about 591K ICP unless governance extends the penalty or the network drops more nodes.

The ICP/XDR rate: if ICP falls back below 2 XDR, the floor binds again and each payment is capped near 528K ICP for the September bill; a higher price means fewer ICP per payment.

The monthly burn:September's 55.6K ICP was the highest of the window. If cloud engines and AI-built apps keep growing, the burn could overtake the 90-day average we project.

Summary

The MrNasdog Pressure Framework reads ICP as mildly inflationary: 2.85M ICP created in 90 days against 129,302 ICP burned, net +0.49%, and +0.48% projected next. New supply comes from monthly node operator pay and from voting rewards that holders cash out; the only offset is the burn apps pay to run on the Internet Computer. The main risk is the 96.45M ICP of unminted maturity that can be cashed out at any time. ICP has no supply cap, so the long-run balance depends on whether computing demand can grow the burn faster than the protocol mints.

MrNasdog Pressure Framework analysis of ICP, Metric 1 — Inflation. Data + explanation only. Not financial advice. Checked Oct 3 2026.