Nostr Biweekly Review ( 7-20 July 2025)
GM, Nostriches!
The Nostr Review is a biweekly newsletter focused on protocol updates, exciting programs, the long-form content ecosystem, and key events happening in the Nostr-verse. If you’re interested, join me in covering updates from the Nostr ecosystem!
Quick review:
In the past two weeks, daily active pubkeys reached 235, 451. New user growth sdecreased, and profiles with bio decreased over 35%. Note events totaled 6 million, zap volume slightly decreased to 12.9 million sats.
Additionally, 8 pull requests were submitted to the Nostr protocol, with 1 merged. A total of 81 Nostr projects were tracked, with 16 releasing product updates, and over 364 long-form articles were published, 52% focusing on Bitcoin and Nostr. During this period, 2 notable events took place, and 1 significant events are upcoming.
Nostr Statistics
Based on user activity, the total daily active pubkeys reached 235, 451, reflecting a modest increase of 4.7% compared to the previous period. The highest daily activity was recorded on July 11, with 17,348 active users.
The number of new users decreased. The number of profiles with bio reached 46,483, down by more than 35% compared to the previous period. The number of pubkeys writing events and profiles with contact lists has slightly decreased.
In terms of content publishing, approximately 6 million note events were published during this period, representing a stable trend compared to the previous cycle. Among them: Reation reached 919,836, showing an increase of about 66%, post reached 2, 296, 681, up 16%.
For zap activity, the total zap amount is about 13 million, showing an slight decrease of over 1.3% compared to the previous period.
Data source:
NIPs
NIP-52: Add collaborative calendar event request #1970
gillohner is proposing a PR that enhances NIP-52 to enable collaborative calendar management by introducing an approval workflow for calendar event requests. This addresses the limitation where only calendar owners can add events to their calendars.
timeSeriesData.md #1973
devops-global is proposing a standardized way to store time series data (e.g., health metrics, sensor readings) on Nostr relays using event kind 12345. It prioritizes user ownership, interoperability, and privacy while acknowledging Nostr’s limitations as a database replacement.
Add NIP-XX: Nostr Internet Radio #1975
zeSchlausKwab is proposing a standard for publishing internet radio stations on Nostr as kind:31237 events, enabling decentralized radio directories and cross-app compatibility. Current open solutions use awkward semi-community driven flows to maintain quality of their registries leading to broken streams and outdated metadata. The direct monetization could incentivize station runners and listeners to maintain station entries ensuring a cleaner registry.
Add bulk queries to NIP-05 #1980
Terry Yiu is proposing a NIP that add a batch query feature to the NIP-05 specification, allowing multiple users to be queried at once to improve performance.With ~8000 character URL length limits, you could probably get about ~800+ names in the query depending on the length of the domain and length of names. Also, there are some organizations where easily revealing all the NIP-05 identities (when names are not provided) is not desired due to privacy reasons. There are no current implementations yet, but I'm opening this up for discussion first.
Notable Projects
Primal
They’ve just rolled out build 2.3.6 with a bunch of bug fixes and improvements to make your experience smoother than ever. Here’s what’s new:
- Mute hashtag now works as expected (#524)
- Media save functionality fixed (#527)
- Resolved scrolling glitches in the feed and side menu
- Prevented OOM crashes from video thumbnails
- Fixed thumbnail aspect ratio issues
- Smoother video playing experience in the gallery
- General stability enhancements (#530, #529, #525)
0xchat
0xchat-lite v0.1.1-beta is live. This version focuses on user experience optimizations, performance improvements, and stability enhancements.
- New Circle Join Flow: Streamlined joining with support for short names and automatic network detection.
- New User Search: Automatic remote search for a smoother experience.
- New QR Code Sharing: Generate and share Nostr protocol QR codes easily.
- New Image Preview Dialog: Enhanced image viewing experience.
- New Circle Introduction Page: Discover circle features and FAQs.
- New App Link Support: Added oxchatlite scheme for deep link handling.
- Improved Onboarding: Smoother first-time user experience.
- Improved Circle Join Flow: Added network checks and user confirmation.
- Improved Search: Automatically triggers search after 0.5 seconds of inactivity.
- Improved File Upload: Fixed missing progress callback handling.
- Optimized Memory Usage: Clears related messages when deleting sessions.
- Improved Contrast: Enhanced visual clarity across widgets.
- Optimized Image Messages: Better corner radius rendering.
- Improved Avatar Interaction: Automatically closes circle list when tapping the avatar.
Fountain 1.2.8 is live on iOS and Android 🚀
- Player design refresh
- Video playback
- AirPlay and Chromecast support
- Auto-queue on play
- Other bug fixes and improvements
degmods.com
New:
- Search based on tags (tags on mods/blogs now functional)
- Filter (exclude) mods based on tags (with default tags)
- Hard blocking system
- Moderation toggles in the settings page
Changes:
- User profile bio now expands to view it full via a popup
- Swapped the first default media upload server to another one
- Removed 'Signature Public Key' field in mod submission page, and removed 'Signature from' in the authentication details popup
Fixes:
- Updating a user's profile picture works correctly again
- Sub-categories becoming categories after editing a mod doesn't happen anymore
- Added loading indicator when running migrations
- Fix ncryptsec export
- Add a icon when using a proxy and check if the proxy is working
- Add more event translations
- Add a screen to send feedback on nostr
- Start separating Bunker and native implementations
- Fix service start error in slow devices when the user moves the app to the background faster than the app can start
- Fix scrollbar position
- Fix requests not disappearing when accepting/rejecting
- Fix QR code scanner when using multiwindow mode
- Use datasource to fetch profile data
- Remove check for paid and auth in relays
- Remove listening for new connections option
- Make secret mandatory for bunker requests
- Update notification less often
- Updated dependencies
- Separated Bunker and Intent logic
- Fixed bunker relay validation when adding a new relay
- Option to reuse an existing connection
- New activities screen
- Always encrypt bunker responses with nip 44
- Target android 16
- Add some error handling to check for network permissions
- Remove gson dependency
- Add more default relays
Alby
Alby Hub v1.18 is now live!
- BOLT-12 offers (yes, you heard it right)
- Integrated Swaps (both ⚡ to ⛓ and ⛓ to ⚡)
- Lightning Addresses for sub wallets
- Channel Rebalancing (beta)
- New (AI) Apps in App Store
Zapstore CLI 0.2.1 is out with a ton of fixes
- Now allows running
zapstore publishwithout having to install it - Fetches highest quality images from Play Store
- Much faster release version checks and lots of other safeguards
- Prepares for new NIP format
Futr
Quick update on futr dev:
- possible bottleneck in LMDB found
- probably Haskell bindings related
- old, unmaintained third party lib
- gonna try switching to something else tomorrow, let's see if this resolves it.
ZEUS v0.11.2 is now available.
- Extended message signing w/ on-chain addresses
- Cashu: lock tokens to pubkey (w/ optional timeout)
- Cashu: token animated QRs
- POS: tax rate for individual items
- LND: set close address on channel open
- QRs: ability to select share QR or text
- Currency: Zambian Kwacha 🇿🇲
- Locale: Taiwanese Mandarin 🇹🇼
- POS: reuse existing invoices when applicable
- Show swap button only within min/max range
- Cashu UX improvements
- Bug fixes
shopstr
Shopstr Markets v0.7.5 is live
This update brings the following improvements and fixes:
- Fixed race condition when minting new proofs at checkout (big thank you to the buyers and merchants who assisted in pinning this one down)
- Revised checkout page design
- Minor code styling fixes
shosho
Shosho – Live Stream on Nostr
Shosho v 0.7.0 is live on Android and iOS.
Now with more speed and stability .
Note over the last few days Zap Stream, our streaming server host, has been intermittently offline which may impact your ability to go live from Shosho. We have improved our checks and error messages around their availability to try to make this easier for users.
Additional new features including to choose your own server coming soon.
Keychat
- Add members to MLS group by inputting a pubkey.
- Paste image and file from the clipboard.
- Check if the websocket is online by sending a message.
- Add vconsole to webview in debug mode.
- Update the grid style for the favorite section.
- Show a blank line for chat messages.
Pokey v0.2.5-beta is now out!
- Some bug fixes
RoboSats
RoboSats v0.8.0 is now out!
- Improved general performance
- Remember hidden self-hosted alert
- Fixed silent failure for invalid invoices
- Coordinator onchain payments are now disabled for swaps. These payments are unnecessary on this scenario and cause user mistakes.
- Libraries upgrades
PurrMint v0.0.1 Alpha is now live!
PurrMint app is a Mobile Cashu Mint - you can now run your own Cashu mint directly on your Android phone!
- 1.Mintd HTTP Mode: Start a local HTTP service
- 2.NIP-74 Mode: Run as a public mint using Nostr protocol (coming soon)
- 3.Onion Mode: Generate onion addresses for your mint (coming soon)
White Noise
White Noise v0.1.2 is released!
- QR scanner for easy connection
- Relay management and dev cache tools
- Confirm on sign-out
- Removed mute/search from group info
- Fixed profile pics, duplicates, iOS group issues
- Back navigation fixed
- Group creator no longer added as member
Long-Form Content Eco
In the past two weeks, more than 364 long-form articles have been published, including over 177 articles on Bitcoin and more than 10 related to Nostr, accounting for 52% of the total content.
These articles about Nostr explore its use as a decentralized protocol for messaging, identity, and payments, along with privacy features like MLS and Onion routing. Some compare different messaging tools, while others extend into areas like scientific research, archaeological collaboration, and digital sovereignty.
These Bitcoin articles highlight the growing institutional embrace of Bitcoin — from public companies and banks adding it to their balance sheets, to countries like El Salvador and Germany exploring national Bitcoin strategies. Many focus on the rise of Bitcoin ETFs, advances in mining technology, and the expanding use of the Lightning Network. Others dive into legal battles, privacy tools like CoinJoin, and philosophical reflections on personal sovereignty, the decline of fiat, and the moral case for adopting Bitcoin.
Thank you,
Lightning News (News Bot),
and others, for your work. Enriching Nostr’s long-form content ecosystem is crucial.
Nostriches Global Meet Ups
Recently, several Nostr events have been hosted in different countries.
Recently, YakiHonne kicked off the first round of the Agentic Mini Apps Hack on Nostr, focused on building decentralized MiniApps with AI, payments, and social features. Running from June 20 to July 25, the hackathon offers a 10,000,000 sats prize pool. Tracks include Nostr tools, payment solutions, and AI-driven apps. On July 21, we hosted our first Demo Day with developers showcasing their smart widget projects.
Nostrbama 2025, took place from July 15 to 17 in Mobile, Alabama. Day one featured a retrospective on the Nostr protocol by Derek Ross, a presentation on the audio space app CornyChat by Rage-Bait Vic, an introduction to the merchant payment protocol ConduitBTC by Eric FJ 🪬⚡️ and AceaSpades, and a session by
Here is the upcoming Nostr event that you might want to check out.
Bitcoin Asia 2025 will take place from August 28–29, 2025, at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC). As one of the largest and most influential Bitcoin events in Asia, the conference will feature main stage keynote talks, enterprise Bitcoin workshops, hundreds of exhibiting companies, a digital art gallery, official limited-edition merchandise. Speakers include
Thanks for reading! If there’s anything I missed, feel free to reach out and help improve the completeness and accuracy of my coverage.