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Burn mechanism

Every transaction on Linea generates gas fees paid in ETH. Instead of keeping these fees, Linea's burn mechanism permanently removes ETH and LINEA tokens from circulation. This creates deflationary pressure on both tokens, directly benefiting holders and the broader ecosystem.

The simple version: after covering infrastructure costs, 100% of surplus revenue gets burned:

  • 20% burned as ETH
  • 80% converted to LINEA and burned

This means Linea becomes a perpetual buyer of its own token while simultaneously reducing ETH supply.

How it works​

Step 1: Revenue collection​

All gas fees from transactions on Linea are paid in ETH and automatically collected into a revenue vault contract. This happens continuously as users interact with the network—every swap, transfer, NFT mint, or smart contract interaction contributes to this pool.

Step 2: Covering infrastructure costs​

Running a high-performance layer 2 network has real costs:

  • Onchain costs: Submitting transaction data to Ethereum L1, finalizing proofs, bridge transactions (anchoring and claiming)
  • Offchain costs: Running the mainnet infrastructure (servers, databases, monitoring systems)

Once calculated, an invoice is submitted to the revenue vault. The vault automatically pays what it can from available funds. If there's not enough balance, it tracks the outstanding amount (called "arrears") and pays it off when more revenue comes in.

Infrastructure costs are always paid first. Burns only happen when there's surplus revenue.

Step 3: The burn operation​

Once costs are covered and there's surplus revenue available, the burn operation is triggered by a service operated by the Linea Consortium on a regular basis:

ETH Burn (20%)​

The vault takes 20% of the available surplus and sends it directly to the zero address (0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000). This ETH is permanently removed from circulation; it can never be recovered or used again.

LINEA Burn (80%)​

The remaining 80% goes through a more complex process:

  1. Swap: The ETH is swapped for LINEA tokens using a decentralized exchange (DEX) on Linea. This creates buying pressure on LINEA and happens at the current market rate with slippage protection to prevent unfavorable trades.
  2. Bridge: The LINEA tokens are then bridged from Linea (L2) to Ethereum (L1) using Linea's native token bridge. They're sent to a special burner contract on L1.
  3. Burn: On Ethereum L1, the LINEA tokens are permanently burned. This is important because LINEA's total supply is tracked on L1, so burning must happen there to properly reduce the circulating supply.

The bridging and burning on L1 is designed to be permissionless: anyone can trigger the final burn step, ensuring the process can't be blocked or censored.

Step 4: Transparency​

Every step of this process is recorded onchain:

  • Invoice submissions with exact cost amounts and time periods
  • Burn operations with precise amounts of ETH and LINEA destroyed
  • Bridge transactions showing LINEA moving from L2 to L1
  • Final burn transactions on Ethereum L1

You can verify everything yourself by checking the blockchain. The live dashboard makes it easy to track:

  • Total gas fees collected
  • Total ETH burned since September 11, 2024
  • Total LINEA burned since September 11, 2024
  • Daily burn amounts for both tokens
  • Historical trends and charts

Smart contract addresses​