Gram (prev. Toncoin)

Gram (formerly Toncoin) is the coin of The Open Network, a proof-of-stake blockchain tied to Telegram, used to pay fees and secure the network.

The Open Network (TON) is a public blockchain first designed by Telegram's founders, Nikolai and Pavel Durov. Its network started on 15 November 2019. Telegram had sold coins called Grams to investors in 2018, but in 2020 it settled with the US SEC, returned $1.2 billion and stepped back; the community kept the network running and its coin became known as Toncoin.

On 15 June 2026 Toncoin was renamed Gram, with the ticker changing from TON to GRAM, after a community vote passed with 81.22%. Only the name changed: balances, addresses and supply stayed the same, and the blockchain is still called TON. The rename was part of Pavel Durov's plan to make TON faster and more closely tied to Telegram. Earlier in 2026 blocks became about six times faster, fees were cut about sixfold, and Telegram took over from the TON Foundation as the main force behind the network and its largest validator.

Gram pays transaction fees and is staked by validators, the computers that confirm transactions. There is no supply cap: about 5.26 billion GRAM existed on 27 September 2026, with new coins paid to validators and half of each fee burned. Because blocks now come faster at the same reward per block, gross yearly issuance has risen from about 0.7% to about 4% of supply before the fee burn (an estimate from on-chain block data). About 1.08 billion GRAM in early-mining wallets frozen in 2023 can be activated again from 21 February 2027.

TON is used mainly for sending USDT and other tokens inside and around Telegram, for Telegram usernames and collectibles, and for mini-apps. About $735 million of stablecoins circulate on it, while its DeFi activity is small.