title_body: What advantages does Cardano have over other "fast" blockchains? I'm a developer looking into starting my first dApp project. I've been waiting for Cardano to release smart contracts due to Ethereum's insane gas fees and low transaction throughput.
  I recently discovered another blockchain (Solana) that already supports smart contracts and has even cheaper transaction fees and very high transaction throughput. Since it's not even possible for me to build my project on Cardano at this moment, and my original reasons for considering Cardano were low fees and high TPS, I'm beginning to consider building on the Solana platform instead.
  I'd like to get your insights on what unique advantages Cardano offers over other platforms before making my decision.
upvoted_answer: I recently discovered Solana too and found that it has awesome speed. Here are my thoughts from a little review:
  
  Decentralized limit: Hardware recommended requirements for Solana nodes are pretty advanced which limits the amount of nodes that can be run.
  Speed: Project Hydra from Cardano has a theoretical limit of 1M TPS acheiving 1/10 of that will still be significant.
  Adoption: Its not always just about technology, I like IOG approach to get adoption with deals. Even if the Africa deal falls through they are still pursuing other opportunities.
  Transparency: I honestly couldnt find any way to actually connect with the people behind Solara. It just looks like they are popping out high performance tools. I do wonder if there is a tradeoff being done for speed.
  
  Finally, I really like the goal of Cardano which is about making the world a better place by building for the globe.
  Most of the crypto ecosystem is mainly in first world countries.