Bitcoin DOG Mode Targets Core Relay Limits Without Fork

DOG Mode would expand transaction relay

DOG Mode’s first major proposed change would increase the maximum standard transaction size, allowing participating nodes to forward transactions occupying nearly an entire Bitcoin block.

Bitcoin uses weight units to measure the data size and resource burden of transactions and blocks. Core’s existing ceiling limits a standard relayed transaction to roughly one-tenth of a block. DOG Mode would allow users to broadcast near-block-size transactions through participating nodes rather than arranging private submission with individual miners.

The second major change would lower Bitcoin’s default dust limit. The dust limit is a relay-policy threshold below which an output is considered too small to propagate economically under default settings. One satoshi is Bitcoin’s smallest denomination and equals one hundred-millionth of one BTC.

Ordinals and Runes users currently add bitcoin, commonly called padding, to outputs so they remain above the applicable dust threshold. Ordinals allow users to embed data such as images and text into Bitcoin transactions, while Runes provide a mechanism for issuing and transferring fungible tokens on Bitcoin.

Leonidas estimated that lowering the threshold could release about $25 million worth of satoshis currently committed as padding in Ordinals inscriptions and Runes outputs. That amount would represent existing bitcoin becoming available again rather than newly created value.

The reduced threshold would remove the need for excessive padding and return the affected satoshis to participants in those ecosystems, according to Leonidas. The proposed change could directly benefit the Ordinals and Runes markets where DOG•GO•TO•THE•MOON, or DOG, trades.

Leonidas previously championed the Runes protocol and co-founded Runestone, which distributed the DOG token. DOG secured a specially sought-after satoshi during Bitcoin’s fourth halving. DOG was down 1.2% over the preceding 24 hours following Leonidas’ Friday announcement posts.

DOG Mode would not increase Bitcoin’s block capacity, compel miners to accept transactions or guarantee lower fees and faster confirmations. Transactions occupying most of a block would continue competing for finite space and could require substantial fees to persuade a miner to include them.

The proposal also did not provide quantitative projections for node adoption, miner participation, additional transaction volume, block-space demand, fee-market effects, bandwidth requirements, storage demands or validation overhead. No development or release timeline was supplied.

Lowering the dust threshold would allow smaller outputs to circulate, but the proposal did not address potential long-term effects on Bitcoin’s unspent transaction output set.

No activation threshold required

DOG Mode would change local forwarding settings rather than Bitcoin’s validity rules. Participating nodes could begin relaying qualifying transactions once compatible software becomes available, without a hard fork, soft fork, signaling period or network-wide upgrade.

A transaction forwarded by DOG Mode would need only a miner willing to receive it, accept its fee and place it in a block. Even one miner could confirm such transactions, although broader node deployment would improve ordinary peer-to-peer propagation.

Core nodes could then accept the mined block despite refusing to relay the unconfirmed transaction beforehand, provided the completed block complied with existing consensus rules.

Leonidas said DOG Mode would require only minimal code changes relative to Bitcoin Core and would deviate from Core substantially less than Bitcoin Knots does. Bitcoin Knots is an alternative client favored by participants seeking stronger restrictions on non-financial data.

The two clients represent opposite relay-policy approaches. Bitcoin Knots seeks to restrict data-heavy or non-financial transactions, while DOG Mode would broaden propagation for transactions already allowed under consensus.

Leonidas asked Bitcoin developers to contribute to the initial release and encouraged miners to modify their operations to receive DOG Mode transactions. Users were also encouraged to promote the initiative through a social-media slogan and repost his announcement.

We’ve launched the all-new COIN360 Perp DEX, built for traders who move fast!

Trade 130+ assets with up to 100× leverage, enjoy instant order placement and low-slippage swaps, and earn USDC passive yield while climbing the leaderboard. Your trades deserve more than speed — they deserve mastery.

Direct miner submissions preceded proposal

Leonidas said the DOG community had already bypassed Core’s relay restrictions by submitting large transactions directly to miners. He said those submissions included the largest Bitcoin transaction and the largest Bitcoin airdrop.

Core nodes did not forward those transactions because they exceeded policy limits, but miners could include them because they remained valid under consensus rules. The previous direct-to-miner strategy demonstrated that users can bypass ordinary propagation without changing consensus when miners are willing to receive transactions privately.

DOG Mode would seek to make that process more accessible by allowing qualifying transactions to spread through participating nodes instead of requiring each user to establish a direct submission route to a miner.

Leonidas also pointed to relay changes in Bitcoin Core version 30 as evidence that policy settings can evolve. That version removed the previous 83-byte OP_RETURN limit and lowered the minimum default relay fee.

OP_RETURN is used to place arbitrary data in Bitcoin transactions, making its policy limits part of the dispute over non-financial activity. Leonidas argued that the changes showed relay settings are not fixed protocol requirements and can shift as users and miners adopt different behavior.

BIP-110 takes the opposite route

Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 110, or BIP-110, seeks to restrict arbitrary or non-financial data by changing consensus through a user-activated soft fork. Unlike DOG Mode, BIP-110 would alter the criteria determining which transactions or blocks are valid and would require coordinated network adoption.

BIP-110’s node support was in the low single digits, with most of that support reportedly coming from Bitcoin Knots nodes rather than Bitcoin Core nodes. Five days before the DOG Mode coverage, BIP-110 was approaching a deadline with effectively no miner backing.

DOG Mode would not bypass BIP-110 after an activation. Instead, it would avoid participating in the proposal’s stalled consensus-change process by pursuing the opposite objective at the relay-policy level.

Restricting transaction validity requires broad coordination because participating nodes must agree on new consensus rules. A permissive relay client can begin forwarding already-valid transactions without obtaining approval from the full network, although its practical reach still depends on developers, node operators, miners and fee-paying users.

Supporters of Ordinals, Runes and related applications say those uses expand Bitcoin’s functionality, create transaction-fee demand and provide permissionless access to block space when users follow consensus rules and pay market rates. Critics say non-financial data consumes limited capacity, increases congestion and competes with conventional bitcoin payments.

Neither side had secured an implemented network-wide outcome. BIP-110 lacked meaningful support, while DOG Mode lacked functioning software.