What is Shiba Inu (SHIB)?
Shiba Inu (SHIB) is a memecoin launched in 2020 by the anonymous developer Ryoshi as an ERC-20 token on Ethereum. Shiba Inu adopted the same Shiba Inu dog mascot as Dogecoin and billed itself as the 'Dogecoin killer' from the start, with the token going live in August 2020 according to the project's own materials.
Shiba Inu's origin story is widely known. The Shiba Inu team sent half of the total supply to the wallet of Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, who in May 2021 burned roughly 90% of it and donated the rest to causes including an India COVID-19 relief fund, an episode that made Shiba Inu known worldwide.
What is Shiba Inu's supply and how does burning work?
Shiba Inu's total supply was 1 quadrillion tokens at launch according to the project's documentation, so a single SHIB trades at a small fraction of a cent. Shiba Inu's enormous supply is often cited as a structural reason why the per-token price is slow to move.
Shiba Inu's ecosystem tries to reduce supply by burning tokens, meaning sending them to addresses where they can never be spent. As of September 28, 2026, KuCoin News, citing burn-tracker data, reported about 410.8 trillion SHIB burned in total, around 41% of the total supply, with most of that coming from Buterin's 2021 burn.
Shiba Inu's recent daily burn figures swing widely and remain tiny relative to circulating supply. A September 2026 Analytics Insight analysis counted 30-day burns at less than 0.0001% of circulating supply, which is why many observers judge that burning alone cannot shrink supply meaningfully.
What is Shibarium?
Shiba Inu's ecosystem has grown beyond the meme with the decentralized exchange ShibaSwap and the supporting tokens BONE and LEASH. Within that lineup, BONE serves as the governance and gas token for Shibarium.
Shibarium is the Ethereum-based Layer 2 network that the Shiba Inu team launched in August 2023, aiming to combine cheap transactions with SHIB burns funded by part of the network fees. Industry reports put Shibarium's total value locked at about 1.44 million dollars as of May 2026, which indicates that usage is still modest.
What happened with Shiba Inu in 2025 and 2026?
Shiba Inu's ecosystem suffered a major Shibarium bridge exploit in September 2025. According to The Block, the attacker used a flash loan of BONE to gain control of most Shibarium validators and drained about 4 million dollars in assets from the bridge, after which the team rotated keys, tightened security and worked on a bridge restart and a user refund plan.
Shiba Inu's team said it carried out a Shibarium node rotation and RPC update in September 2026 to improve network stability and decentralization. Shiba Inu remains one of the flagship memecoins with a large community, but its price is heavily influenced by memecoin market cycles and investor sentiment.
What is Shiba Inu's roadmap?
Shiba Inu's roadmap can be summed up as moving 'from meme to ecosystem'. The Shiba Inu team has named Shibarium infrastructure stability, privacy features, a stronger burn mechanism and expansion into real apps, payments and the metaverse as its main priorities.
Shiba Inu's published plans include completing a Shibarium chain reindexing in the fourth quarter of 2026. The Shiba Inu ecosystem aims to shrink its vast supply through burning while adding real uses for the token, though the delivery and timing of these plans may change.
What are the risks of Shiba Inu?
Shiba Inu has a large community but is fundamentally a memecoin, so its price is extremely volatile. Shiba Inu's enormous supply limits how much burning can reduce circulation, and the token faces sharp declines when meme enthusiasm fades.
Shiba Inu's ecosystem is also exposed to smart contract and bridge security risk, as the 2025 Shibarium bridge exploit showed. Whether Shiba Inu's utility story turns into sustained real-world use is still unproven, and this article is for information only, so any investment decision remains your own responsibility.
