Pi Network Deep Dive: Focus shifts to real-world utility after first Open Network anniversary

Pi Network (PI) trades above $0.20 at press time on Thursday, up 20% so far this week, gaining traction ahead of Pi Day on March 14. Founders are shifting focus toward expanding the identity-verified network for real-world applications after its first anniversary as an Open Network. The roadmap includes planned version upgrades to the underlying Stellar blockchain, ecosystem token design feedback, and efforts to boost community engagement.

Pi Network’s first anniversary and expansion roadmap

Pi Network's ecosystem marked its first anniversary as an Open Network on February 20, after nearly six years in a closed development environment. The transition to an identity-verified open Web3 environment enabled PI token holders, commonly referred to as Pioneers, to migrate their holdings to the mainnet and deposit them on certain Centralized Exchanges (CEXs).

In the anniversary video, founders Nicolas Kokkalis and Chengdiao Fan emphasized a strategic shift in the roadmap, focusing on real-world applications for network and community expansion. 

However, a crucial obstacle in Pi Network’s architectural roadmap is its approach to value. The lack of interoperability with other layer-1 blockchains and established Decentralized Finance (DeFi) protocols in the crypto market makes Pi Network an island, with no tangible value for its PI token. 

Even Chengdiao Fan addressed this issue in her anniversary keynote by saying, "The hard problem is figuring out how tokens can be used in real-world applications, in commerce involving real goods and services, or how they can be used to participate meaningfully in business and production processes."

The lack of clarity on Know-Your-Customer (KYC) approvals, which are mandatory for the mainnet migration, has drawn criticism from its community. Additionally, the constant delays in team announcements, unlocks, and migration statistics, and the lack of transparency, have led to persistent rumors surrounding Pi Network. 

As of Thursday, the PI token's lack of utility in its native ecosystem keeps it largely speculative, available on five Know-Your-Business (KYB)- verified CEXs. 

Pi Network’s struggle to expand its network

Over the last year, Pi Network made multiple attempts to expand its network for real-world utility by encouraging development through its Hackathon event, which saw proposals for e-commerce, dating apps, and educational platforms.

Defending these apps, Fan said, “Pi prioritizes applications that solve real-world problems and fulfill real-world needs, not just creations in financial mechanics. DeFi mechanisms matter only if there is real utility and production involved. It’s easy to enable fast, high-volume trading. It’s much harder to enable tokens to be used inside real products that support real-world innovation and economic activity.”

Unlike the current segment leaders, such as Ethereum (ETH) or Solana (SOL), which already offer thousands of applications with real-world use cases, Pi Network continues to struggle to provide a freely accessible network that utilizes free-to-mine tokens to overcome financial barriers.

The risk of KYC

Pi Network has faced the criticism of sharing its users' KYC data with other companies. Kokkalis cleared up doubts in the anniversary video by saying, “We will offer the technology and product of KYC, importantly not the data, as a service to other projects, be it Web3 or traditional businesses.” 

This means the founder could provide its APIs to external services so they can use the Pi KYC solution at scale. Innovating its KYC solution, Pi Network plans to add palm-print verification to further strengthen matching and authentication. 

Over 16.8 million users have completed the complex KYC requirements, while millions await their opportunity to migrate to the mainnet.

Pi Network upgrades and developments

Pi Network has made multiple attempts to boost its ecosystem by accelerating Pi payment setups and integrating AI capabilities into the Pi App Studio. However, the ecosystem still lacks a stable real-world application.

At the network level, Pi Network continues its transition from version 19 to version 23 of the Stellar blockchain protocol, as previously reported by FXStreet. The final rollout is expected to bring components such as DEX functionality and liquidity pools, making the platform more usable for real-world applications and activities.

The ongoing ecosystem developments highlight the Pi core team’s dedication to releasing a functional layer and expanding it in the long term.

Fresh attempt to boost user activity

Pi Network has announced an initiative to recognise the contributions of its Pioneers ahead of Pi Day on March 14. Pioneers will receive milestone badges based on their achievements. These include founding status for the first 100,000 Pioneers to join the network, Mining Consistency badge to pioneers who actively mined PI for 365 days between December 2024 and December 2025. Community Engagement badge for users who document over 2,000 hours in Pi Chats and Ecosystem Exploration for users who have used over 50 Pi apps within the same period. Meanwhile, new users who joined Pi Network in 2025 and completed KYC will receive the New Adoption badge.

On the other hand, the release of the "Slice of Pi" serves as a live gaming demonstration that integrates Pi payments and the Pi Ad Network, providing a teaser of the digital economies that could be built on the Pi Network.  

Finally, the core team announced an Ecosystem Token Framework, which aims to build tokens for real products and long-term utility on the mainnet. For this framework, the core team has asked for community feedback, taking a transparent step to include Pioneers in the process by either commenting on GitHub or submitting broader feedback via a Google Form. 

Pi Network’s efforts toward real-world applications through community-inclusive steps could improve Pioneers' confidence and its broader market perception.