Nostr Biweekly Review ( 18-31 Aug 2025)

By The Nostr Review September 2, 2025

GM, Nostriches!

The Nostr Review is a biweekly newsletter focused on protocol updates, exciting programs, the long-form content ecosystem, and key events happening in the Nostr-verse. If you’re interested, join me in covering updates from the Nostr ecosystem!

Quick review:

In the past two weeks, daily active pubkeys reached 200,638. New user growth increased, and pubkeys writing events increased over 54%. Note events totaled 5.3 million, zap volume slightly decreased to 18 million sats.

Additionally, 9 pull requests were submitted to the Nostr protocol, with 4 merged. A total of 88 Nostr projects were tracked, with 20 releasing product updates. During this period, 2 notable events took place, and 1 significant event is upcoming.

Nostr Statistics

Based on user activity, the total daily active pubkeys reached 200,638, reflecting a decrease of 15% compared to the previous period. The highest daily activity was recorded on 20th Aug , with 17,429 active users.

The number of new users overall is on the rise. In particular, the number of pubkeys writing events reached 329,253, marking a significant increase of over 54% compared to the previous period.Meanwhile, the number of profiles with bios and contact lists both increased by around 4%.

In terms of content publishing, approximately 5.3 million note events were published during this period, representing a decrease of about 20% compared to the previous cycle. Among them, Repost and Post all showed a decrease of about 28%,17%.

For zap activity, the total zap amount is about 18 million, showing a considerable increase of over 20% compared to the previous period.

Data source: https://stats.nostr.band/

NIPs

NIP-17: Expiration preferences #2028

@VitorPamplona is proposing a NIP which adds a setting to the relay list event, each user can make their own chat disappear at a fixed schedule. If enough people implement this feature, it would delete sent and received messages together, avoiding the weird UX of my messages disappearing while other users’ messages stay.

Add NIP-XXX: Encrypted Binary Attachments for Notes and DMs #2040 Jab-r is proposing an Encrypted Binary Attachments which standardizes how Nostr events reference binary attachments (images, audio, video, documents), supporting both unencrypted and encrypted forms. It introduces two new tag types (attach, eattach) for public events and a normalized JSON schema for private DMs. Attachments are integrity-verified via SHA-256, with optional AES-256-GCM encryption for privacy-preserving sharing.

Add NIP-XX: Time Capsules specification #2045 KarimHassanis proposing a NIP defines time-locked capsules: encrypted Nostr events that become readable only at/after a target timestamp or when a threshold of designated witnesses publish unlock shares. It includes specifications for event kinds, unlock modes, protocol flow, client behavior, security considerations, and examples.

Notable Projects

Amethyst v1.02.1 @Amethyst

Upgrade AGP to 8.12.2
Sets Quartz to Java 1_8
Creates a bootstrap relay list specifically for inbox relays
Register lists as Account fields to avoid GC or user settings.
Fixes inability to delete relays from certain relay lists.

Flotilla @jlrs…ynqn

New Flotilla release, version 1.2.3 is out — highlights include an in-app onboarding flow and bunker login to reduce user confusion, bugfixes and other UX improvements.

Add created_at to event info dialog
Add signer status to profile page
Re-work bunker login flow
Add in-app onboarding flow
Only protect events if relay authenticates
Filter out non-global chats from global chat
Improve publish status indicator
Fix encrypted upload content type
Add relays to event details dialog
Add universal link handler for apps

Damus @damus

Added new onboarding suggestions based on user-selected interests
Added adjustable max budget setting for Coinos one-click wallets
Improved the image sizing behavior on the image carousel for a smoother experience
Handle npub correctly in draft notes
Move users-section to be last in muted view
Fixed #nsfw tag filtering to be case insensitive
Fixed stretchy banner header in Edit profile

Primal @primal

Primal 2.5 for iOS is now live — with our brand-new streaming video player. Watch it in action below!

0xchat @0xchat

The 0xchat-lite version has been rebranded as XChat(for Nostr) — now available on the App Store, with Google Play coming soon.

Compared to 0xchat, XChat features a simpler design and streamlined functionality, with a stronger focus on privacy. It’s ideal for closed, private groups such as family and close friends. Features:

End-to-End Encryption with MLS protocol
Amber/Nostr bunker login support
Encrypted media sharing
Secure local data storage
Two-way chat/message deletion
Native iOS & Android UI
Privacy-friendly push notifications
Independent Circles storage

Nostur v1.23 @n0st…k6h0

New in this version:

Voice Messages (Yaks): record a short voice message
Improve sync / already seen between iCloud devices
Button to expand long posts in feed
Search now also searches in previous names
Added extra bookmark color
Many bug fixes and performance improvements

Formstr @Form*

You can now use your local AI to analyse form responses, bring up insights and extract important data.
You can now create custom urls for your forms like
WE HAVE SECTIONS NOW!
Plus a bunch of other updates

Amber 4.0.0 @Amber

Refactor everything to use the new quartz update
Fix reconnection issues
Kill switch feature

ZEUS @xnf0…lpr5

For the bold: ZEUS v0.11.4-alpha1 builds are now available for testing.

LND: Watchtower support
Pay to hybrid Lightning addresses (BIP-353/BOLT-12 + LNURL-pay)
Swaps: restore swaps from seed
Peers: sorting and filtering
Animated QRs: set animation speed
BIP-321 invoice parsing

Citrine 0.8.2 @Citrine

Close connections when it’s sending invalid frames
Better handling of disconnections
refactors how WebSocket connections and subscriptions are managed
Support for mute
Always accepts ephemeral events
Fix auth command results
Make protected events readable by anyone
Fix EOSE message
Allow localhost access to bypass nip 70 checks
Dispatch events to subscriptions from the same connection it came from

Stacks 1.1.0 @Team Soapbox

Stacks 1.1.0 has arrived and DevRel @Derek Ross is here to give a quick tutorial on what’s new, like slash commands. Be your own OpenRouter and pick the LLM you want, right from your terminal. It’s easy to switch your LLMs back and forth, too!

nostr.build @nxy4…avr7

We’ve been releasing a ton of new features lately:

Nostr.land Premium Relay Account Feature and partnership
10GB+ Large file upload support for Accounts, pause and continue uploads
Analytics dashboard (analytics.nostr.build)
New Gallery View Free and Paid (gallery.nostr.build)
Blossom integration (blossom.band)
Primal Support and Media Mirroring
$1.50 Puritan Account (nostr.build/plans)
Pegged Acct prices to the $ ($100k) making prices cheaper and more consistent
Kind 1222 Voice sharing support

Bitmap @scvy…68d8

Spam filter toggle: A modest attempt to filter out repetitive and true noise spam.
Login button: Login to your existing nostr account, regenerate your ephemeral identity, log out if so desired.
Right click/long-press to teleport to geohash on the map

FROSTR @bitcoinplebdev

Just shipped igloo-server v0.1.8!

Replaced SSE w/ WebSocket (auth + auto-reconnect)
Node health checks + auto-restart w/ backoff
Status API now includes live metrics
Docs, OpenAPI & release automation overhauled

Sats Tracker @tuma

Sats Tracker v0.4.0 is now available on! This version fixes a couple of small bugs and bring the possibility to see your spending statistics per month.

Added new expense categories: ‘AI Agent’ and ‘Games’.
Added a new income category: ‘Cashback’.
Added possibility to navigate through months in the Home screen.
Added LICENCE
Fixed a bug that prevented an income tx to be added in case the amount was more than the available balance.
Improved visualization of the Home screen.

Samiz v0.0.6-alpha @Samiz

Include own user-agent in local relay connections
armeabi-v7a and arm64-v8a architectures now available to download

NYM v1.5.5 @Luxas

New: added NSEC login
New: added /zap command
Hotfix: better failed relay connection handling
Hotfix: saving settings no longer nukes persistent identity profile

PurrMint @heatherm

Purrmint v0.0.9 is now live on

Added functionality to delete mint service and clean up resources
Fixed some crash issues

WhiteNoise @White Noise

Search & Discovery

Comprehensive chat search –> with message highlighting for finding conversations quickly
Chat list search –> to navigate growing contact lists effortlessly
Enhanced QR code functionality –> including login via QR code and improved safety with npub validation

User Profiles & Contact Management.

Enhanced user profiles –> with copy npub functionality and better group member views
Improved group management –> allowing admins to remove users and add members to existing groups
Streamlined connection flows –> with redesigned profile sheets

Network & Relay Management

Real-time relay status monitoring
Add/edit relay options with validation
Pull-to-refresh functionality
Improved relay selection based on the outbox model

UI/UX Improvements

From consistent paste/copy buttons across inputs to fixed message content wrapping, scrollable bottom sheets, and enhanced reaction displays.
They also updated splash screens for both iOS and Android with proper dark mode support.

Stability & Bug Fixes

Major metadata cleanup –> standardizing on displayName throughout the app
Authentication fixes –> for login flows and profile creation
Relay management improvements –> fixing issues where existing relay lists were getting overwritten
Enhanced error handling –> with proper mounted checks to prevent widget disposal errors

Vlogstr @Patrick

The mobile version of vlogstr.com is now available for Android. First Release Features

Sign in with Amber → access your Home/Following feed.
Swipe up and down to browse vlogs from friends.
Double tap (or tap the heart) to like, plus comment, zap, or share a favorite video to Nostr as a kind1 note.
Share feature supports multiple options, including direct mp4 sharing (with wider NIP-71 support coming in the future).

Explore & Discover

Discover tab: a global feed of new vlogs.
Note: this is a completely public global feed with no moderation, so be cautious—some content may be sensitive. More moderation features will be added later.

Video Uploads

Record directly in the app or upload from your device.
Videos are published to the Blossom server, then you’ll be guided to set your title and description.

Creator Dashboard

A creator’s dashboard on the home bar lets you see your published videos and basic analytics.
A settings page is also available, though many options are still unimplemented and will be added in future updates.

Nostriches Global Meet Ups

Recently, several Nostr events have been hosted in different countries.

Bitcoin Asia 2025 successfully took place on August 28–29, 2025, at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC). As one of the largest and most influential Bitcoin gatherings in Asia, the conference featured main stage keynotes, enterprise Bitcoin workshops, hundreds of exhibiting companies, a digital art gallery, and official limited-edition merchandise. Speakers included @stephanlivera, @Aaron van Wirdum, @calvadev⚡️, @xtsc…kk5s, among others.

The 3rd Nostr & Bitcoin Asia Meetup was also held on August 29 in Hong Kong, focusing on the theme of building free expression and financial freedom. The event featured two panel discussions: “Nostr in Asia: Builders & Backers” and “Bitcoin Asia: Community & Academic Innovation.” Panelists included @xtsc…kk5s, @WendyDing, @teruko, @3lpn…rx7d, @Kostro, @fpql…qwcz, among others.

Here is the upcoming Nostr event that you might want to check out.

The Bitcoin Indonesia Conference 2025 & Bitcoin Week Bali will take place on September 5, 2025, at Bitcoin House Bali in Canggu, accompanied by a full week of Bitcoin-themed activities from September 1–8. Centered on education, community, and local adoption, the event will feature keynote talks, panel discussions, workshops, as well as cultural and sports experiences. Speakers include @dusan @Kostro @s05p…eyhe @efenigson @Dea Rezkitha @win @Piriya ⚡🟧 @jacklee @raj @Shaun @sondreb @wingman and others, all committed to advancing Bitcoin education and adoption in Indonesia and across Asia.