ton-adoption

Posted on Jun 3 • Originally published at ton-adoption.xyz on Jun 3

TON Storage and TON Proxy in 2026: TON's Decentralized Web

#basics #tonstorage #tonproxy #tonsites

TON Storage and TON Proxy are two building blocks of the decentralized web that are rarely mentioned because only ~1% of TON users touch them. But they close an important gap: they let you fully decentralize a website — from hosting to access — without depending on Cloudflare, AWS, or DNS providers.

This piece covers what they are, how they work, what they cost, and where they show up in 2026.

2026 context: after Toncoin’s rebrand to Gram (June 1, 2026), TON Storage payments are denominated in Gram. See our main rebrand explainer.

What TON Storage is, technically

TON Storage is a distributed file storage protocol on top of the TON network. Architecture:

Bag (the file container)

A file (or directory) is split into 128 KB chunks and packed into a bag — a torrent-like structure:

Each bag has a unique bag-ID (256-bit SHA-256 of the Merkle root)
The bag holds a manifest with metadata (filename, size, chunk hashes)
Chunks are distributed across storage providers via a DHT

Storage providers

Any TON node can become a storage provider:

Deposits Gram as collateral in a dedicated smart contract
Stores chunks locally
Receives periodic Gram payouts from the file owner for uptime + retrieval

Providers compete on price and uptime — the market is saturated, prices have fallen from $0.50 per GB/month in 2022 to $0.05–0.10 in 2026.

Addressing and retrieval

Client knows the bag-ID of the file
Looks up storage providers holding the chunks via DHT
Downloads chunks in parallel, verifies SHA-256, reassembles the original file
If a provider is unavailable, switches to another (replication solves centralization)

What TON Proxy is

TON Proxy is an anonymous access layer for TON Sites — the Tor-equivalent. Architecturally:

TON DNS resolves .ton to an ADNL address (Abstract Datagram Network Layer)
TON Proxy node — any TON node that tunnels TCP/HTTP traffic over ADNL
Client (Tonkeeper, MyTonWallet, Tonutils Proxy) issues HTTP to .ton, tunneled via Proxy → ADNL → TON Site

Pros:

Anonymity — the client doesn’t reveal its IP to the destination (only the Proxy node sees it)
Censorship resistance — .ton domains aren’t controlled by ICANN, can’t be revoked
Web3-native — integrated with TON wallets for micro-payments

Cons:

Latency — each ADNL hop adds 50–200ms
Browser support — requires either a TON wallet or the Tonutils Proxy extension
Throughput — not suitable for video / heavy graphics (storage providers aren’t streaming-optimized)

The TON decentralized web stack

Layer	What	TON option
Domain	Names	TON DNS (`.ton`)
DNS	Resolution	TON DNS resolver
Hosting	Files	TON Storage
Network	Routing	ADNL
Privacy	Anonymity	TON Proxy
Payment	Micro-payments	Gram (ex-Toncoin)

A self-contained stack — theoretically you can build a full site without any Web2 calls (DNS, hosting, CDN).

Pricing and Gram tokenomics

TON Storage pricing 2026

Tier	Cost / GB / month	Use case
Cold (1 copy)	~$0.02–0.04	Backups, archives
Standard (3 copies)	$0.05–0.10	Static sites
High-availability (6+ copies)	$0.20–0.40	Production-critical data
Pinned (gateway pin)	$0.10–0.20	NFT metadata

For comparison:

AWS S3 Standard: $0.023 per GB/month + bandwidth ($0.09/GB out)
IPFS pinning (Pinata): free up to 1 GB, then $20/month per 100 GB
Arweave: one-time ~$5–10 per GB for 200+ years

TON Storage wins on cost for active access (bandwidth included) but not for cold archive.

Payments in Gram

A storage provider publishes a tariff in Gram per GB per month
The owner creates a storage contract = tariff × duration
The contract holds Gram in escrow, pays the provider periodically
If a provider fails proof-of-storage submission, the owner can claim a refund

Who uses TON Storage in 2026

Confirmed use cases

TON Foundation docs — part of ton.org documentation is hosted on TON Storage (with a Cloudflare fallback)
Fragment.com — NFT-username and TON-number metadata
Notcoin legacy assets — static assets for the app (after the wind-down of active development)
Some Mini Apps — experimental user-generated content

Where it’s NOT used (yet)

Mainstream Mini Apps (Hamster Kombat, DOGS) — traditional AWS/Cloudflare
DEXes (STON.fi, DeDust) — front-end on Vercel/Cloudflare Pages
TON Connect dApps — usually Web2 hosting
User-facing products — TON Storage is still too rough for mass UX

How to use TON Storage yourself

Hosting a static site (5 steps)

# 1. Build the static site
npm run build
# → dist/ with HTML/CSS/JS

# 2. Create a bag via tonutils-storage CLI
tonutils-storage create dist/ --description "My TON site"
# → bag-ID: ABCD1234...

# 3. Upload the bag to TON Storage
tonutils-storage upload ABCD1234 \
  --providers  \
  --tariff 

# 4. Register a .ton domain via Fragment
# fragment.com → buy .ton

# 5. Bind bag-ID to the domain via TON DNS
ton-dns set mysite.ton --storage ABCD1234

After that, the site opens from:

Tonkeeper / MyTonWallet (in-app browsers)
Tonutils Proxy extension in regular Chrome
The ton.site/mysite.ton gateway (privacy is reduced)

TON Proxy: viewing without hosting

If you just want to view TON Sites:

Tonkeeper — open the in-app browser, enter .ton
MyTonWallet — same
Tonutils Proxy Chrome extension — install, type .ton as a regular URL
Mobile TON Proxy app — a dedicated app from the TON Foundation

Typical latency: 200–400ms on load (vs 100–150ms for a Cloudflare site).

Problems and limitations

1. Speed

TON Proxy is slower than a CDN. Fine for static; not OK for video. Not suitable for real-time (gaming, video calls).

2. Adoption

TON Sites count is on the order of under 5000 in 2026. People actively opening .ton — tens of thousands. Still niche, not mainstream.

3. Search-engine indexing

TON Sites aren’t indexed by Google/Yandex directly (no crawler over ADNL). The workaround — publish the site both on TON Sites and a regular domain (hybrid). Most projects opt for this hybrid.

4. Mobile UX

Opening a .ton site on iPhone without Tonkeeper is impossible. On Android, Tonutils Proxy app works, but some features need root.

5. Provider trust

Despite cryptographic proofs, in practice you trust that storage providers won’t disappear. Active providers: 200–300 across the network, insufficient for serious enterprise.

Future of TON Storage under MTONGA

Within Durov’s MTONGA program (see the full breakdown), TON Storage may get a boost:

If step 5 is Telegram-product integration, native hosting of Telegram sticker packs / NFT metadata via TON Storage becomes plausible
Step 6 (scaling) may improve throughput (Catchain 2.0 sub-second finality already accelerates proof-of-storage cycles)
Step 7 — if it includes the Bitcoin bridge Teleport, deeper storage integration with cross-chain assets is possible

Bottom line

TON Storage and TON Proxy are functionally working decentralized layers with a real Gram economy. But adoption is still low — these are technologies for those who specifically need decentralization (NFT metadata, censorship-resistant content, anonymity-focused projects).

For most Web3 builders, a hybrid (Web2 hosting + TON Storage backup) is rational. The full decentralized stack is for enthusiasts and politically/regulatory-sensitive scenarios.

For depth, see:

DEV Community