How do Bitcoin Ordinals work?
Bitcoin Ordinals assign a unique identifier number to the satoshis in any given bitcoin. Bitcoin developer Casey Rodarmor introduced the idea in 2023 and used a feature of Bitcoin’s 2021 Taproot upgrade, which allowed for data to be stored directly on the Bitcoin blockchain to make it happen.
Ordinals work by making each unit of a single bitcoin uniquely identifiable. When a bitcoin is mined, all one million satoshis are assigned a number in the order of their creation. Satoshis can be tracked individually across multiple wallets, meaning you can spend BTC and still keep track of individual satoshis or Ordinals.