Rounding out our list is a technology that was supposed to upend industries far and wide: blockchain (and its most famous application, cryptocurrencies). In the late 2010s, blockchain was hyped as the solution to everything – a fundamental innovation as profound as the internet. Enthusiasts claimed it would decentralize finance, eliminate middlemen, secure supply chains, enable self-sovereign digital identity, and even reinvent the web (the whole “Web3” movement). Bitcoin’s wild price surges and the 2017 ICO boom made headlines, fuelling a gold rush mentality. By 2021, a new frenzy emerged around NFTs (non-fungible tokens), selling digital art and collectibles for eye-watering prices and heralded as the future of entertainment and ownership. The expectation was that by 2025, blockchain would be as ubiquitous as databases, powering countless mainstream applications and perhaps even replacing fiat money with crypto in some places.
Reality Check: While blockchain technology has found niches and crypto remains in existence, the overall hype has fizzled dramatically by 2025. Gartner’s renowned “Hype Cycle” analysis in 2024 showed most blockchain-related innovations sliding into the “trough of disillusionment.” NFTs, Web3, decentralized exchanges, blockchain IoT – all of them had passed their peak hype and were waning in enthusiasm. In fact, interest faded so much that Gartner suggested it might not even bother publishing a dedicated blockchain hype cycle anymore. As one senior Gartner analyst put it, “Blockchain technologies just really haven’t hit the heights that were promised.” Despite over a decade of development, the grand visions largely failed to materialize at scale. The sentiment in many boardrooms shifted from curiosity to fatigue: “C-suite and board interest in blockchain has taken a nosedive, replaced by demands that CIOs invest in AI,” notes Gartner’s Adrian Leow. In other words, blockchain is no longer the shiny object in tech – AI took that crown – and budgets have moved on accordingly.
Certainly, it’s not all dead: Bitcoin and Ethereum are still running, and cryptocurrencies have an avid user base. Some financial services have adopted blockchain for specific use cases (like interbank settlements or trade finance), and there are enterprise pilots for supply chain tracking, etc. But these are isolated successes rather than the wholesale transformation once predicted. A lot of the excitement was siphoned off by the volatile and often scandalous journey of crypto itself. The late 2021 crypto market peak was followed by a harsh “crypto winter” in 2022-2023, punctuated by major collapses (Terra/Luna stablecoin crash, the FTX exchange implosion) that eroded trust in the space. To many on the outside, blockchain became synonymous with speculative bubbles and scams rather than groundbreaking innovation. “The blockchain hype starting in the late 2010s has nearly died, replaced by intense interest in AI and hurt by sketchy cryptocurrency and NFT schemes,” writes CIO magazine, summarizing expert views. Indeed, the implosion of overpriced NFT markets and the proliferation of fraudulent crypto projects cast a long shadow, making businesses and consumers more cautious.
What Went Wrong? Part of the issue is that blockchain was a solution seeking problems – and in many cases, existing technologies worked fine. Not every database needs to be distributed and trustless. Many touted use cases (like blockchain for grocery supply chains or for personal health records) ran into the complexity of integrating with real-world data and legal frameworks, where blockchain added little beyond buzz. Some early enterprise blockchain projects failed due to a “lack of clear objectives and use-case” and a “poor understanding of the technology,” according to industry analyses of deployment failures (dltledgers). Essentially, companies jumped on the bandwagon without a solid reason, and those projects fizzled out.
Blockchain technology itself also had limitations that slowed adoption. Scalability was a big one – early blockchains like Ethereum could only handle a handful of transactions per second, far too few for, say, a global payments network. There have been improvements (Layer-2 networks, new consensus mechanisms), but by the time solutions matured, much of the hype wave had passed. Interoperability proved tough too; dozens of separate blockchains emerged, but getting them to work together or integrate with legacy systems is ongoing work. And let’s not forget regulatory uncertainty – governments worldwide cracked down on crypto in various ways (banning, restricting, or just creating legal ambiguity) which made large corporations hesitant to pivot to blockchain-based systems for core business.
Crucially, the hype might have been simply too far ahead of reality. Gartner’s Leow reminds us: “Most of the value from blockchain won’t happen for another five years or so…This is not an overnight sensation.” In other words, the timeline was misjudged. It’s possible that by the late 2020s, some blockchain applications (perhaps in combination with AI or other tech) will flourish. But by 2025, the technology has settled into a more subdued phase of incremental progress and niche uses, rather than the world-changing force some predicted.
In summary, blockchain and crypto provide a textbook example of the hype cycle’s boom and bust. The initial euphoria gave way to hard lessons, but that doesn’t mean the story is over – it means the reset has happened. A quieter, more pragmatic approach is now taking hold: focusing on where decentralized ledgers truly add value and integrating them “with other emerging technologies” (for example, using blockchain to ensure data integrity in AI processes). For now, though, blockchain’s grand revolution is postponed to a later date, and 2025 finds the tech world largely moving on to other frontiers.
Lessons from the Hype Machine
Looking across these examples – VR/AR, the metaverse, flying cars, 5G, self-driving cars, blockchain – a common theme emerges: technological change is usually more gradual and challenging than initial hype suggests. In each case, genuine innovation was at play, and none of these technologies are outright “failures” – VR does deliver amazing experiences to a niche audience, 5G does provide faster connectivity, autonomous driving features are improving safety, etc. But the gulf between the promises made at peak hype and the reality by 2025 has been wide.
Why does this happen? Partly, it’s human nature and the business of marketing – we love a good story about the future, and companies/investors have incentives to generate excitement. It’s also a function of the Gartner hype cycle: a new technology often sees over-enthusiasm and inflated expectations, followed by a crash of disappointment when those expectations aren’t immediately met. Eventually, a more productive, realistic use of the technology tends to develop. We can see that trajectory in many of the cases above. As TechBooky’s research highlights, many of these innovations are now in that sober middle phase – out of the spotlight, but quietly advancing.
The cautionary tales of these hypes that fell short by 2025 remind us to maintain a healthy scepticism with each “next big thing.” Breakthroughs do happen, but usually not exactly on schedule or in the form predicted. It’s instructive to recall that even the internet itself took decades to evolve from a niche academic network to the world-changing force it is today. Artificial intelligence – which is currently riding high on the hype wave – may very well face its own hurdles and setbacks in the coming years, even as it transforms industries.
From the TechBooky perspective, the key takeaway is that technology’s progress is not a straight line upward. Some hype will inevitably fizzle, but each failure often yields lessons that spur the next attempt. Today’s “failed” VR experiment might be laying the groundwork for a better form of spatial computing tomorrow. The metaverse concept could re-emerge when the infrastructure and user appetite are truly ready, perhaps in a different guise. In the meantime, separating realistic potential from marketing fantasy is crucial for industry leaders and consumers alike.
By 2025, the world is not exactly what the futurists imagined five or ten years ago – no ubiquitous VR meetings, no highways filled with robo-taxis or skies thick with personal drones, no blockchain-based world economy. But understanding why these hypes didn’t pan out on schedule is valuable. It tempers our futurism with practicality, and that balance is important. As we look ahead, the lesson isn’t to avoid bold visions – it’s to approach them with clear eyes and adaptive expectations. Technology will continue to advance and surprise us, just often not in the ways we first hype it up to be.
Paul Balo is the founder of TechBooky and a highly skilled wireless communications professional with a strong background in cloud computing, offering extensive experience in designing, implementing, and managing wireless communication systems.
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