Cardano is set to pursue significant growth in 2026, building on its 2025 achievements, including the Voltaire Era hard fork and the Hydra v1.0 rollout, which enhanced scalability. The network's Midnight project saw its native token, NIGHT, reach a billion-dollar valuation. In 2026, Cardano plans to implement the Ouroboros Leios upgrade, aiming to increase throughput to between 1,000 and 10,000 transactions per second. The network also plans to integrate Bitcoin DeFi, launch the Midnight mainnet, and establish stablecoin and oracle connections. Further, Tier-1 integrations from the Pentad are expected to enhance Cardano's ecosystem.