BIP Proposal: Define Bitcoin Subunits as Satoshis/Sats

The proposed Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP) is aimed at standardizing the terminology for the smallest unit of Bitcoin. This informational BIP seeks official recognition for "satoshi" as the singular term and "satoshis" for plural, referring to 1/100,000,000th of a bitcoin, with "sats" as its abbreviation. Despite the widespread use of these terms within the Bitcoin community, there currently exists no formal standard, leading to inconsistencies in their usage across various platforms including applications, documentation, and communications.

This initiative to formalize the terminology does not alter the underlying unit structure of Bitcoin but rather aims to standardize the already commonly used nomenclature. It's important to distinguish this proposal from prior BIPs such as BIP-176, which suggested a "Bits Denomination," and BIP-177 that proposed redefining Bitcoin's base unit. Unlike these proposals, the current BIP focuses solely on formalizing the existing terms without suggesting any change to the denomination scheme itself.

For further details, the BIP has been made available for review at https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/pull/1841. The proposer is open to feedback and suggestions from the community to refine and enhance the proposal.