How is the private ledger Ripple offers central banks different from the public XRP Ledger?

The full answer

What Ripple says its central bank ledger is

On March 4, 2021, Ripple said it was “piloting a private version of the public, open-source XRP Ledger” for central banks issuing digital currencies [1]. The same post said this CBDC Private Ledger is based on the same blockchain technology that powers the XRP Ledger [1]. Ripple’s May 18, 2023 release kept that description for its renamed CBDC Platform. It said the platform is “built on a new private ledger underpinned by the XRPL’s core energy-efficient technology” [3].

So the two share software. They are different ledgers.

Who can see and run each ledger

Ripple’s 2021 post set out the contrast itself. It said most blockchains are public ledgers, “visible to all and updated by a broad network of validators”, and that a central bank needs more privacy and control than that, so it would likely pick a private ledger [1]. Each central bank, Ripple wrote, has “complete sovereignty and ability to customize” the ledger to its own privacy and policy rules [1].

Ripple went further on December 13, 2023. It said each central bank creates its own private version of the ledger and governs it, and may run the validation network, admit chosen institutions, or outsource operations to authorized parties [4].

The public ledger works differently. XRPL.org’s About page says the XRP Ledger is a decentralized, public blockchain and not a private one owned by Ripple [5]. Who runs its validators is covered in does the default validator list make the XRP Ledger centralized. Regulated institutions use that public ledger too: Ledger Insights reported on July 31, 2026 that tokens in an Aviva Investors UCITS fund are issued on the public XRP Ledger [6].

What the two ledgers share technically

Ripple’s 2021 post said transactions on the private ledger are verified by the same consensus protocol the XRP Ledger uses [1]; how that protocol works without mining is explained in how XRP is kept secure. Ripple also said in that post that the private ledger “will handle tens of thousands of transactions per second” at first. That is Ripple’s own target from March 2021, not a measured result [1].

The May 18, 2023 release said issuers such as central banks manage their currency’s full life cycle, from minting to destruction, using the XRP Ledger’s built-in multi-signing [3]. It listed wholesale and retail CBDCs on a private ledger, as well as stablecoin issuance, as use cases [3].

Where XRP fits

Ripple’s March 4, 2021 post said XRP “can be leveraged as a neutral bridge asset” between CBDCs and other currencies [1]. The wording is “can”. As of October 13, 2026, Ripple has not said in these 2021 and 2023 statements that a central bank must hold or use XRP to run the platform.

Which central banks have used it

Ripple announced on September 22, 2021 that Bhutan’s Royal Monetary Authority would pilot a digital currency on the CBDC Private Ledger [2]. Ripple said the authority would pilot retail, cross-border and wholesale payments for a digital Ngultrum in phases [2]. That release also described the private ledger as “based on the public, open-source XRP Ledger” [2]. More on that pilot is in what Ripple is doing with Bhutan’s central bank.

The case against reading this as XRP Ledger adoption

As of October 13, 2026, the descriptions of the private ledger come from Ripple itself. A central bank pilot on a private ledger does not run on the public XRP Ledger and adds no activity to it. Ripple’s December 13, 2023 post calls the setup a “decentralized operating model”, yet in the same passage it says the central bank governs the ledger and can run the validation network itself [4]. The link between separate CBDC ledgers was still at the planning stage in Ripple’s own words: its March 4, 2021 post said Ripple was “working on a fresh approach” for a network of CBDC Ledgers [1]. Whether bank-focused uses like this carry weight for XRP at all is argued in whether the XRP bull case is simply that banks will use it.