Peer-to-Peer Networks
A peer-to-peer (P2P) network is one where computers talk directly to each other rather than through a central server.
In depth
In a client-server model everyone connects to one company’s servers; if those go down, the service stops. In a P2P network every participant is both a client and a server, relaying data to neighbours, so the network keeps running as long as some nodes are online. Cryptocurrency nodes gossip transactions and blocks to each other this way.
Why it matters
P2P architecture is what makes crypto networks resilient to outages and censorship.