Before we can go ahead to explain what Proof of Stake (PoS) is, let's first and foremost understand what is Consensus Mechanism.
Whenever one says by consensus, it means that they've come to agree on something. Let's imagine a scenario, where four out of seven persons decide on going to a particular show, that way consensus has been achieved because majority has won the vote.
Now reverting back to Blockchain Technology, consensus means that up to 51% of the nodes on the blockchain network agree on the global state of the network. So, Consensus mechanism also known as consensus protocol or consensus algorithms provides a platform for distributed systems to work together, this way they stay secure.
Proof of Work (PoW) and Proof of Stake (PoS) are the two most common types of Consensus mechanism.
In another article we'll discuss about Proof of Work (PoW) and how it is achieved; but today we'll discuss about proof-of-stake (PoS).
Proof of Stake (PoS) is a type of consensus algorithm or mechanism that enables networks on the blockchain achieve well distributed consensus. Put it this way, the intention behind proof-of-stake is to divide the voting power of a miner from its computing power i.e. the higher the percentage of token possessed by a miner, that determines their mining power. Therefore, the larger his or her share of the total amount of tokens the more likely this miner is picked to mine the next block.
Nevertheless, the PoS mechanism makes use of a random algorithm for consensus building, except for some other cases where other factors can come into play.
CONCLUSION
The Proof of Stake (PoS) mechanism comes with more added advantage compared to the Proof of Work (PoW) mechanism due to the following reasons:
Better energy consumption.
Lower barriers to entry i.e. one doesn't require too many hardware unlike PoW.
Stronger immunity to centralization, as this will lead to additional nodes in the blockchain ecosystem.
Stronger support for shard chains - a key upgrade in scaling the Ethereum network.