Why does bridging to ETH / BSC / BTC take long?
Transactions on Telos are very fast, and regular Telos users may not expect the slow transactions on other chains when they use a cross-chain bridge.
You may find that certain bridges, such as the pNetwork Bridge, could take hours to bridge your tokens to or from other chains such as BSC, ETH or BTC.
When you bridge tokens between two chains, there is a transaction on both chains - the sending and receiving side.
Transactions on Telos are very fast, and regular Telos users may not expect the slow transactions on other chains when they use a cross-chain bridge.
The delay is most likely not caused by the Telos side of the transaction, but by the ETH / BSC / BTC side of the transaction.
Why are ETH / BTC / BSC transactions slower?
These chains work on a proof-of-work (POW) mechanism, which is a slower infrastructure. Telos works on a delegated proof-of-stake (DPOS) mechanism which is faster, far more environmentally friendly than POW because it consumes less energy and processing power [1].
POS is a lot more scalable than POW networks because of vastly improved transaction speeds and negligible transaction costs.
You can read more about proof-of-work and proof-of-stake in these articles:
Blockchain Development Platforms Part 1
Blockchain Development Platforms Part 2
Can I speed up my transaction?
Yes, you have the option to speed up the transaction on most platforms. “Speeding up” a transaction issues a new transaction on Ethereum that has a higher gas price than the transaction that was originally sent. Since the new transaction has a higher gas price, it is more likely to be included in a block. Only one of the transactions (the original and the "sped up") will be accepted. Speeding up a transaction that is transferring funds to the bridge is safe. However, the user interface will not be aware of the new transaction, meaning you may not see the confirmations in the user interface [2].
On which platforms can I bridge to ETH/BSC and others?
The most up-to-date list can be found here.
Sources:
[1] Yknot Blockchain Solutions. 2021. Blockchain Development Platforms. Available at: https://y-knot.io/blockchain-development-platforms-part-1/
[2] https://docs.avax.network/learn/avalanche-bridge-faq#speed-up-transaction