Block.number - how to fetch it correctly

Question

I want to get the current block number of all blocks. If I run return block.number it only returns me the number of blocks since the last deploy.

Why is it like that?

Answer 1

I think you are using the Remix VM environment.

This environment is in memory and Remix only generates new blocks when someone deploys something or sends a transaction. Therefore you are getting the latest generated block when you deployed the contract

to have what you want you can download and start Ganache and then connect Ganache to remix (limitation: i think you will not be able to debug transactions)

Remember to disable "auto mine" in Ganache, otherwise, it will work as Remix did

Update: there is also another way (commands using the console) to change the time and this will generate empty new blocks. but this is another question :D