The Difference Between Bitcoin Cash And Bitcoin

The Difference Between Bitcoin Cash And Bitcoin

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) may share a similar name with the original Bitcoin (BTC), but the two cryptos aren’t the same. Here’s how they differ.

What Is Bitcoin Cash?

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) is a cryptocurrency that is considered to be a “fork” of the original Bitcoin.

It was created in August of 2017 as a way to make transactions easier to process by increasing the size of the blocks on the blockchain.

Like Bitcoin, BCH has a 21 million supply cap and shares many technical similarities to the OG cryptocurrency, with the major differences being philosophical.

To simplify an extremely complex idea, BCH is essentially what Bitcoin was always meant to be – a peer-to-peer cryptocurrency that is primarily used for daily transactions.

However, as the price surged to tens of thousands of dollars per coin, this obviously became near-impossible to process, thus turning BTC into an investment, rather than a convenient currency to use.

And so, Bitcoin Cash was born.

What’s it valued at?

At the time of publishing, one BCH is worth $660.09, according to CoinMarketCap.

bitcoin cash
Image: CoinMarketCap

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Bitcoin Cash ABC VS Bitcoin Cash SV

But it gets a little more complex.

BHC itself was forked in November 2018, where it was split into Bitcoin Cash ABC and Bitcoin Cash SV (Satoshi Vision).

ABC is the standard BHC we refer to now.

Basically, ABC is an updated version of the original client, with a few changes to the blockchain like Canonical Transition Ordering Route (CTOR), which basically allows transactions to be placed in a specific order.

Meanwhile, SV is now run by Craig Wright – the Australian man who claims to be the original Satoshi Nakamoto, but this is yet to be proven.

Is It The Same As Bitcoin?

Short answer? No.

One Bitcoin is worth $44,449.84, while one Bitcoin Cash is worth a measly $660.09. So basically, one BCH is worth 0.015BTC. However, the prices aren’t linked.

The major difference is the block size, which impacts how many transactions can be processed per second. While Bitcoin has a maximum block size of 1MB, its counterpart can reach up to 32MB.

This means that while only 7 BTC transactions can be processed per second, as many as 200 BCH transactions can go through in the same time period.

Overall, this makes transactions quicker, easier and cheaper for users.


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