Gate.io Blog bitcoin vs bitcoin cash | difference between bitcoin and bitcoin cash

bitcoin vs bitcoin cash | difference between bitcoin and bitcoin cash

05 July 14:30

While Bitcoin is by far the dominant crypto coin in the space, it is not without flaws. Having introduced the world to what a blockchain is, Bitcoin has gone on to become the frontrunner in a $2 trillion crypto market. However, when it comes down to how the coin works, there have been major disagreements among the community. One such debate is regarding Bitcoin Cash.

What is Bitcoin Cash?

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) is a hard fork of Bitcoin. That means it is an offshoot of BTC but has its own blockchain and working protocols. Bitcoin Cash was created by a group of people who were dissatisfied with Bitcoin’s implementation of SegWit (segregated witness).

SegWit was implemented into Bitcoin to reduce the size of each entry that is written onto a block, thus reducing overall block size. The way, this is done is by removing the signature data from each transaction and adding all of it as a separate block. According to estimates, signature data makes up 65 per cent of all block data.

Some within the community argued that SegWit was not a viable solution and limiting block sizes was not the way to proceed. They were also of the opinion that Bitcoin’s direction was deviating from Satoshi Nakamoto’s vision. Hence, Bitcoin Cash was born.

Differences Between Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash

Block Size

Bitcoin has a block size of 1 MB, In contrast, Bitcoin Cash was created to support a block size of 8 MB. This means that verifications on BCH are faster, ensuring shorter wait times for people using the blockchain to transfer money. As of 2018, the maximum block size of Bitcoin Cash has been increased to 32 MB.

Algorithm

Bitcoin Cash uses a completely different hashing algorithm to that of Bitcoin. The coin also implements a replay and wipeout safety mechanism in case there is a hard fork of Bitcoin Cash in the future. This would allow both chains to coexist with minimal disruption.

Transaction Fees

As mentioned above, transactions on the Bitcoin Cash network are faster due to the larger block size. Consequently, every transaction requires lower fees as the network isn’t excessively strained. On the other hand, although Bitcoin is the more popular coin of the two, transaction times on the Bitcoin chain averages 10 minutes and you could incur significantly higher fees.

Hashrate

Bitcoin Cash has a total hash rate of 1.14 EH/s, whereas Bitcoin’s is 99.7 EH/s. EH/s stands for exa-hashes per second. One exa-hash is equal to 10 raised to the power 18 hashes. This number multiplied by 1.14 or 99.7 gives the number of hash verifications that these networks can perform in one second. As is evident from this comparison, there are a lot more miners for Bitcoin than Bitcoin Cash.

Price and Market Cap

Due to its explosive popularity, Bitcoin currently stands at $34000, having touched an all-time high of $65000 previously. As such it is head and shoulders above Bitcoin Cash, which goes for $517 per coin at the time of writing. By extension, while Bitcoin has a total market cap of $636.61 billion, Bitcoin Cash is at $8.87 billion.

Conclusion

Both Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash have their spaces in the crypto world but Bitcoin continues to dominate the market. Regardless, if the improvements found in Bitcoin Cash interest you, you can buy Bitcoin cash as well as Bitcoin on gate.io, an exchange that provides these coins and several more.

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